Fine start to #FishyFriday in Newlyn

More evidence that work has commenced on the £1.7 million fish market refurbishment...

as four beam trawlers, a few inshore and one invisible netter provide the fish for Friday's market...

though this is the last time the grading machine will be seen here as it is due to be dismantled and moved to the other end of the market today...

when the current crop of big landings will see much more crowded floor in future as the market will be effectively half its present size...

so big trips of plaice...

turbot...

brill...

pouting...

and John Dory...

will take some fitting in to the space left...

a hazard of the cuttlefish season is the staining of the skin of some fish - the belly of flat fish are not affected as the top side which has a scaley finish...

that allows the ink to seep under the scales...

the ink gets everywhere including the market floor...

with chief auctioneer Ian prising every penny he can out of the assembled buyers with the price of cuttles going up in pence this morning he's looking for the next bid...

which goes down in the market book...

and wins a wry smile...

as the bidding starts all over again with only a handful of buyers bidding on the cuttles every penny counts...

so it looks like young Edwin is keeping his price close to his chest as the bidding starts again...

there's plenty of hake from the Govenek of Ladram...

along with a good shot of shiny haddock...

and even more pristine red gurnard...

on a flat calm morning...

the big scalloper Isla T...

so big she needs a set of steps to get up to the dredge table...

the Sapphire II has managed to get her broken derrick ashore for repair - a hazard of the job for any of the big beam trawlers if the happen to hitch fast with a following sea and tide.

The crown is won back almost! - Newlyn is England's top port by total landings!

The MMO has just published its 2016 UK Sea Fishing Statistics - with some great news for the fishermen who find themselves landing to the port at the top of the league but one with total landings worth £27 million pounds for the year!  With an ever-increasing number of English, Scottish and even Spanish vessels choosing to land to the port the future is looking bright - roll on the new fish market and fish auction which should help bring the port into the 21st century. Brixham, with nearly £16 million pounds worth of cuttlefish, topped the table with £31 million!

Mid-week market in Newlyn.

Most of the inshore trawler fleet landed this morning along with the big beam trawler, Sapphire II and a couple of invisible netters landing hake...

which meant there were plenty of boxes throughout the market...

with John Dory a feature of all the trips...

though it was down to Plugger on the Shiralee to top the quantity scales...

along with the Imogen III...

and the Millennia...

and the Harvest Reaper to bring home the money...

the Sapphire  managed a few lemons from her broken trip...

and plaice...

while Mark touched on a brace of bass...

more JDs...

and plenty of ray wings...

while the squid count was higher for some than others...

Tom hit on a few cuttles...

and Mr Pascoe came home with a bag of crawfish...

the Ajax and the Joy of Ladram piled into the hake from way west of the Scillys...

young Mr Trebilcock provides an overview of the fish trade to Exiting the EU Dept & MP for Wycombe, Steve Baker and FalFish staff wearing their fetching 'teabag' garb provided gratis by the harbour for such fishmarket visits...

food for thought...

taking a break from chasing John Dory, young Roger Nowell hit on a few cuttles...

and the odd bream...

as did one or two others...

predatory hake, the last thing to be seen its prey...

the benign smile of the blue shark...

in a few weeks time this end of the market will be closed until the refurbishment is completed...

standing around in the rain that just started to fall...

devoid of her derricks and beam trawls, the William Stevenson or 'little tiger' as the star of the BBC TV serie, The Skippers and book of the same name affectionately referred to her...

the temporary offices are in place for the fish market refurb...

there's another cat in the harbour...

there's something amiss with the beam trawler, Sapphire II who was not due to return to port until Sunday night...

looks like she snapped her portside derrick almost clean in half - beam trawlers can do that if they catch the trawl on a wreck or bad 'hitch' on the sea bed...

time for tea and fuel...

although bigger than your average visiting yacht these guys, at the tail end of the sailing season, will be looking to make a break from Newlyn before seem very fresh winds hit the Western Approaches late on Sunday night as hurricanes Irma and Jose join forces over the weekend and head for the UK...

when they will undoubtedly dump plenty more rain water over the harbour.

Live from the EU - Seminar "State of Fish Stocks and the Economics of Fishing Fleets"

The Directorate General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries of the European Commission (DG MARE) is organising a Scientific Seminar on the status of European fish stocks, fisheries management systems and the economic performance of the EU fishing fleet.

Presentations will be made by senior experts in fisheries biology from DG MARE, ICES (International Council for the Exploration of the Sea) and STECF (Scientific, Technical and Economic Committee for Fisheries), among others.

The meeting will be opened by our Director General, Mr Joao Aguiar Machado, and closed by Mr Karmenu Vella, European Commissioner for Environment, Maritime Affairs and Fisheries. The sessions will be chaired by Mrs Hélène Clark, Director for Fisheries Policy Atlantic, North Sea, Baltic and Outermost Regions.

