Danny Rasch 



fishermen despite a 30-year 

 participation in the fishery, 

 Rasch says. 



But the council did recog- 

 nize North Carolina scallopers 

 in the early 1980s when they 

 entered into a fray over a pro- 

 posed size limit for sea 

 scallops. 



Mike Orbach surveyed 

 Carteret County fishermen 

 who periodically dash off to 

 the Florida coast to cash in on 

 the lucrative calico scallop 

 harvests. 



In the fall and winter, 20 to 

 30 North Carolina fishermen 

 occasionally hightail it to 

 Florida's northern Atlantic 

 coast to scoop up calico 

 scallops from newly dis- 

 covered beds. 



All it takes is a call from one 

 of the scallop processors in 

 Florida. Many of the 

 processors have ties or even 

 processing plants back in 

 North Carolina. 



In fact, North Carolinians 

 have dominated this Florida 

 fishery since the first large 



beds of calico scallops were 

 discovered in 1980. 



Fishermen from Wanchese 

 to Swansboro headed south. 

 Nearly half of the scallop fleet 

 working out of the Canaveral 

 docks in the early 1980s were 

 North Carolinians. Some 

 fishermen even moved their 

 families to Florida. 



The lure? 



"The scallops carried a high 

 value, and it was a dead-easy 

 fishery," Orbach says. 

 "Everybody knew where the 

 beds were. All the boats had 

 to do was go to the beds, 

 shovel up the scallops, head 

 back to the docks, unload 

 them and go out again. They 

 worked 24 hours a day." 



North Carolina processors 

 cashed in, too. Much of the 

 machinery needed for shuck- 

 ing the scallops sat in plants 

 on the shores of Carteret 

 County. 



Truckload after truckload of 

 calicoes was hauled to North 

 Carolina for shucking. ButA fli 

 eventually the processors 

 moved their equipment south. 



And just as the South Atlan- 

 tic Fishery Management 

 Council set its sights on a 

 calico scallop management 

 plan, the fishery collapsed. 



Tar Heel scallopers headed 

 home, and the management 

 plan was shelved. 



But in recent years, new 

 beds of the calicoes were 

 found, and processors called 

 in their fishermen friends from 

 North Carolina again. 



Because of North Carolina's 

 dominance in the fishery and 

 in the processing, there has 

 been little conflict and resent- 

 ment over the Tar Heel inva- 

 sion, Orbach says. 



And the South Atlantic 

 Fishery Management Council 

 is eager for the results of this 

 study. If the fishery booms 

 again, the council wants to be 

 prepared with as much infor- 

 mation as possible, Orbach 

 says. 



Johnson, Orbach and 

 Rasch are busy writing up the 

 results of their study. Their 

 findings should give state 

 management agencies, the 

 fishery management councils 

 and the National Marine 

 Fisheries Service a better 

 understanding of North 

 Carolina's transient fishermen 

 and the impacts their travels 



make. 



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