[Mussel]

I am a commercial fisher, those were not my nets. At present there is no market for burbot as we are forced to sell our commercial catch to the Freshwater Fish Marketing Corporation and they refuse to buy burbot. We do whatever we can to give these fish away to whoever would like to take them, unfortunately we are not always able to find people who want them. This particular season has a zone that makes it especially difficult to avoid the burbot and still catch the targetted whitefish. There is a commercial quota on the burbot that is never reached as we are usually very good at avoiding this species. As commercial fishers we would like to see anglers keep as many burbot as they can catch. These burbot are extreme predators that are very adept at feeding upon walleye. We have dressed spring burbot and found as many as 60 walleye fingerlings in the belly of one burbot. In our commercial nets we can catch many whitefish with the very odd walleye, the walleye are usually no good as they have spent the night in the belly of a burbot and are partially digested. As for changing the law it would prevent people from seeing the wasted fish but these fish are being eaten by birds coyotees and the like, if the were hauled off of the lake they would needlessly fill our local landfills and truly be waisted. No easy solution here but please know that it is never the intention of a commercial fisher to waste fish.