Spoonbill. Caviar And Ok Fish And Game

[Bird Watcher]

Oklahoma Paddlefish regs: #7,8,11,12, and 13 deal with the eggs.

I'm glad the department is doing something with the eggs to produce revenue. It's better then wasting them, IMO.

Paddlefish daily limits are one (1) per day on Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday, statewide; catch and release of paddlefish only on Mondays and Fridays, statewide. Anglers cannot possess a paddlefish while in the field on Mondays or Fridays. Once you keep a fish, you must stop paddlefish fishing (snagging) for the day. The following restrictions apply to paddlefish harvest at all times.

1) Paddlefish angling by all methods is closed on the Spring River from the Highway 60 bridge upstream to the Kansas State line. Snagging of paddlefish or any fish is closed on the Grand River from the Highway 412 bridge upstream to the Markham Ferry (Lake Hudson) dam from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. year round.

2) Residents and nonresidents alike must obtain a free paddlefish permit before fishing for paddlefish. Paddlefish anglers can obtain their free permit online at wildlifedepartment.com or by contacting fishing license dealers or any Department of Wildlife Office in the state.

3) Residents or nonresidents may only have one paddlefish in their possession in the field. Nonresidents may not have more than four paddlefish in possession at any other time.

4) Catch and release of paddlefish by use of rod and reel, trotlines and throwlines is allowed, year-round. Paddlefish must be released immediately after being caught, unless kept for the daily limit. Anglers fishing trotlines or throwlines must release all paddlefish before leaving their lines (unless keeping one for a daily limit).

5) Paddlefish taken by bowfishing, gigs, spears and spearguns cannot be released. These methods cannot be used on Mondays and Fridays.

6) Paddlefish not immediately released are considered kept, and must be tagged immediately with the angler’s paddlefish permit number. Additionally, the date and time of harvest must be recorded on the paddlefish permit. Under no circumstances can any paddlefish be caught, kept, then later released (no culling).

7) Each cleaned paddlefish and its parts (carcass, meat, or eggs) must also be tagged and kept separate from all other cleaned paddlefish or paddlefish parts. Each person must keep their own paddlefish distinctly separate from paddlefish taken by others.

8) Paddlefish and paddlefish parts must remain tagged until the person in possession of the paddlefish and/or parts reaches their residence.

9) When snagging for paddlefish, anglers are allowed only one hook (one single hook or one treble hook) and all hooks must have the barbs removed or completely closed. Anglers must stop snagging when a daily limit of one fish is kept.

10) When landing a paddlefish, it is illegal to use "Gaff hooks" or any other techniques or devices that injure the fish, unless the angler is bowfishing.

11) No person can possess the eggs of more than one paddlefish that are still attached to the egg membrane. In addition, no person can possess more than three (3) pounds of either processed paddlefish eggs or fresh paddlefish eggs removed from the membrane. "Processed eggs" are any eggs taken from a paddlefish that have gone through a process which makes the eggs into the product caviar or into a caviar-like product.

12) No person can ship into or out of, transport into or out of, have in possession with the intent to so transport, or cause to be removed from this state raw unprocessed, processed, or frozen paddlefish eggs.

13) All paddlefish must have all viscera (internal organs) removed before leaving the state.

[Outside Bend]

Seems like a bit of waste going in the MO side. Why not allow an angler to possess eggs of spoonbill, after all the only other option is to dump them in the stream. I hate stupid laws.

The logic behind the MO statute is that, if possessing paddlefish eggs were legal, you have folks out there harvesting the fish just for their eggs (caviar market), and dumping the carcasses elsewhere, or slitting the bellies of captured paddlefish to check for eggs before they're creeled, releasing fish which aren't gravid.

Basically, it's six on one hand, a half-dozen the other. Either you waste the paddlefish eggs by making anglers dump them overboard, or you help support a sketchy caviar market allowing anglers to keep the eggs.

[troutfiend1985]

The logic behind the MO statute is that, if possessing paddlefish eggs were legal, you have folks out there harvesting the fish just for their eggs (caviar market), and dumping the carcasses elsewhere, or slitting the bellies of captured paddlefish to check for eggs before they're creeled, releasing fish which aren't gravid.

