Fish protection circuit in the iron waters
In the first half of the year, our professional and social fish wardens operating in the water areas managed by the Vas County Association of Sports Fishing Associations inspected nearly 9,000 anglers, compared to which, fortunately, 25 reports were issued for fishing and fish protection irregularities. Most of the irregularities were caused by the failure to keep a catch log, the failure to register the fish caught and kept, protected by size restrictions, but there are also fishermen who fish with more skills and who fail to redeem a territory ticket. In addition, our fish wardens have registered a lot of written warnings for anglers who violate the national or local fishing regulations and parking rules, in which case the fish wardens are entitled to collect the territorial ticket in case of repeated violations.
During the communication between fish guards and fishermen, the frequency of the presence of fish guards is discussed in almost every case, many people miss the daily fish guards and want more frequent and stricter control. Of course, it would be possible to further increase the number of fish guards, but in the current situation, this would first be seen in the reduction of the amount of fish that can be planted in the waters.
The goal of our association is an efficient and effective, but supervisory and preventive fish watcher employment supplemented by service activities, which is in balance with the constantly rising costs and the price of the amount of fish planned for stocking.
It is also an interesting experience that the voices demanding stricter fish protection communicate completely differently during the fish protection procedures experienced by themselves or in their circle of acquaintances - similar to the road inspections carried out by the police - after they have experienced firsthand the fish protection fines imposed by the authorities, but mainly the withdrawal of the state fishing license consequences.
We would like to draw the attention of our fellow anglers to the fact that the approved fishing regulations of our Association allow the application of a ban for a period of up to 5 years depending on the gravity of the act from changing the area ticket valid for the waters managed by us. Our association has taken advantage of this opportunity several times in recent years, and it soon became clear that, in addition to the fines applied by the authorities and the inclusion of the state fishing license, this sanction most painfully affected the angler who broke the rules.
During personal conversations between fish wardens and local fishermen, fishermen often have a sudden "attack of honesty", during which they try to provide our fish wardens with authentic or less serious information. In addition to thanking our well-intentioned anglers for their help, we ask everyone to try to notify our professional fish wardens or the office of our Association during working hours in the event of a violation of the rules as soon as possible, since in most cases our fish wardens cannot meaningfully deal with several days' or weeks' worth of information.
In addition, the number of anglers who warn their fellow anglers to comply with the laws and regulations regarding fishing in the event of irregularities experienced on the spot - due to ignorance or intentional - is still small. Our fish wardens often experience that, upon arriving at the site, our fishermen complain to them about the behavior of a visitor breaking the rules, instead of warning them or, in more serious cases, notifying the competent fish warden.
During the summer vacation, a special topic is the problems of young people, especially minors, arising from insufficient knowledge of fishing. We would like to point out once again that children's state fishing tickets, which can be obtained easily and at a minimal cost, are mandatory for children, for which highly discounted regional tickets can be exchanged, but they are only authorized to fish under the supervision of an adult.
Several of our backwaters have webcams operating periodically or permanently, which, in addition to providing information to anglers (weather, water quality, number of anglers), also perform a fish protection function. The web camera control shed light on one of this year's prominent irregularities, and provided evidence for the initiation of the procedure, as the legally licensed camera recorded the hiding of fish caught and not entered in the catch logbook in a vehicle.
We respectfully ask our fishermen to help our fish wardens in protecting our waters and their valuable fish stock, in case of irregularities, provide authentic and verifiable information to indicate its commission, and calmly warn or call into question fellow fishermen who do not follow the rules - thereby harming all honest fishermen!
According to the experience of our fish guards, honest fishermen are still happy about the inspection, they cooperate, they consider the inspection by professional fish guards a necessary and useful activity!
We would also like to thank the police and our fishermen who supported the inspection!
Let's protect the precious fish stock of our waters together!
Note: The photos are not taken of illegal anglers, but only for the purpose of illustrating inspection actions.
