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SEAWATCH August 2001 Continued Issue #88

Table of Contents:

• Net Ban Enforcement -- some improvements, but problems persist
• New Pompano Regulations May Not Curtail Illegal Netting
• FWC Supports Restrictions on Bottom Longlines in Gulf Grouper Fisheries
  —Gulf Council Delays Action
• Page One Articles
  • CCA Florida Preparing for Avalanche of "No Fishing Zone" Proposals
  • Defending Conservation--the legal defense of our marine resources
  • CCA Lawsuit Reopens Gulf Closed Areas to Surface Trolling

Net Ban Enforcement
-some improvements, but problems persist

by Rick Farren

Last August [2000], CCA Florida began a Net Ban Enforcement Special Project to seek solutions for reducing ongoing violations of Florida’s ban on gillnets. Although the project initially started in Southwest Florida, it quickly became apparent that problems with enforcement of the net ban extended statewide. From a well-documented lack of on-the-water enforcement resources, to weak prosecutions and civil remedies, the cards remain stacked in favor of the poacher.

Nevertheless, there have been some positive actions, especially on the part of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s (FWC) Division of Law Enforcement, which has initiated a more pro-active approach to reducing netting abuses. For instance, last winter, for the first time, the FWC assembled a special task force to follow the mullet roe season down the Gulf coast. The result was an increased number of arrests and an increase in the amount of gillnets that were confiscated and removed from Florida’s waters.

Another example occurred last April, in the Panhandle counties of Franklin and Wakulla, where the FWC anticipated the arrival of pompano season with an aerial sweep of the region. Officers searched for hidden gillnets that are routinely retrieved, used to illegally catch fish, then hidden again while the catch is carried to the dock with only a castnet on board.

In one week, officers confiscated seven gillnets with a total length of more than 4,500 feet and a 2,100-foot trammel net made up of three walls of monofilament. One of the gillnets they discovered had been abandoned and was full of dead fish.

Another positive step toward better enforcement occurred earlier this year when the 2001 Legislature, through the leadership of a number of key legislators [see article on Legislative Conservation Awards ], appropriated $3.8 million for the hiring of 25 new marine enforcement officers and the vehicles, boats and equipment required to put them on the water.

Local Courts
One of the most obvious problems in enforcement are weak rulings by local judges. For example, in one Panhandle county courtroom, over a 27-month period ending in January 2001, 37 defendants were charged with 109 separate violations. Of these, 64 charges were dismissed or the defendant found not-guilty, 31 charges were still pending after an extended period of time, and only six violators received fines ranging from $195 to $220 for a single charge.

In another case that CCA is currently tracking through the courts in the same county, two netters were observed deploying an illegal gillnet three times. The subjects, both of whom had previously been arrested for net ban violations, were directed to return to the boat ramp, where officers discovered a 556-yard-long gillnet in a hidden compartment in the boat. They also discovered 1,000 pounds of illegally caught mullet. The two defendants voluntarily made video taped confessions in which they admitted catching the mullet with the net that was found on their boat. Following an evidence suppression hearing, however, the tape was disallowed by the same local judge. This case is still pending.

The result, explained an FWC marine officer in the same district, is that even if they see a net being dumped from a boat, they have had enough experience in court to know that they will be unable to prove ownership of the net to the judge’s satisfaction. They feel they are more effectively protecting Florida’s coastal resources by accepting “forfeiture” of the abandoned net, than by taking the case to court only to see the nets returned to the violators.

In a recent case, in Mosquito Lagoon, on the central east coast, two violators were caught after an anonymous tip led officers to a major pompano bust that seemed to be supported by overwhelming evidence. After officers observed the suspects trailering their boat from across a canal, they came around and arrested the two men on the highway. They were found to have more than 400 pounds of pompano and 600 yards of monofilament trammel net that was still wet, and that also contained grasses from inshore waters. Nevertheless, the case was dismissed after an experienced defense attorney convinced the judge that the marine officers had no right to stop the netters once they had left the boat ramp and were on the road.

