New Bedford Guide Your Guide to New Bedford and South Coast, MA
UPDATED at 8:30am Tuesday, June 25:
Massachusetts Environmental Police Col. Patrick Moran was patroling the New Bedford waterfront when he spotted what were clearly undersized fish about the be processed. He made the plant immediately cease operations so he could confirm that the fish were indeed under the legal limit of 16 inches.
3,000 out of the 11,000 total pounds were determined to in violation of state law.
The trawler responsible for the cartch was the F/V Fisherman owned by M & P Fishing Corp. The M & P refer to the owners Mario Ribeiro and Pedro Cura. They unloaded their catch at the BASE Seafood Auction on Wednesday night when it was then sold to a process plant. The captain’s name and the processing plant have not been made public.
“Massachusetts Environmental Police officers measure Haddock that was offloaded by an offshore dragger to a processer in New Bedford.
Over 3000 pounds were found to be below the legal size limit of 16 inches.
The vessel Captain will have his day in court and the illegal fish was donated to various food pantries to help those in need.”-Massachusetts Environmental Police.
Massachusetts Environmental Police photo.
All of these fish would have been thrown back and died as bycatch. Just give them a limit on what comes up in the nets. Once you have a limit on board you are done fishing. I’ve been behind draggers and have seen acres of dead stripers, scup and other fish. All they are doing is pretending they are protecting a species.
Most likely you are probably right but what disturbs me most is how politicians capitalize off of the industry but never truly represent their interests.