Perfectly Legal To Waste Burbot
 

Found this at Slave Lake yesterday on the point at Assineau. There was several nets set and this was the scene at each one of them. I wrote down the numbers and took photos and called Fish and Wildlife later in the day. Apparently Burbot are "not" gamefish and can be wasted. Commercial fishing is going on slave till mid April and this is occuring every day. There is no market for Burbot so Commercial fisherman are not obligated to salvage them. Here's where it gets interesting; although they are not classed as a gamefish, quota's are still in place. We'll use Pigeon Lake for an example. You, me and everybody else can go out and kill the limit for burbot on Pigeon which is ten fish ( "0" retention after Feb.1 I might add ). You can take them home or leave them on the ice, but don't kill more than the quota!!! We figured there was roughly 500 plus Burbot laying on the ice.




http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u...0/P1050115.jpg

http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u...0/P1050116.jpg

http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u...0/P1050117.jpg

holly cow...this has to be stopped....

why burbot is not a gamefish? it`s in the Regs and has limit to keep...

please let us know what was the F&W's answer....

There's a couple of spots in that area with alot of rock which makes it a good spawning area. We stopped there on the way home to pick up a few Burbot for the freezer and came across this. I was so disgusted we packed up and headed home.

wt???????????????????

I just cant believe the crap "commercial fishermen" are allowed to get away with these days....just because they don't want burbot it doesnt mean anglers dont. Personally i'd rather keep a few burbs over a pike or two....Thats gotta be the most disgutsing display i've ever seen.

X2! Wow...... unbelievable!

Thats sooooooooooo wrong

Thanks for putting up the pics. Disgusting! F'n Disgusting!

No point having two threads on this, and these pictures say it best. This link is to the Queen's Printer, this is the Act that must be amended to stop this from being legal.

http://www.qp.alberta.ca/574.cfm?pag...=9780779745258

To clarify, Burbot are lagally listed as a game fish, but this section of the Fisheries Act allows this to happen. All that needs to be done to stop this is to have SRD request parliament to amend section 57- 2-a.

WildCats, those pictures are invaluable in closing this loophole to abuse. Thanks for taking them, and sharing them. Please keep them posted in the photobucket account so others can see them, and forward the link to the government with their complaint/request for a change to this law.

If someone doesn't beat me to it, I'll post up some email address where people can voice their concerns, pictures included.

Thank you so very much for sharing this. Emails have been sent to the Fisheries head and Minister Mel Knights office. As sick as this is, it may help the initiative to get Burbot listed as an official game-fish and get some controls on limits and hopefully stop this ignorant behavior. I suggest finding the fisheries biologist in your area and sending them these shots with your comments. It only takes 5 minutes of your time.

The biologists would have likely been on the lake when the nets were pulled. If you want action send it to the newspaper, every newspaper you can think of. I have sent a link for this thread to the Edmonton Sun and my mla George Vanderburg. Disgusting waste.:mad3:

speechless
 

All I can say is what a flipping waste. Next thing you know the limit for burbot
will be 0.This has to stop!!!!!!!!!! :mad3:

X2 , get it in the face of your MLA, most people seeing that waste would not agree to let it continue !

WTF is right.I'm no biologist or whatever but don't these fish serve some sort of purpose to these lakes being bottom feeders they clean up alot of stuff.Or am i out to lunch,besides the point that just shows how Alberta's fisheries are,never mind time and money some anglers put in to catch these fish,just my $.02.

Makes me sick to see that and F&W will not do a thing. Our lakes to me are getting worse every year and this kind of crap does not help. How many have kids and they would be thrilled to catch burbot all day would they not. I saw the same thing years ago at Utikama but much worse. There were piles of dead fish and I swore I would never go back. Wanted to write my MLA about it but figured why waiste the time. The CO should find out who did this and make them clean up every spec of fish and fine them big time. :mad3::mad3::mad3::mad3:

Good on ya for taking the time and putting in the effort. I'll be droping an
e-mail to my M.L.A. including the photos and my thoughts on the waste.
:mad3: :mad3: :mad3:

I would think that if the pictures were sent to F&W along with a link that AO members and who ever can send a letter addressing this matter..things mite happen.
I have seen this kind of thing at PCR just not this bad..
Why not make them donate them to the homeless shelter like you can do with your un wanted wild meat?

Unreal

Wow. The pictures say it all. That really is unfortunate.

Before the commercial fishing bashing gets out of hand, it would be good to hear from the other side. I would hope this is an isolated incident "one bad apple....". Bad apples exist in all groups. Unfortunatley a bad apple netter can do tons more damage then a bad apple angler.

Any commercial fishermen on here that have pulled nets with lots of burbot? If so, what did you do? Of course it is possible the nets were set by an aboriginal so the same question should apply there.

It's not Aboriginals, F&W ran the net numbers and it came back Commercial.

thats just friggen retarted the burbots are excellent game species and great for eatting, such a huge waste.

There a couple of fish in the pics that don't appear to be Burbot. Thay have forked tails. Am I wrong?

There was a few Redhorse Suckers mixed in but mostly Burbot.

That's brutal and in no way should that be legal and if it is legal it needs to be changed.

Thats unbelievable!!!! Sportsfisherman have regs to abide by & the netters can waste that much of OUR resource????? That's fu**ing wrong!!!! Get on it AO members,lets try to get this changed!!!

this is not legal and burbot are in fact a game fish thus making them subject to the sportfishing regulations. i found this on SRD's website. Please read this because it seems as though people are grossly misinformed when it comes to the status of Burbot as a game fish.

http://www.srd.alberta.ca/BioDiversi...ot/Burbot.aspx

Jono88 please see walking buffalo’s post/ link to the Fisheries Act. Sadly it is legal.

Even if they were killed in the nets as a result of fishing for other fish like whitefish, they should not have been wasted. Forcing them to take them will just result in them being in the garbage somewhere else as it has been said that there is no commercial value to them(??????? really???)

Better options can be found:

a) food banks-not a big fan of this one.
b) I would pick up some for the table as I am sure many of us would - at least they would not be left to rot
c) change how netting is done to stop this (not sure if its possible)
d) no netting during the burb spawn (not sure if this is feasible)

To Wildcats
 

Dan
Those pictures were sent to media. Let the media put pressure on the government. :wave:

A further plunder of OUR resources. I find it hard to believe that there is no commercial market for burbot, I think it is greed and laziness by the commercial fisherman. Likely, not worth the time to find a market and lower prices than whitefish or walleye. Go to your local supermarket and have a look at what they are selling for fish these days, frozen, rough fish from ocean trawlers that cannot find traditional species due to over harvest. I think a market could be found or established for burbot if there was an effort made. I know I would rather purchase locally caught Alberta burbot instead of some unheard of species from south african waters.

Regardless of the waste from Alberta commercial fishing, please remember who is netting our waters. It's our rural neighbours, typically farmers that have the off time in winter and suplement (barely) their income that is already suplemented through tax paying dollars. Do they really need this income to survive? I think not. They are profiting off of our resource, when we are barely allowed to bring home a meal. Could you only imagine the outcry if these same farmers were allowed to harvest bighorn sheep, deer, moose etc in quantity when other taxpayers could not or only on draw and god forbid waste any of it?