One of the men in this case had also been previously arrested for a net ban violation. In fact, many illegal netters being arrested throughout the state have already had multiple arrests for fishing violations or other criminal activities.

For instance, earlier this year, in Southwest Florida, enforcement officers had staked out a fish house in an attempt to catch a turtle poaching suspect with a previous record of netting violations. Instead of a turtle poaching suspect, however, three men pulled up to the dock in a mullet boat and began unloading outboard engines. They were quickly apprehended and are believed to be part of an outboard motor theft ring. Two of the suspects also turned out to be major multiple net ban violators who had been arrested numerous times before.

Eyes on the Water
The FWC has begun working with interested citizens to help keep an eye out for illegal netting activities—a kind of neighborhood watch for coastal areas. The new program trains interested citizens to recognize the difference between legal seine nets and illegal gillnets, and provides a mechanism for reporting illegal activities.

The initial meeting to establish a local program was held in July for members of CCA Florida chapters in the Ft. Myers/Charlotte Harbor areas. The members who attended were provided with individual ID numbers that now identify them as trained observers when they report a violation.

According to Col. Bob Edwards, Director of the Division of Law Enforcement, Southwest Florida was chosen as the site of the pilot program because, “CCA had indicated a desire to meet and help with enforcement efforts. Since that was such an encouraging attitude ... we thought we should try to start there.”

CCA chapters interested in starting a similar program in their part of the state should contact CCA Florida’s Tallahassee office (850) 224-3474, or the FWC’s Division of Law Enforcement at (850) 488-4676.

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The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) has adopted new regulations intended to control illegal netting of pompano in state waters. CCA Florida is encouraged that the Commission is working to address the issue; however, the measures may not be sufficient to control the problem.

The main problem is not with the approved concept of using special permits and observers to document and control net fishers who may actually be able to net pompano in limited offshore areas. Instead, CCA Florida is concerned with loopholes in the new regulations that will be exploited by poachers netting in state waters.

Commercial landings of pompano declined dramatically right after the net ban went into effect because virtually all commercial take was done with gill and entanglement nets in state waters. All around the state, recreational anglers began to see impressive increases in pompano abundance. However, reports of widespread illegal pompano netting and net ban violation arrests began increasing. At the same time, commercial pompano landings, with huge increases supposedly caught in “offshore federal waters,” began to build. Before long, commercial landings rose to a level equal to pre-net ban landings. Pompano abundance began to decline again, particularly in Southwest Florida.

As part of the rule-making process, the FWC’s Marine Research Institute (FMRI) completed a preliminary pompano stock assessment, which verified what anglers, guides and others have been saying about the declining population. The stock assessment states:

Estimates of 1986-99 Florida pompano biomass and fishing mortality show short-lived changes that coincided with the July 1995 ban on the use of entangling nets in Florida State waters. Biomass increased sharply in 1997 and 1998 on both coasts of Florida but then declined to near 1986-96 average levels by 1999 and 2000. Fishing mortality rates dropped in 1996 to levels of fishing that were just below that necessary to capture the maximum sustainable yield but then rebounded by 1998 to near the highest levels measured during the 1986-99 time frame.

The Florida pompano populations in and adjacent to Florida appear to be over-fished with respect to the amount of fishing needed to harvest maximum sustainable yield. There is no current population or catch age-structure information that would allow us to calculate the spawning potential ratios (SPR) for Florida pompano. However, the estimated current level of fishing relative to other biological benchmarks implies that current fishing mortality rates are about double that needed to achieve a static SPR of 35 percent.

In other words, it appears that pompano landings need to be reduced by 50 percent to insure a healthy and abundant population.

