Huge Poaching Incident Shows Value of Strong Natural Resource Police

In perhaps the worst example of poaching in a quarter century, Maryland natural resource police yesterday discovered an illegal, half-mile long net near Kent Island in the Chesapeake Bay full of nearly three tons of striped bass, The Baltimore Sun is reporting.

The identities of the people responsible is still under investigation.  No arrests have been made.  But one thing is clear: the incident shows that poaching remains a major problem in the Chesapeake Bay, and that strong law enforcement by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources is critical.

 It’s not just rockfish that are being caught illegally. 

 In a report last year called, “On the Brink: Chesapeake’s Native Oysters,” the Chesapeake Bay Foundation found that illegal harvesting of oysters is so widespread that it is now “one of the biggest obstacles to restoring oysters in the Chesapeake Bay.”  Nearly all of the state’s existing oyster 34 sanctuaries have been victimized by poachers, a problem worsened by a more than 40 percent cut in natural resource police over the last decade, according to the CBF report.

Law-breaking on the water is so common that 43 percent of the active watermen in Maryland were charged with violating the state’s commercial oystering and fishing laws in 2008, according to the Maryland Department of Natural Resources figures quoted in the report.

 “It’s a severe problem,” aquaculture specialist Dr.Donald Meritt of the University of Maryland says in the report. “I don’t like to use the word ‘poaching,’ because ‘poaching’ gives it almost a sportsman’s connotation, and it’s not. It’s theft."

What the most recent incident involving rock fish indicates to me is that, even in a time of budget cutting in Maryland and across the region, natural resource police agencies should not be slashed -- and, indeed, should be bolstered -- if we want to protect the treasure that provides an identity and economic engine for our whole region: the Chesapeake Bay.

By Tom Pelton

Chesapeake Bay Foundation

Comments

[fran & Bill Fox]

i hope these individuals receive the harshest sentence available! our natural resources need to be preserved for all, not for the monetary gain of others...

[DARREN POWELL]

I HAVE WITNESSED IT FIRST HAND IN MATHEWS COUNTY VA. 5 MEN IN A SMALL JOHNBOAT CATCHING AND KEEPING UNDERSIZED STRIPERS AND OVER LIMITS. WHEN I CALLED VMRC THEY TOLD ME THEY DIDNT HAVE THE MANPOWER TO CHECK IT OUT.ALL THEY WOULD HAVE HAD TO DO WAS MEET THEM AT THE RAMP. THEY WOULD LOAD UP AND LEAVE AND THEN RETURN TO THE SAME SPOT AND LOAD UP AGAIN.

IF YOU OBSERVE THIS HAPPENING ENOUGH AND KEEP REPORTING SOMEONE EVENTUALLY WILL INVESTIGATE.IT'S ALL OUR PROBLEM AND IF YOU TURN A BLIND EYE YOUR JUST AS GUILTY.

IT'S EVERYONES RESPONSABILTY TO PROTECT OUR RESOURCES.

[Tom Pelton]

I totally agree, Darren. I've seen lists of the repeat offender poachers and it's incredible. Some people get charged with violating natural resource laws 40, 50 times -- and the charges are either dropped, or the fines are so small they don't deter the poaching. We can't pretend it's not happening.

[greg hager]

I agree with you all.100%..Ilove the bay.On a Rock fishing last year 15 fisherman we only caught 2 rock fish allday