Spread the MMO news! Additional quota for capped licence vessels remains open.

This news needs spreading to all four corners!

The Marine Management Organisation (MMO) will accept new applications by capped licence vessels for additional quota until early December following a positive early response to its initiative.

Under this scheme, which is being run in partnership with selected Producer Organisations, owners or skippers of vessels under 10m long with licences limiting their annual quota stock catch to 350kgs can apply for more opportunities for the remainder of 2021.

The one-time offer means a small amount of the additional quota England received from the Trade and Cooperation Agreement will be distributed via the selected Producer Organisations. It will enable the capped vessels to fish above their annual limit for quota stocks before 1 January 2022.

The scheme was devised at pace in response to concerns from a number of small-scale fishers. It is hoped it will help them weather some of the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on markets for non-quota stocks, combined with the consequences of a poor fishing year.

The stocks covered by this initiative are available by emailing:

InshoreQuotaManager@marinemanagement.org.uk. 

New applications for additional quota should be emailed to this address and include vessel details, which stocks skippers plan to catch and in what quantities.

Newlyn's sardine fleet sails for the night.

Taking advantage of a big tide and more time dried out the John Dory king has a little maintenance to do alongside the market...

the big ship is back in port...

a sign of the times, times, a completed safety folder gets the once-over - it seems the industry is being swamped in officialdom, paperwork where the safety rules for much larger vessels with far more complex working and vessel operations have been crudely adapted to police very small fishing vessels with little regard for the skills, competence and fishing operations they live by - increasingly seems we live in a world where we attempt to mitigate against any and every kind of problem - every new set of rules simply creates a need for audits which in turn creates easy money for the auditors but ongoing costs and additional work and paperwork for those being audited...

Cornish sardines look out! - the fleet is leaving the harbour, first off the Asthore...

followed by the Plymouth based, Charlotte Clare...

and the Lyonesse...

one of them there St Ives men heads down the steps...

and waits for Dan to get the Golden Harvest moving...

as the rest of the fleet join in the hunt...

with one hand on the tiller...

his thoughts might just go back to the time his hands were sheeting the mains'l during the 1994 Defi des Ports de Pêche - next year will be the 33rd such event - five days of intensive yacht racing with crews made up entirely of fishermen makes for some pretty intense competitions between fishing ports from all over Europe - maybe it's time the guys put together such a team again?..

not too sure what to make of this, maybe its so they can have two on watch?...

first sight of the new Rowse crabber just arrived from France...

she's an ex-netter...

so won't need quit so much work to convert to trawling...

mackerel man Mr Morley emulates one of Ralph Bramley's most accomplished watercolours, Eyes and No Eyes, which can be seen in the Penlee gallery in nearby Penzance...

though the presence of the young eyes in his case is missing...

all quiet on the lifeboat front tonight.

Sunday through to Monday in pictures.

The lengths people go to...

 to get the shot they want...

or you just have to be patient or get up early...

Monday morning's market was full of day boat fish after a weekend of fine weather enable the saller boats to get to sea in numbers...

though the beam trawler Algrie made the only big-boat contribution to the first auction of the week...

for young Roger on the Immy squid are till almost non-existent - in some years they can be landed by the ton...

while he made a good landing of ray...

a few bass...

and more ray...

both squid...

and cuttles release large quantities of ink when caught...

and despite the best efforts of the guys a few fish bear the scars - not that the ink in any way detracts from the flavour...

flatfish tails like these on plaice...

turbot...

and Dover sole serve to adjust the height of the fish over the ground as they swim - some think they raise the tail and use the tide to push them along and conserve energy...

not so many reds at this time of year...

a good box of witches...

while Tom got lucky with this nice landing of monk tails...

leaving a few bigger ones for the Algrie...

there were still a few JDs on the ground too...

these pristine reds were hauled up the beach at Cadgwith...

not much of a conger line...

while the bass boys were in action again...

some chose to make the most of good mackerel marks...

like the Sea Spray...

the big one will be sailing later today...

Crystal Sea heads in through the gaps to land...

fishermen have an old saying, name the three most useless things you can have on a fishing boat, and this is one of them, along with a step ladder and a soldier...

bait taking time...

taking the springer...

as a few more early-morning line caught bass come ashore...

the Kaen N was unlucky enough to pick up a length of 80mm mesh floating on the surface which meant an 8 hour tow job from sister-ship, Louisa N...

just another day's trials and tribulations for rugby player Jack Nowell's fisherman father Mike and brother Steven!..

a short time-laps of the morning's events.