Rec’d the following note from Clint Muns and Corey Freeman about the Governor’s signing of SHB 2431 today. I have pasted a copy of the legislation to the bottom of this message. The new rules and separate cards for Dungeness crabbing will go into effect this year. There is a $3 endorsement for Dungeness crab and the first CRC is free. Subsequent cards will cost $10.




AN ACT Relating to Dungeness crab endorsement; amending RCW 77.32.430;
creating new sections; providing an effective date; and declaring an
emergency.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

{+ NEW SECTION. +} Sec. 1. It is the intent of the legislature to
optimize the management of the recreational allocation of Dungeness crab in
Washington state. To accomplish this task, it is necessary to accurately and
efficiently quantify the total catch by recreational fishers for Dungeness
crab using data from catch record cards. Therefore, an endorsement fee on the
catch record card paid at the time of purchasing a recreational fishing
license will be required for Dungeness crab to specifically identify the
recreational crab harvesting population. The endorsement fee will
significantly improve the precision of the catch estimates by eliminating the
current practice of sampling fishers who do not participate in the
recreational crab fishery.

Sec. 2. RCW 77.32.430 and 2003 c 318 s 1 are each amended to read as
follows:
(1) Catch record card(({- s -})) {+ information is +} necessary for
proper management of the state's food fish and game fish species and
shellfish resources{+ . Catch record card administration +} shall be (({-
administered -})) under rules adopted by the commission (({- and issued at
no charge for the -})){+ . There is no charge for an +} initial catch record
card (({- and ten dollars for -})){+ . E +}ach subsequent {+ or duplicate +}
catch record card(({- . A duplicate catch record [card] -})) costs ten
dollars.
(2) {+ A license to take and possess Dungeness crab is only valid in
Puget Sound waters east of the Bonilla-Tatoosh line if the fisher has in
possession a valid catch record card officially endorsed for Dungeness crab.
The endorsement shall cost no more than three dollars including any or all
fees authorized under RCW 77.32.050.
(3) +} Catch record cards issued with affixed temporary short-term
charter stamp licenses are not subject to the ten-dollar charge (({- as -}))
{+ nor to the Dungeness crab endorsement fee +} provided {+ for +} in this
section. Charter boat or guide operators issuing temporary short-term
charter stamp licenses shall affix the stamp to each catch record card issued
before fishing commences. Catch record cards issued with a temporary short-
term charter stamp are valid for two consecutive days.
(({- (3) -})) {+ (4) +} The department shall include provisions for
recording marked and unmarked salmon in catch record cards issued after March
31, 2004.
(({- (4) -})) {+ (5) +} The funds received from the sale of catch record
cards {+ and the Dungeness crab endorsement +} must be deposited into the
wildlife fund. {+ The funds received from the Dungeness crab endorsement may
be used only for the sampling, monitoring, and management of catch associated
with the Dungeness crab recreational fisheries. Moneys allocated under this
section shall supplement and not supplant other federal, state, and local
funds used for Dungeness crab recreational fisheries management. +}

{+ NEW SECTION. +} Sec. 3. After the completion of one season using
the Dungeness crab endorsement fee for Puget Sound recreational Dungeness
crab fisheries, the department of fish and wildlife shall evaluate the
effectiveness of the endorsement fee as a method for improving the accuracy
of catch estimates for the Puget Sound recreational Dungeness crab fishery.
The department's report shall include how the method has affected their
ability to more accurately estimate the preseason allocation of the Puget
Sound recreational Dungeness crab fishery and monitor in-season catch. The
department shall report their findings to the appropriate committees of the
legislature by May 15, 2006.

{+ NEW SECTION. +} Sec. 4. This act is necessary for the immediate
preservation of the public peace, health, or safety, or support of the state
government and its existing public institutions, and takes effect May 15,
2004.

Oops, I dropped the soap.

Do you still need to buy the shell fish license or is this in addition to the shell fish license? I ususally don't go after clams, shrimp or other shell fish but I do crab. If I am able to buy a crab endorsment the 3 bucks is cheaper than the 7 dollar shell fish license. Knowing our fine state I am sure it is 3 dollars in addition to the shell fish license.
By the way, didn't we already have a catch record for crab?? Maybe that thing I have been filling out was just for fun!

baddawg,

I think the concern is that with the current crab catch records, WDFW doesn't see the cards until well after the end of the season when the card is turned in.

