Save our Bass Fishing
Campaign update - October 2018
Since its conception in 2009 the Angling Trust, and the National Federation of Sea Anglers (NFSA) for many years before that, has been campaigning for greater protection for one of the UK’s premier sporting marine fish – the European bass (Dicentrarchus labrax).
This campaign has been a partnership between the Angling Trust and the Bass Angler’s Sportfishing Society (BASS, also encompassing Save our Sea Bass), and the European Anglers Alliance who have also long campaigned for increased bass conservation. Over recent years the scientific advice published annually by the International Council for the Exploration of the Seas (ICES) has repeatedly shown a stock that is at serious risk of collapse, which is a result of commercial overfishing, successive years of poor recruitment and a lack of coordinated management and harvest control measures.
The key outcomes that the campaign to rebuild bass stocks has sought, and the progress towards these outcomes, are:
- An increased Minimum Conservation Reference Size (Minimum Landing Size) – we have been successful in increasing this from 36 cm to 42 cm, allowing female bass the opportunity to have spawned before capture.
- An end to the midwater trawling of vulnerable spawning aggregations of bass.
- Hook and line only targeted fishing for bass in 2017 (recreational and commercial) with limited bycatch allowances for unavoidable catches from demersal trawls, seines and gill nets
- Development of a Bass Long-term Management Plan – in 2015 our campaigning efforts forced the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to agree to work with the Angling Trust and BASS on a Long-term Management Plan for the species. This work is ongoing and we continue to work at an EU level with the European Angler’s Alliance to influence the European-wide management plans.
Campaign Timeline Since 2014
Emergency Measures
Ministers at both a UK and European level began to take the decline in bass stocks much more seriously following the publication of scientific advice calling for drastic reductions in catches. The European Commission reviewed the measures Member States has taken at national level and concluded that they had failed to conserve bass and that EU-wide measures were now necessary to protect the stock.
However, The EU Council of Ministers failed to reach agreement on bass when they met to discuss the 2015 Fishing Opportunities. The French argued in favour of a Total Allowable Catch (TAC) while the UK and other countries were in favour of technical conservation measures to protect the stock. As a result of no agreement being reached by the EU Council, a number of very rarely used “emergency measures” were introduced for 2015 by the EU Commission following a request by the UK Government. These were introduced over the course of 2015 and included:
- A ban on the winter pair trawling of spawning aggregations of bass
- An increase in the Minimum Landing Size from 36 cm to 42 cm
- Monthly vessel limits for all gear types
- Restrictions on recreational anglers – an EU-wide daily bag limit of three fish.
Read more about the developments following the 2014 Fishing Opportunities meeting here.
Major changes in 2015
- A complete fishing ban for commercial vessels and recreational anglers (including catch and release) in the first half of 2016
- In the second half of 2016 a monthly one tonne catch limit for vessels targeting sea bass and a one fish per day bag limit for recreational anglers.
Bass Campaign in 2016
Unsurprisingly following the lack of action to decrease commercial catches of bass, the 2016 scientific advice from ICES revealed that stocks of bass around the UK and North European coast were below the critical level at which recovery can be guaranteed. Following the publication of this advice, the European Commission proposed that drastic changes be made to the bass fishery in 2017:- A complete ban on all targeted netting of bass
- A monthly bag limit for anglers, as opposed to the current daily bag limit
- A bycatch allowance for demersal trawls and seines
- A closed period during February and March to protect spawning bass
The restrictions for recreational anglers failed to change, with a no-take period from January – June inclusive and a one-fish-per-day bag limit from July – December.
Bass campaign in 2017
- Fixed nets: 1.2t provision over 10 months (Feb-March closed).
- Demersal trawls and seines: Bycatch down to 1 per cent of catch capped at 100kg for trawls and 180kg for seines per month over 12 months.
- Commercial Hooks & Lines: 5t per vessel per year over 10 months (Feb-March closed)
Contact: Angling Trust Eastwood House, 6 Rainbow Street, Leominster, Herefordshire HR6 8DQ
Tel: 0343 5077006 (For Membership enquiries select Option 1) |
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Email: admin@anglingtrust.net
Angling Trust Limited is a company limited by guarantee, company number 05320350