You will also be able to follow the sessions, thanks to the twitter coverage of @EU_MARE and the dedicated hashtag is #EUFishEcon, as well as the access to the live webstreaming on the day of the seminar 

(https://webcast.ec.europa.eu/scientific-seminar-2017).

AGENDA

Seminar "State of Fish Stocks and the Economics of Fishing Fleets" 

Van Maerlant Building, rue Van Maerlant, 2-18, (room VML02) 1040 Etterbeek, Brussels, Belgium, 26th September 2017 – 9h15-13h00 

Session moderator: Hélène Clark, European Commission, 
Director, Fisheries Policy Atlantic, North Sea, Baltic and Outermost Regions 

• Registration and welcome coffee (from 8.30 onwards) 
• Welcome João Aguiar Machado, DG MARE Director General 9.15-9.30 
• Comparison of EU and US fisheries management systems Ernesto Penas Lado, DG MARE Principal Adviser 9.30-10.00 
• Questions and discussion 10.00-10.15 
• Economic performance of the EU fishing fleet Michael Keatinge, STECF, Chair of the STECF WG on Economics 10.15-10.35 
• Questions and discussion 10.35-10.45 
• Coffee break 10.45-11.15 
• Long-term trends with respect to Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY) Ernesto Jardim, JRC , Senior Fisheries Scientist 11.15-11.35 
• Biological status and developments of the main stocks - Northeast Atlantic Eskild Kirkegaard, ICES Advisory Committee Chair 11.35-11.50 - 
• Mediterranean Clara Ulrich, STECF Chair 11.50-12.10 
• Questions and discussion 12.10-12.40 
• Concluding remarks Karmenu Vella, European Commissioner for Environment, Maritime Affairs and Fisheries 12.40 Closing 13.0

Throughout the whole event, simultaneous interpretation will be provided in English and Spanish.

Top story in the Fishing News this week

English under-10s struggle to earn a living. Tough controls and loss of grounds threaten future.

Under 10m vessels make up the greatest percentage of the UK fleet.

A mounting regulatory burden and heavy-handed enforcement are threatening the inshore fleet in England, reports Tim Oliver. Fishermen say the increasing amount of regulation and licence restrictions imposed on them by IFCAs and the MMO, plus lack of quotas, loss of grounds to MPAs, windfarms, cable laying, dredging and other restrictions are making it impossible to make a living. They say IFCAs and the MMO enforce regulations rigorously, with no margins for genuine mistakes, and there is no trust and a lack of communication between IFCAs and the industry.

Regular posts on the Fishing News Facebook page and conversations with fishermen attest to the frustration and anger they feel over the way the inshore industry is managed. Few young men are entering the industry and there are fears of long-term decline as the average age of fishermen increases – despite the new era Brexit promises. The problems are particularly acute in the South and South East.


Fishermen at Wells-next-the-Sea in Norfolk have forcibly expressed their alienation from the fisheries authorities in this hard-hitting notice.
One young inshore fisherman, Pete Williams of Emsworth near Portsmouth, said he is finding it so impossible to fish viably that he has put his under-10m boat, Sarah C, up for sale. He said he knows of five fishermen who have left the industry this year and last year, and of another five who are likely to do so this or next year. He told Fishing News that the endless restrictions and loss of fisheries year-after-year were destroying the versatility the inshore fleet needs to survive. He was particularly critical of the Sussex IFCA, which he accused of treating fishermen with ‘complete contempt’. He has lodged a formal complaint against it over its recent confiscation of cuttle traps.

“They’re boarding us, checking us, searching us and posting it all over social media as soon as a fisherman is fined or warned. They’re treating us like millionaire criminals, when actually we’re all struggling and on the verge of going under because of all the draconian, stupid regulations that have come in over the past few years,” he told Fishing News.

“They’re talking about bringing in a netting permit next year, so not only will we be regulated by the CFP, quotas, minimum mesh and landing sizes, and conservation areas, but we’ll be managed by the amount of netting gear we use in the IFCA areas. People are going to go bust.

“All the fish markets are struggling in the South and South East, most of the inshore fleet and co-ops are struggling, and the IFCAs are just fining people left, right and centre and dealing with us in a very heavy-handed way.”

Safety threat

He said the IFCAs did not understand the practical realities of fishing and ‘how close to the wire we’re being forced to sail to make a living. They think if they close an area, we can just go somewhere else, but the reality is it’s making it more and more unsafe for small vessels to work because we’re being pushed out of sheltered waters.’

He said fishermen all along the coast chat to each other and they are all ‘sick to death of the way we’re being treated’. “They’re making me ill and affecting my family life, my wife and daughter because we’re having to live this nightmare.”

Eric McLeod who runs shellfish merchants Viviers UK, based in Portsmouth and Billingsgate, has regular contact with inshore fishermen from throughout the region. He said the way fishermen are being treated is ‘terrible’ and needs involvement from the top level in DEFRA, the MMO and the fisheries management establishment.