What they really need, though, is fairly accurate inseason catch totals to assure that the tribal/non-tribal and non-tribal commercial/sport allocations are being followed.

As it is now, they base the sport catch on a sample of fishermen extrapolated over the total shellfish license holders, some of which don't crab.

This leads to an over-estimate of the sport catch, which closes our seasons faster and more often than they need to be. It's like this...

If they sample a few dozen crabbers and find out that everyone is averaging, say, three crabs per day, and is crabbing three days a month. That means about nine crabs per person, per month.

They take that number and multiply it by the amount of shellfish licenses out there, which we'll say is 1000. That means that the sport catch is estimated to be 9000 per month.

The problem is, though, that of those 1000 shellfish licenses, maybe only 750 of them actually use their shellfish license to crab...they just gather seaweed and jig for squid.

If the 750 crabbers had an endorsement, then the estimate is made on the basis of 750 crabbers, rather than 1000. That would make the sport catch 6750 crabs per month.

This would give us a longer season as it doesn't overestimate the sport catch so badly.

Knophish, you can probably pick up the soap and be all right, unless the few extra bucks, if that, to get the endorsement chaps you more than having your season unnecessarily shortened.

Though I don't like to spend more $$ for my licenses any more than anyone else does, at least this money is earmarked for monitoring and evaluating recreational crabbers, rather than charging sturgeon fishermen extra $$ so crabbers can get better monitoring.

Fish on...

Todd

I couldn't have said it better Todd

Thanks Todd

I am not one to gripe too much about paying a few extra bucks for a license. In the great scheme of fishing costs it is a pretty small portion of what I spend.
I just hope it doesn't end up being another fee and the information gets lost or disregaurded in the process of managing the resource. I get a little discouraged to see politics replace data when it comes to managing the resource.

The money don't bother me, yes it does. It's the Govt's redundant rules & waste of time. I think the catch cards are already required to get a new license, not like the old days when you didn't really have to. I'm thought the season was shortened last year & it was way better than the year before. The monitoring will be a joke. How do you accurately monitor the tribes? OK thanx for letting me vent.

Todd has pretty much summed it up but I will say that the idea behind the CRC for a fee is that right now everyone who gets a fishing license gets one free so everyone takes one even if they do not crab....If it costs a few bucks those who will never crab won't get one so the sampling will be from real crabbers and not from every single license holder.

The tribes also threatened to shut down sport crabbing because they claimed we could not adequately account for our catch and they were correct. So we fixed it.

Thanks to Gary Hulsey , JD Wade , Clint Muns and some of my other cohorts at PSA for putting the leather on the street to get some changes made . I guess getting spit on by commercial crabbers in Port Townsend was all worth it in the end. Thanks to all the hard work behind the scenes to get one more got thing done for the sports fishing community.

Grandpa-

did they make any other changes that will insure that we get a longer season/ or fairer allocation? Dont we currently get something like 13%? How is that justified? Did anything else come from the protest efforts?

Thanks for helping me get caught up!

So much emphasis was placed on the CRC legislation that I lost track of the possibility of longer seasons but I do know that crabbing will be open at the same time all over instead of the usual practice of blaming soft shell on the extended closures in area by area. The tribes crab all the time ....I don't know who buys their soft shell crabs. Obvioously since the CRC is new we won't necessarily benefit right away. I do think things will be somewhat better this season thanks to making the disparity between commercials and sports crabbers more obvious to the policy makers. We are all over this and expect to see more good things happen if we can all stick to it.

So just last year I read that WDFW had discovered that crab molt in different parts of the sound @ different times, and the seasons were now adjusted to match the hard shell test.

This was not true? Made sense to me.

I am trusting, maybe too much, of the State WDFW, but the crabbing and clamming thing is where I start to sound like one of the older gentlemen I ride the ferry with each day. Bitter about having to have a license at all, and having to look in a book to figure out when to crab.

So now we just do like we did back in the day , test the crab shell ourselves and throw back the ones that don't pass. Sound good to me but the contradictions don't build trust. Especially when it goes back and forth from one year to the next.

The opening will be in June and the molt sxhould be over

Why is it every time the WDFW does something it cost the sportman more money? It never fails. I'm getting tired of it.

Sportsmen arent the only harvester, but are they the only group to pay for it?