11 replies to this topic

[Alarmed Angler]

I have just learned from sources close to the minister that the Review Of Inland Fisheries Sector by FGS is another SHAM just like the recent review of the Pike sector by the CFB. While FGS may be carrying out the review in good faith apparently the Minister intends to save €20m (plus) per year the Fisheries Boards cost by scrapping them entirely.

The most alarming aspect of the Ministers plan is to transfer the monitoring of freshwater fisheries to the Environmental Protection Agencies (EPA) and the administration of fisheries to the Local Authorities (Co.Co’s). The protection of sea fisheries will remain with the Navy.

This would leave a situation whereby anglers would have no statutory representation in the management of our fisheries and no single body could be held accountable for their management. We already can see what a poor job the Local Authorities and EPA are doing with the water quality issue, how bad will things get when they have complete control over our fisheries in such a haphazard manner.

Anglers must start screaming bl***y murder during the Review Of Inland Fisheries Sector or our sport and fisheries in general are truly finished.

[Andy]

A very political first post.

I take it that you are pointing out the prospects of Irish angling

[Alarmed Angler]

Sorry, I thought this was an Irish Angling stie.

I was referring to the Irish Fisheries Boards

[Andy]

Thats not a problem mate, your views are not restricted to Irish angling sites.

We do have an Ireland forum,
At least we know the Irish Fisheries Boards plans.

We do have members on the site from Ireland, hopefuly they will have a comment on it.

Its nice to learn what is happening over in your country, as members from this site and other angling sites visit Ireland on a regular basis.

My last post was not meant to demean you in any way

[DaveB]

Based in North and do most of my fishing in the South. I can't beleive that they are going to screw things up on down there as well. I always got the impression that the govt. was more clued in with regards to fisheries management etc on that side...maybe I was wrong.

[Alarmed Angler]

Thanks for the support lads. A good example of the incompetence in Irish fisheries management is

a) They The Fisheries Boards have destroyed angling by wrongly blaming Pike predation for the decline in Trout stocks wasting valuable resources on Pike culling and employing indiscriminate gill nets which have killed many coarse fishes and Trout in a vain attempt to eradicate Pike.

b) Pollution is the real reason for the decline in Trout, and because they are less able to deal with poor water quality than Coarse fish and Pike the Boards blame predation. The existing Regional Fisheries Boards are made up by incompatible interest groups like farmers who have been identified by the Environmental Protection Agency as the main cause of poor water quality in our freshwater rivers and lakes due to excessive use of Phosphate based fertilisers destroying aquatic life.

Most anglers want the ineffective Regional Boards to be replaced by a national agency managed by anglers. The system the Minister is planning would be a real disaster.

[Andy]

If i'm not mistaken we had a debate about gill netting on another site some time back. and the pike culling

Dont know what came of it, :q

[Angler]

It's a sad fact of life that when ministers start changing things, it suddenly get's worse than ever, they just waste a lot of money doing so called research and come up with theories that wouldn't make sense in a million years .

I'm sure if they took or just listened to advice from the real people who do know what the problems are, then things would certainly start improving. Lets hope it's not too long happening or it will be too late