Coast Guard seizes shrimp from two boats in closed fishing area

[highplainsdem]

Source: Times-Picayune

Coast Guard seizes shrimp from two boats in closed fishing area
Published: Monday, June 21, 2010, 11:12 AM Updated: Monday, June 21, 2010, 11:36 AM
Martha Carr, The Times-Picayune



The Coast Guard on Sunday seized approximately 30,000 pounds of shrimp from two boats that were fishing in closed area 35 nautical miles south of Terrebonne Bay.

Coast Guard officials boarded the fishing vessels Lady Monica and La Borrachita after recieveing a tip that the boats were shrimping in prohibited waters. During the inspections, approximately 10,000 pounds of brown shrimp were found onboard Lady Monica and approximately 20,000 pounds of brown shrimp were found on the La Borrachita. The shrimp were returned to the sea.

"The Coast Guard is committed to ensuring a robust law enforcement presence in the restricted fishing area," said Lt. Cmdr. Carmen DeGeorge, chief of the Eighth Coast Guard District law enforcement branch. "We will continue to dedicate assets to the restricted area to ensure integrity of the Gulf of Mexico seafood."

Both vessels were issued written fisheries violations.


Read more: http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/06/coast_guard_seizes_shrimp_from.html

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This happened with another boat last week, and that one also got off with just a written warning, as I recall.

Are there any fines associated with these violations? Or are they so minimal that fishermen are likely to disregard them?


Editing to add that I posted a link to the AP story on this incident, which included the information that the boats were from Brownsville, Texas, in reply 6 below.

[jpak]

1. If contaminated Gulf shrimp reaches the market, it will affect all US shrimp sales

and we will have to eat shrimp farmed in Asia - where there is no pollution....

:sarcasm:

The Coast Guard and FDA really need to crack down on violators - desperate shrimpers will do their best to cheat....

[AsahinaKimi]

4. it would be horrible if there

Was a huge ban on all US shrimp in the country. I am not sure where, on the west coast, we get our shrimp, but I for one would be really sad, if I couldn't have it once in a while.

[mbperrin]

7. Could always get it from west Texas, improbable as that seems:

http://www.usmsfp.org/farm-websites/texas%20news/seafoodwithoutthesea.htm


IMPERIAL, Texas – Seagulls swirl and swoop in the gray winter skies above the dusty Permian Basin. The big white birds are as improbable as the prey that lures them: desert-grown shrimp.

Never mind that this patch of wind-blown West Texas is better known for oil fields than seafood farms. All that drilling occasionally released underground saltwater, remnants of the Permian Sea that covered the area eons ago.

In 1992, a wildcatter's bust turned out to be a marine biologist's gusher. Dallas-raised Bart Reid and his wife, Patsy, punched holes in the ground looking for seawater, not oil. When they struck saline gold, the Reids pumped it into 16 four-acre manmade ponds and began farming shrimp on the edge of the Chihuahuan Desert.

Now, these homegrown crustaceans are putting the tiny Pecos County town of Imperial on the culinary map. Sporting an organic pedigree, they're on restaurant menus across West Texas and will debut at a ritzy Dallas steakhouse early next year.

They're "the very cleanest and sweetest tasting I've ever used," says executive chef Peter O'Brien of the tony Lajitas Resort.

For Mr. Reid, West Texas shrimp farming is a dream come true – and a calling.

As a marine biologist, he says, "Growing fish is the best way to produce top-quality food and take some of the heat off the oceans." As a convert to the beauty-and-the-beast nature of West Texas, he believes shrimp farming makes the otherwise useless underground saltwater "a perfect resource, and it would feel like a sin not to use it."




Lots more at the link - these really are some nice folks.

[highplainsdem]

8. See my post below, reply #6. The boats were from west Texas, from Brownsville.

That info was in AP's story on this, which I linked to there.

[mbperrin]

15. Brownsville is the southernmost tip of Texas, right on the border with Mexico,

620 miles from here, west Texas, the edge of the Chihuahuan Desert.

This is the Permian Sea, which disappeared a couple of hundred million years ago.

Please don't mix up our pristine shrimp with that open water wild stuff!

[AsahinaKimi]

10. Where does California get its shrimp?

Do we have shrimp boats here? I love seafood so much!

[Juneboarder]

12. California Shrimp

I believe the two largest exporters of shrimp to California are Hong Kong and Fiji.

[AsahinaKimi]

16. oh! Thank you ..

So my Kung Pao shrimp probably does come from Hong Kong! Nice!^^

[time_has_come]

11. Why would you be sad if you couldn't eat shrimp once in a while?

Trawling for those bottom feeding toxic filters results in over 5 pounds of waste (unintended fish caught/killed) for every pound of shrimp caught.

Really a disgusting creature to be eating if we consider what it is.

[AsahinaKimi]

14. I happen to enjoy

Ebi with sushi, as well as Chinese Shrimp Fried Rice, Garlic shrimp with Noodles, and other Asian recipes for Shrimp. I love it! What better reason then that? Oishkatta ne!

[thereismore]

2. They are in a tough spot. nt

[no_hypocrisy]

3. Brown shrimp - - - in more ways than one.

[CountAllVotes]

5. after recieveing a tip

too bad they cannot spell "receiving" ... :dunce:

:(

:kick:

[highplainsdem]

6. The AP story on this says the boats were from Brownsville TX. Would selling the shrimp back in Texas

let them evade the additional testing being done?

That AP story on AL.com:

http://blog.al.com/live/2010/06/shrimp_oil_spill_louisiana_closed.html

[Ian David]

9. Oil is organic! Let the Conservatives at the shrimp!

"Oil is Organic" bumper sticker on neighbor's car.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8564083

Idiot republicans are sporting Oil is Organic bumper stickers if you see an idiot with that on their car, pour oil on their windshield
http://twitter.com/Xultar/status/16261271655

[Juneboarder]

13. The fact that this is happening is making me double think

my carnivorous habits. I have always been one to induldge in a nice, juicy burger; however tainted shrimp can enter into our food chain and I don't even want to go there with my body...

[wordpix]

17. good for the Coast Guard & I hope those shrimpers get a nice fat fine

Let's stop slapping resource-violators on the wrist. The time for that is OVER