The commercial fishery landings data gives further evidence of an illegal netting problem. An FWC analysis shows that 97.5 percent of commercial hook and line gear trips (i.e. the legal inshore fishery) landed less than 200 pounds per trip. However, 77 percent of the total statewide commercial pompano landings came from trips landing more than 200 pounds. In other words, 77 percent of the commercial landings are supposedly coming from a gillnet fishery in offshore federal waters.

For nearly two years, the FWC has discussed the netting of pompano in federal waters vs. inshore poaching and has urged net fishers to take FWC observers to document the gillnetting of pompano in federal waters. To date, only three fishermen operating out of the Marco Island area have done so.

CCA Florida objected to the FWC’s rule, which could promote the development and expansion of a gillnet fishery in federal waters because there is no set time frame or deadline for demonstrating that pompano can be caught in federal waters. In addition, once any fisherman demonstrates the necessary catch to an observer in a region, all fishermen (with poundage documentation) can begin pompano netting.

There is also concern that a gillnet fishery should not be encouraged on an overfished species, especially when the preliminary assessment indicates that current fishing mortality is already double what can be sustained. On the east coast, an expanded gillnet fishery will re-establish the serious conflicts between gillnets and endangered sea turtles that existed prior to the net ban.

In addition, a “by-catch” exception provision, that undermines much of the rule, allows anyone with a commercial license to possess 100 pompano (approx. 150-200 pounds of fish). The problem this represents is that many of the previous illegal pompano netting arrests actually included seizures for existing poundage in the by-catch allowance range; plus, under the “by-catch” exception, net-fishers do not have to comply with special license requirements; do not have to stay in designated regions; and do not have to be free of illegal netting violations. Even convicted net poachers are allowed to obtain the special pompano netting licenses after only a three year wait.

The 250 fish “state waters” commercial limit (approx. 370-500 pounds) is also much larger than what is needed to accommodate the legal hook and line fishery in state waters as evidenced by the fact that 97.5 percent of the commercial hook and line trips landed less than 200 pounds of pompano.

Unfortunately, the predicted overfished status of the fishery means the Fish and Wildlife Commission will need to readdress the pompano issue again in early 2002 when the stock assessment is finalized. The result could be major new restrictions on legal catches because of continued, widespread poaching.

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FWC Supports Restrictions on Bottom Longlines in Gulf Grouper Fisheries—Gulf Council Delays Action

by Ted Forsgren

In May, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission urged the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council to prohibit the use of bottom longlines to harvest red, gag and black grouper inside of 50 fathoms off of Florida’s west coast. Bottom longlining for grouper is already prohibited inside of 50 fathoms (300 ft.) in the rest of the Gulf of Mexico west of Cape San Blas, Florida, and the entire Atlantic Coast from Florida to North Carolina.

CCA Florida applauded the strong position the Commission has taken on this issue. We also believe that eliminating bottom longline gear is really the only viable way to restore the red grouper stocks. Although the Council is made up of representatives from all the Gulf States, the recommendation from the FWC was considered to be extremely important because 95 percent of all the commercial and recreational red and gag grouper taken in the Gulf are landed in Florida.

Scientific assessment has determined that Gulf red grouper stocks are seriously overfished and federal law requires the Gulf Council to adopt measures to stop the overfishing by October 2001. The commercial fishing industry takes 87 percent of the Gulf red grouper, recreational fishers take 13 percent. In 1999, commercial bottom longlines took 66 percent of the total commercial take of red grouper.

The current federal red grouper stock assessment also reports that bottom longline gear was not used in the fishery until the early 1980s. The assessment states that, “the number of vessels employing bottom longline gear grew rapidly from none in 1979 to a maximum of about 300 by 1989.” Bottom longline boats put out mainlines many miles long with hundreds to thousands of baited hooks. The longline gear takes more grouper at a much faster rate than traditional commercial hook and line gear, which is exactly why the overfishing has occurred.

Last minute problems in commercial landings data caused the Council to delay final decisions until their September meeting.

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