Basically, it's six on one hand, a half-dozen the other. Either you waste the paddlefish eggs by making anglers dump them overboard, or you help support a sketchy caviar market allowing anglers to keep the eggs.

I guess, but I would want to know if this was really an issue in the past. Maybe if there were really an issue with this in the past, which could well be(I'm not claiming to be an expert on paddlefish) then that would be a justification which I would accept.

However, it still seems to be a waste of a resource, in that people do seem to consume these eggs. I don't know, just seems to be silly to make more things illegal.

[Bird Watcher]

I guess, but I would want to know if this was really an issue in the past. Maybe if there were really an issue with this in the past, which could well be(I'm not claiming to be an expert on paddlefish) then that would be a justification which I would accept.

However, it still seems to be a waste of a resource, in that people do seem to consume these eggs. I don't know, just seems to be silly to make more things illegal.

I think they just caught a big poaching ring on the James a couple years ago doing this very thing. I'll see if I can look it up.

Found the link on OA

http://ozarkanglers.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=12567

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — It’s probably not going to earn 38-year-old Thomas J. Nix Jr. any nominations for Sportsman of the Year.

A federal grand jury in Springfield indicted the former Shell Knob resident Wednesday in connection with the alleged harvesting of paddlefish eggs caught in illegal nets at Table Rock Lake and processing them into caviar for sales in Tennessee.

Nix, who now lives in Memphis, Tenn., was charged in a seven-count indictment accusing him and an unindicted co-conspirator of transporting and selling paddlefish roe taken in violation of state and federal laws for about seven weeks from Dec. 31 through Feb. 17. In a little more than four weeks, between Jan. 11 and Feb. 11, Nix sold about 387 pounds of the caviar to a Tennessee company for $35,820, according to the indictment.

Agents of the Missouri Department of Conservation nabbed Nix and his co-conspirator Feb. 17 in alleged possession of 78.3 pounds of unprocessed paddlefish roe, the U.S. attorney’s office for the Western District of Missouri said in a news release. Nix and his co-conspirator allegedly took eight paddlefish from Table Rock Lake on that occasion and extracted their roe, the U.S. attorney’s office said.

Another 91.32 pounds of paddlefish caviar, processed and packaged in containers for sale to the Tennessee company, allegedly were discovered at Nix’s home in Shell Knob and seized by the agents.

Paddlefish native to the Mississippi River basin have been declining in population because of over-fishing and habitat changes, and are protected by state and federal laws, the federal prosecutor’s office said.

Female paddlefish reach reproductive maturity at nine to 11 years of age and can weigh 50 to 100 pounds. They may hold five to 10 pounds of roe.

Nix allegedly set gill nets, commercial fishing nets set vertically in the water to entangle swimming fish by their gills, on Table Rock Lake in Stone and Barry counties. The U.S. attorney’s office said he would return to check on the nets every few days, removing the fish he’d caught, and relocating the nets as the fish moved upstream to spawn.

Nix allegedly split open the fish suspected of containing roe, extracted the eggs by hand, bagged them and placed them in a cooler to be taken back to his home. He would also weight the carcasses of the fish with rocks and sink them in the lake to avoid detection, the federal prosecutor’s office said.

He sold it to the caviar processing and sales company in Tennessee at various locations in that state by falsely representing it as caviar lawfully taken in Arkansas, the prosecutor’s office said.

The indictment charges him with a single count of possessing and transporting roe taken in violation of federal regulations and five counts of transporting paddlefish caviar across state lines. An allegation is included that would require Nix to forfeit to the government all vehicles and equipment used to commit the offense, including a 20-foot Bumblebee 200 Pro boat and trailer with a 225 hp engine, a global positioning system, three gill nets and a digital scale.

A close relative of the sturgeon, the paddlefish’s roe produces a caviar similar to sturgeon caviar and has become a popular substitute in the face of diminishing sturgeon populations worldwide and international protection for declining stocks, the U.S. attorney’s office said.