Digging with tongs for clams. 



When they wrote the plan, it was 

 written in such a way that allowed 

 black sea bass pot fishing to continue." 



But, says Mahood, fishermen 

 could no longer possess fish pots on 

 board if they were fishing for snapper/ 

 grouper species with hook and line or 

 hydraulic lines. 



And, says Shepard, "if you went to 

 a black sea bass pot with anything 

 other than sea bass in it, you had to 

 throw 'em away." In the past, the odd 

 marketable species caught in a bass 

 pot could help you meet your fuel 

 expenses for that trip, says Shepard. 



Shepard and two other fishermen 

 made a trip to Key West to appeal the 

 regulation, and upon review, the 

 council agreed one vote short of 

 unanimous to recommend an emer- 

 gency rule correcting the problem. The 

 dissenting vote came from the NMFS 

 representative on the council. Shepard 

 says the NMFS representative is 

 instructed never to vote in favor of an 



Scott D. Taylor 



emergency rule because a unanimous 

 vote by the council would oblige the 

 Secretary of Commerce to approve it. 

 Even though this particular rule was 

 ultimately approved by the secretary, 

 this policy often makes NMFS the odd 

 man out, says Shepard. 



Bill Hogarth, who heads the state's 

 Division of Marine Fisheries, says this 

 kind of politics doesn't help the 

 already tenuous relationship between 

 watermen and Washington. 



"It makes you look sort of stupid 

 as far as they (fishermen) are con- 

 cerned," says Hogarth. "I think it's 

 extremely difficult to get the national 

 office to back off once they've made a 

 decision." 



At the state level, he says, "it's a 

 lot easier to manipulate a problem 

 politically by just screaming and 

 hollering at us." 



Even though the trip resulted in a 

 victory for Shepard, he says it cost him 

 and his companions close to $5,000 in 



time and traveling expenses to correct a 

 management mistake they think should 

 never have happened. 



And though he says the fish pot 

 dispute was not an issue of the greatest 

 magnitude, it stands out as a particu- 

 larly telling example of how govern- 

 ment ignores what would be valuable 

 feedback from the fishing community. 

 If the real issue was limiting the 

 number of large, spawning-size 

 snapper/grouper species caught, says 

 Shepard, then redesigning pots to 

 exclude fish of that size would have 

 been a more logical solution — not 

 banning pots and continuing to allow 

 fishermen to angle for their catch. 



"A hook doesn't know what size 

 fish bites it," says Shepard. 



But in Mahood 's opinion, the 

 convincing arguments presented by 

 Shepard and his colleagues was a 

 perfect example of fishermen learning 

 to use the system to meet their needs. 

 He says the appeal was well-argued 

 and that the three coordinated their 

 testimony so that they weren't all 

 saying the same thing. 



"They did a sales job," he says, and 

 the effort paid off. "North Carolina 

 fishermen have become very sophisti- 

 cated." 



There's not a lengthy sign-up sheet 

 of fishermen wanting to learn the rules 

 of this political game. But Schill has 

 issued the call. 



"The commercial industry is 

 overregulated, and there's a lot of 

 justification for them (fishermen) to be 

 upset," he says. "But you just can't 

 keep going to meetings saying you're 

 the redheaded stepchild. You've got to 

 start participating in the process, 

 whether you like it or not." 



The oldest trade group in the state 

 and one of the oldest in the nation, the 

 N.C. Fisheries Association is entering 

 its 41st year of representing the 

 interests of commercial fish dealers and 

 fishermen. The Southeastern North 

 Carolina Waterman's Association has 



6 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1993 



