{"id":503,"date":"2009-06-18T16:47:41","date_gmt":"2009-06-18T15:47:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bxttlines.wordpress.com\/?p=503"},"modified":"2009-06-18T16:47:41","modified_gmt":"2009-06-18T15:47:41","slug":"scottish-shark-tagging-campaign-highlights-critical-stocks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/2009\/06\/18\/scottish-shark-tagging-campaign-highlights-critical-stocks\/","title":{"rendered":"Scottish shark tagging campaign highlights ‘critical’ stocks"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tope,<\/a>
Tope, Luce Bay, Solway. Picture: Worldseafishing.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

SHARK populations off Scotland\u2019s south-west coast are now at a \u201ccritical low\u201d angling conservationists warned today as results from last weekend\u2019s massive tagging exercise were revealed.<\/p>\n

Some 215 volunteer anglers from all over the UK travelled to the Solway coast to take part in Sharkatag 2009, a three-day project to catch, tag and release various species of endangered sharks.<\/p>\n

Project Director Ian Burrett of the Sea Angling Conservation Network (SSACN<\/a>), said: \u201cAround 200 tope, smoothound and bull huss were tagged over the three days and that can only be described as poor compared with what the total should have been.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said he was extremely concerned that packs of tope appeared to be absent.\u00a0 \u201cThe whole region seems to be void of the expected male breeding stock and the fish caught were most immature females, typically under 20 lbs.\u201d He said mackerel food stocks were \u201cpatchy\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"Ian<\/a>
Ian Burrett, Project Director, SSACN<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Burrett said the shark species were at a fraction of their levels of a decade ago when he himself could have expected to have caught up to 20 fish a day in the 30-35lb class.<\/p>\n

Just three specimens of thornback ray, another threatened species, were caught during the weekend. He added: \u201cIt shows how urgently plans are needed to help protect and regenerate the stocks.\u201d<\/p>\n

SSACN claim that\u00a0 successive governments and fisheries managers have made decisions regarding commercial exploitation of inshore fish without adequate knowledge of stocks or the environment.<\/p>\n

\u201cYet, when it is obvious to all that many stocks are in serious danger, there is a total lack of protective action by Scottish fisheries managers due to an \u2018insufficiency of data\u2019,\u201d Burrett said.<\/p>\n

The anglers want several key areas of Scotland\u2019s west coast designated for marine protection with inshore commercial fishing, especially scallop dredgers, banned.<\/p>\n

They have set up the Scottish Shark Tagging Programme<\/a> database to act as a central clearing point for all data on sharks, skate and ray stocks in Scottish coastal waters and will use the results to put pressure on the Government to take conservation measures.<\/p>\n

The Scottish Government is currently considering an independent report on the economic impact of sea angling which it is estimated is worth at least \u00a3150 million a year.<\/p>\n

The anglers say that designating the Solway as a European centre for sea angling could bring in a further \u00a315 million a year to the local economy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SHARK populations off Scotland\u2019s south-west coast are now at a \u201ccritical low\u201d angling conservationists warned today as results from last weekend\u2019s massive tagging exercise were revealed. Some 215 volunteer anglers from all over the UK travelled to the Solway coast to take part in Sharkatag 2009, a three-day project to catch, tag and release various…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btl.longlinemedia.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}