States Want Control of Red Snapper

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Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) and Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) filed legislation today that seeks to transfer responsibility for the management of Gulf red snapper to the Gulf states. The legislation (S.1161) comes two months after the governors of four Gulf states released a joint letter to the leadership of the U.S. House and Senate stating that federal management of Gulf red snapper is ?irretrievably broken,? and calling for a coordinated Gulf states partnership for red snapper management.

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http://www.ccamississippi.org/cca-mi...t-of-2013.html

I applaud the effort of the States for standing up. Hopefully something positive comes out of it. Even though I don't go offshore much, the whole situation just pisses me off. The federal government has been a joke on this. Crooked lobbying has ruled the day on this issue.

I feel the exact same way. I rarely go snapper fishing, but it really pisses me off. This has gone on for too long.

What does the feds or states gain by controlling this? Consider me ignorant. All I understand is that what, 8 miles out, is federal water?

OCS is 7 I believe.

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Originally Posted by Goat Holder

What does the feds or states gain by controlling this? Consider me ignorant. All I understand is that what, 8 miles out, is federal water?

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Basically, the states are standing up for the recreational fisherman. The rec fisherman gets very little chance to harvest red snapper b/c everything has been given to the commercial fleets. This was due to big money lobbying. The commercial guys are destroying the red snapper population. They then blame rec fisherman and lobby to get their numbers further reduced. It's one big political sham where the little guy is getting the screws put to him for no reason with no concern for the damage they are putting on the wildlife. All around insane situation.

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Originally Posted by Goat Holder

What does the feds or states gain by controlling this? Consider me ignorant. All I understand is that what, 8 miles out, is federal water?

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varies from state to state ... in Miss, fed waters start approx 3 miles south of horn island which is somewhere around 15 - 17 miles from the state coastline ...governing entity for this is the NOAA and the way they count red snapper populations is to dive natural reefs and natural structure only ... yeah the populations were down in Florida years ago but almost overcrowded everywhere else because they refused to consider man-made structure in their surveys like artificial reefs, oil rigs, sunken ships, ect and used this assumption that populations were down EVERYWHERE ... gov't mismanagement at it's finest on this... things would improve I think if they would transfer from NOAA to the US Fish & Wildlife Dept..... this is the best news I have heard all year so far... and I would bet that the states make more money off the rec fishermen than the commercial guys by far

ETA - wouldn't surprise me one bit to learn that Bobby Jindal was behind the states push ... he gets it

When you guys say recreational fisherman....is that pretty much all the charters say, like out of Destin? Are commercial guys on bigger boats?

I have a friend in Destin who is about to try and start fish farming in the Gulf, raising snapper, cobia and other stuff. Maybe this is the answer, and the commercial guys won't have to destroy the wild population. Pretty sure it's already being done in other places, like Miami....

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Originally Posted by Goat Holder

When you guys say recreational fisherman....is that pretty much all the charters say, like out of Destin? Are commercial guys on bigger boats?

I have a friend in Destin who is about to try and start fish farming in the Gulf, raising snapper, cobia and other stuff. Maybe this is the answer, and the commercial guys won't have to destroy the wild population. Pretty sure it's already being done in other places, like Miami....

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Recreational fisherman range from charter captains to weekend warriors. They adhere to state recreational size/bag limits. Commercial guys get mandated quotas on how much they can harvest (we're talking tons). It gets extremely complicated depending on what type of fishing the commercial guys are doing and the regulations they have to adhere to. In a nutshell, commercial guys make more impact on the fish schools than recreational guys. The end means is that no one, rec or commercial, needs to abuse any specie of fish to the point where everyone is in the danger zone.

Slight hijack but thats kinda what my brother does. He's a marine biologist and works as an observer in Alaska. He works on commercial fleet ships that fish the same waters as the deadliest catch guys. The waters up there are the most heavily regulated in the US and every boat must have an observer to document all the ship's practices and what they catch. His company and many others are basically sub contracted by the government. Basically, my brother does the work of the federal government and reports to the federal government but doesn't specifically work for the federal government.