Rec boats oppose opening closed fishing areas – GDT

Recreational fishermen and the Pew Environment Group have weighed in against a potential decision to allow commercial boats to harvest from two fishing areas that have long been closed to commercial operations………Pew Environment Group’s opinion aligns with a number of non-government organizations including Conservation Law Foundation, the Nature Conservancy and Earthjustice, but not all of them. But the Environmental Defense Fund has given a conditional endorsement of the policy of opening closed areas where fishing had been barred to impede mortality……..Tower and a number of other recreational captains argued that the reopening of the mortality closures within the larger confines of the three major closed areas in the Northwest Atlantic would benefit big boats but provide little or no help to the day boats………..Pew Environment Group’s Peter Baker made much the same point in an email. He attributed the movement to the trawlers or draggers because “it seems to be the draggers from Associated Fisheries of Maine and their sometime allies at the Northeast Seafood Coalition that have argued most strenuously to open closed areas to fishing.” Read more.

http://www.gloucestertimes.com/topstories/x1133187726/Rec-boats-oppose-opening-closed-fishing-areas

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