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An Australian article from the Sunshine Coast in Queensland caught my eye. Fuel prices have made it non viable for trawlers to operate at profit and they seek FURTHER subsidy from the government for gas.

Part of the article read:

Today's action follows yesterday's threat by desperate Sunshine Coast trawler operators that they will blockade major Australian ports if the federal government refuses to provide their industry with emergency funding.

They said if help wasn’t forthcoming, the industry would be dead on the Coast by Christmas.

Rally organiser Michele West, who has been fishing for the past 20 years, said high fuel prices and the indiscriminate dumping of cheaper imported prawns on the market would spell the end of the industry.

I agree with the sentiment of the poster "aussiefish"whom nailed it by saying "What a great Christmas present for the ocean environment . Finally a end to one of the most destructive fishing methods on the planet. Lets hope the government take aggressive action against any vessels blocking our waterways. 2009 will be a great year if the longline and netting industries also collapse.
We do not need to eat prawns or swordfish. I hate to see my tax dollars funding blatant environmental vandalism for profit."

There has been a few stories running about and it worth reading them HERE
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Commercial netting interests once again tried to get the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) to allow larger mesh sizes in nets so they could be used as a gill net. The issue was discussed with public testimony before the full Commission at its June 12 meeting in Ft. Lauderdale.

Read the full story HERE

"In November 1994 an overwhelming 72% of Florida voters said yes to the constitutional amendment limiting marine net fishing. The amendment includes both a prohibition on the use of gill and entangling nets in all state waters and a size limit on other nets. Although the restrictions have been in place for nearly fourteen years, there are still factions within the commercial industry who refuse to accept the legal reality that the constitutional prohibition on gill nets means no gill nets."

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The giant squid which has been on display at Underwater World for the past year and a half is off to its new home at the Queensland Museum in Brisbane.

There it will be thawed out, preserved in formalin, made into a resin model and then cut up into different bits – not for the world’s largest calamari platter, but for research.

The seven-metre squid was caught in fishing nets off the South Island of New Zealand and had spent much of its afterlife being gazed upon in awe by the thousands of tourists who passed through the exhibit. Story here SQUID MOVE

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