“What Pete Williams says is true – you can hear the same views from all the established, experienced fishermen,” he told Fishing News.

“We’re losing fishing grounds to MCAs, MPAs, windfarms, cables – they’re even telling you what hours you can fish,” he said.

The IFCAs, he said, were run by academics and other people with no knowledge or experience of the fishing industry – hardly anyone from the fishing industry is on their committees and fishery officers now call themselves ‘enforcement officers’.

“It’s unacceptable to the fishing industry, and the way it’s going, it’s on its way out. When I came ashore in 1985, there were 30,000 fishermen – it’s down to 10,200 now, maximum.”

The number of boats has fallen to 6000 – a reduction of 28% since 1996, according to UK Fisheries Statistics.

“Dozens of boats are on the market and they’re not selling. There are very few young people entering the industry and doing their courses. It’s terrible what’s going on and the government needs to know.”

Tim Dapling, chief executive of the Sussex IFCA, said he could not comment specifically on Pete Williams’ case as it was the subject of a formal complaint. But he said he did not recognise the overall relationship between fishermen, and rejected claims that the IFCA is heavy-handed and does not communicate with fishermen.

“I completely refute these comments, they don’t reflect the situation here or the feedback we get from fishermen,” he told Fishing News.

“Fishery officers have regular contact with fishermen and the IFCA receives positive feedback from fishermen on the shellfish permit, which provides a lot of detailed info on how the scheme is working and receives considerable support.

“I can’t comment specifically on these remarks but more generally, perhaps, there is a need to look at the broader context rather than isolated comments.”

IFCA under fire in official complaint

A fisherman from the Solent has slammed his local IFCA over what he says is heavy-handed action over the removal of his cuttle traps from Chichester Harbour at the beginning of September.

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Pete Williams was unaware his traps had been lifted until he saw the Sussex IFCA post on Facebook. Pete Williams, who operates the Sarah C SE 121 from Emsworth in the Solent, has told the Sussex IFCA in a formal complaint letter that he is ‘seriously not happy’ about the way the IFCA has behaved. He said he had no communication from the IFCA about the removal of the traps and only found out about it from a post the IFCA put on Facebook. He accused the IFCA of publicly flaunting what it appeared to regard as an ‘achievement’.

The traps were removed because some of the identification tags had come off the traps.

“I do not find this good practice. I hold a shellfish permit, and I comply with your regulations,” he told the IFCA.

He said he had placed the traps to allow the cuttlefish eggs to come off. The buoy was clearly labelled/marked and each trap had a tag on. He had not lifted them as he wanted the eggs to hatch. He could see the traps were still in position and had no need to lift them.

“Should we stuff the environment and pressure wash the eggs off?” he asked.

The pen on the buff had probably come off because he had to lay it in 3ft of water to comply with harbour authority arrangements to avoid navigational issues. This meant the buff rubbed on the sand every time the tide went out.

The missing tags had probably come off because of bad weather, but 50% of the traps had tags on when they were hauled. “You could clearly see that they were my traps and they made no effort to contact me to fix this problem.”

He said if the IFCA had phoned him to say some of the tags had come off he would have replaced them, or advised them that they would be removed entirely by the end of the week. He had only used 16 traps since June, to be sustainable, and the IFCA had lost 25% of them when they lifted them.

The traps have been taken to a distant ‘secure location’ and because he does not have a vehicle suitable for transporting them, he has now lost his entire cuttle fishery.

He said the IFCA had ‘yet again’ adopted a ‘heavy-handed approach, with a lack of respect, care or consideration for a licensed fishing operation and business in this area’.

“It has caused me unnecessary stress and I am financially out of pocket. This issue could have been resolved very easily, and quickly, instead you have taken my traps, not alerted me and left me in a predicament where I cannot access the cuttle fishery next year,” he told the IFCA.

He has asked for his pots to be returned, along with back rope, anchors and weights, to the location from where they had been removed, and compensation for the lost pots. He had been intending to use the back ropes for prawn pots so was now suffering loss of earnings.

He accepted the traps had to be tagged, and he could have done this if the IFCA had contacted him.

NFFO chief executive Barrie Deas, who was copied in on Pete Williams’ complaint letter to the Sussex IFCA, said rules have to be enforced but enforcement should be done ‘in a reasonable, balanced, proportionate way’.

He said there was a concern that things seemed to escalate very rapidly and that in Pete Williams’ case a phone call or a warning would have been appropriate.

“There may be a manpower issue – I’m not talking about IFCAs specifically,” he said. “At one time there was somebody on the coast fishermen could talk to who would have understood the fishing patterns, and I think we’ve lost something there.

“The first stop shouldn’t be heavy-handed action, it should be dialogue. If there are problems, they should be resolved before things escalate. The way to achieve that is to have dialogue. Penalties should be the last resort not the first resort.”

Tim Dapling, chief executive of the Sussex IFCA, said he could not discuss the case because it was the subject of a formal complaint.

Read more from Fishing News here.