Maryland Dnr Offers Reward For Snakeheads

[ollie]

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/maryland-offering-200-gift-cards-dead-snakehead-fish-163943568.html

Just read this on yahoo. The pic at the end is messed up and so is some info the writer gives, but it looks like Maryland wants to get serious about the problem. Bounties will work, but I think the way they are going about it will lend itself to dishonest people claiming the reward.

[Outside Bend]

Letting folks just send in a photo does seem pretty lax, but it also sounds more like a sweepstakes than a bounty- send in the pic and you get a chancat the $200 gift card, as well as a bunch of other prizes. If it helps raise awareness and reduce the problems, I'm all for it. The dangerous things about these sorts of programs is that it can backfire- you can wind up creating a constituency for the resource. MDC's wrestling it right now- their feral hog policy has created a group of hunters who really enjoy going out in killing them, to the point where there's evidence of they're being stocked. If folks in MD come to the conclusion snakeheads are a viable sport species, the entire bounty/ eradication program may be that much harder to implement.

[Tim Smith]

Letting folks just send in a photo does seem pretty lax, but it also sounds more like a sweepstakes than a bounty- send in the pic and you get a chancat the $200 gift card, as well as a bunch of other prizes. If it helps raise awareness and reduce the problems, I'm all for it. The dangerous things about these sorts of programs is that it can backfire- you can wind up creating a constituency for the resource. MDC's wrestling it right now- their feral hog policy has created a group of hunters who really enjoy going out in killing them, to the point where there's evidence of they're being stocked. If folks in MD come to the conclusion snakeheads are a viable sport species, the entire bounty/ eradication program may be that much harder to implement.

Exactly. I've watched the bounty/snakehead issue for a while and have had concerns and hopes on either side. It's not clear that there will be enough harvest to keep the biomass of snakeheads or other problem species down or if those will just be replaced with more, smaller fish. Bounties could work, but will they?

Robert Rice at Carb Busters has been pushing for bounties for carp and has some results to show for it here and there. Some of the bounty programs for lionfish in the Caribbean don't seem to have done any harm (although there's little evidence they've helped much either). I don't think the (misguided) pikeminnow bounty in the Pacific Northwest ever showed any useful results. Maybe it's worth a try. I doubt many people in Maryland have their hopes very high.

And as OB mentions, you have to worry that as people begin to enjoy taking out snakeheads there will be attempts to restock the population. Unfortunately, there seems to be an unlimited number of sportsmen (and women) willing to foster a fishery that damages other fisheries and the environment around it. I've found at least one group online so enthusiastic about snakeheads that they're calling for their management and stocking. They seem to have money and membes...certainly enough members to keep snakeheads in the water on the sly if that's what they want. What do you do with people like that?

There is a lot of noise (some of it mine) about how important and helpful sportsman-driven conservation can be. On finer points like this, I'm back to reassessing if this is actually true. For too many people, it's all about having something (anything) pulling on their pole without much thought for anything else. The level of selfishness and ignorance out there is pretty high.