State legislators pushing the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency to open most of the state's waters to commercial fishing need to keep two numbers in mind: 262 and 871,000.
Two-hundred-and-sixty-two is the number of licensed commercial fishermen in Tennessee. Of those 262, roughly 50 of them are in the business full-time.
The other number, 871,000, is how many sport fishermen there are in Tennessee. Many of them aren't going to be very happy when they find out what the commercial fishermen, backed by the state legislature, are wanting.
In June, a bill backed by Rep. Frank Nicely passed through the General Assembly that established a Commercial Fishery Advisory Council to make recommendations to the TWRA that would, ostensibly, improve their industry. As part of the bill, all of the waters in Tennessee are to be evaluated to see how they would be impacted by commercial fishing.
That brings us to another number: $741,850.
That's how much the TWRA is going to have to spend to study all of the waters in Tennessee for commercial fishing. And the legislators who passed the bill are OK with the nearly three-quarter-of-a-million-dollar tab being picked up by the sport fishermen.
The Commercial Fishing Advisory Council held its first meeting in August and the recommendations it made to TWRA include doing away with the 34-inch size restriction on catfish, opening up several East Tennessee lakes — including Norris and Melton Hill — to commercial fishing for paddlefish, allow commercial fishermen to use nets with a smaller mesh size and allow commercial fishing helpers to run gear without the commercial fishing license holder being present.
In other words, the CFAC and its political backers would like to take most of the commercial fishing regulations in Tennessee and stand them on their head because, they say, it would create jobs, bring more money into the state, etc.
That brings us to even more numbers: $700,803,079 and $1,200,000,000. According to the American Sportfishing Association, that's the economic impact of sport fishing in Tennessee every year. There's more than $700 million in retail merchandise bought every year, which has an economic impact of $1.2 billion and creates 12,344 jobs.
If the CFAC get their way, some of that could be in jeopardy.
Take Melton Hill, for example.
When the Tennessee Wildlife Federation rolled into town last Tuesday to have meeting with its Camouflage and Casting Coalition members about commercial fishing and other issues, representatives from the National Wild Turkey Federation, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Campbell Outdoor Recreation Association, Quail Unlimited, Tennessee Striped Bass Association and others were on hand. Few were as concerned about the potential of the Commercial Fishing Advisory Council and their political backers having their way as Billy Davis.
Go to
http://www.tnmuskies.org and Davis can show you dozens of reasons why he believes commercial fishing on Melton Hill is a bad idea. Davis has become a musky fishing legend in East Tennessee, has helped spread the word about the lake's fishery all over the country, and knows that nets and muskies won't mix.
"It wouldn't take long for that fishery to be wiped out," Davis said. "Melton Hill has become a destination for musky fishermen and if you put nets in there, well "
TWRA's program to reintroduce musky into Melton Hill has been a success by anybody's standards. Since 1998, the fishery has grown from a truckload of 8-inch musky dumped into the lake to one that produces musky of record proportions. Nets that would catch 5-foot long paddlefish are probably going to take a few 55-inch musky as well.
Lower the mesh-size of the nets to 1-inch and you can start kissing bass, walleye, and just about anything else that swims goodbye as well.
Musky wouldn't be the issue if Norris gets opened to commercial fishing, but then you would have the striped bass guys riled up. And all those big smallmouth in Norris? They're not swimming through a 1-inch mesh, and TWRA doesn't need to spend three-quarters of a million to confirm it.
That's why the legislators that have pushed all this have made an interesting political gamble. On one hand, they are trying to make 262 commercial fishermen happy. On the other, you risk making 871,000 sport fishermen mad.
© 2011, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.
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