More Info on Goliath Grouper Issue in South Florida

[SharkyJillian]

Found this on E-Divers and wanted to share:
There appears to be a highly disturbing trend occurring off Palm Beach
County involving a few individual spearfisherman who are actively going
out
and intentionally spearing goliath grouper.

The first reported incident took place back in the early half of this
July
on the Bonaire/Zion Train wreck site, also called the Jupiter Wreck
Trek,
off Jupiter Florida. The fish apparently survived its encounter
loosing the
shaft a week later.

Since then there have been four more such incidents.

The first on September 6, 2007, which Randy of Emerald Charters in
Jupiter
found alive with spear lodged in it’s mouth after someone apparently
shot it
at the Bonaire/Zion Train wreck site, also called the Jupiter Wreck
Trek.
The video of him wrestling with fish is on YouTube.com (video taken by
Terri
Roberts) in order to free it of the shaft, which he did successfully,
and
now has the shaft and tip in his possession.

The second fish was found dead September 22, 2007 with a shaft clean
through
its gill covers after someone apparently tried to free shaft it. Photo
of
that fish is on this link
http://www.emeraldcharters.com/divereport.html

Both of these fish of these fish on the same Bonaire/Zion Train wreck
site.


In addition to these two more recent fish, a third fish was caught the
same
week on video by Jay Cashmere of WPTV, Channel 5 news while they were
shooting for their news program Underwater Wednesdays
(http://www.wptv.com/content/segments/uww/default.aspx) at the
Bonaire/Zion
Train Wreck site which shows a shaft buried deep in its side.

Gerry Carroll at Jupiter Dive Center found the same fish on two more
occasions a week later. The first time taking pictures of it after
failing
in their attempt to catch it to remove the shaft. The second time,
dead,
from both the wound and starvation. Gerry did retrieve and identify the
shaft as one coming from a European type/style gun. Different from the
ones
used on the two fish Randy ran across the same month.

The fourth fish, September 29, 2007, was shot and then apparently stuff
under a ledge near the Hole-in-the-Wall after the shaft was removed. Note: All five of these fish were shot at two known spawning aggregationsites, four of which during the peak month of their spawn season which isSeptember over here on the east coast. And this is only the fish we do knowof, which brings the question of those we haven’t run across yet.As of now there is a $1,500 reward (sponsored by Emerald Charters and ScubaWorks Dive Shop) for any information leading to the arrest of the poacher(s) that is doing this. For more information call Randy 561-248-8332--Michael C. BarnetteAssociation of Underwater Explorershttp://uwex.us

 

[dumpsterDiver]

Jewfish are deliberately being killed by some spearfisherman and also by some hook and line anglers. The resentment some members of these two groups feel for the fish is growing rapidly and I am hearing of more and more frequent ancedotal evidence of fish being shot and eaten, shot and discarded and also hauled to the surface by hook and line fisherman and then deliberately not venting the fish to allow it to drift off and die at the surface. Jewfish are responsible for "stealing" a lot of fish from hook and line and spearfisherman.

Their populations are exploding in the last 5-6 yrs and many people now that the population needs to be thinned out. Based on what I am hearing, a significant number of fish are being deliberately killed and their meat is being wasted. I doubt that these few observations are isolated incidents.