WDFW NEWS RELEASE
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife
600 Capitol Way North, Olympia, WA 98501-1091
http://wdfw.wa.gov/

September 8, 2008
Contact: Susan Yeager, (360) 902-2267

Commission approves penalty for
failure to report crab catch

OLYMPIA - A $10 penalty for failing to comply with Puget Sound crab catch-reporting requirements was approved by the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission during a meeting here Sept. 5-6.

The citizens commission, which sets policy for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW), approved the department's proposal to begin enforcing the fine starting next year with catch reports due after the 2009 crab season.

Sport crabbers in Puget Sound are required to record their Dungeness crab catch on separate catch record cards - one for the summer season and one for the fall/winter season. People have the option of reporting that harvest information on the Internet or by mailing in their catch cards.

Under the new rules, crabbers who fail to report their catch will be required to pay $10 before a license vendor will issue a new catch record card for the following Puget Sound crab season. According to WDFW, less than a third of the 200,000 people licensed to fish for Dungeness crab in Puget Sound reported their catch as required.

Commissioners agreed that timely catch reports are an essential tool needed to manage the popular fishery.

In other action, the commission approved a Game Management Plan that establishes goals and performance measures for WDFW's game management program from 2009 through 2015.

Key issues addressed by the plan - approved after an extensive public review process that drew thousands of comments - include hunter access to private lands, predator management and improved communication with the public. The final plan will be posted on the WDFW website at http://wdfw.wa.gov/wlm/game/management/2009-2015/index.htm by Sept. 9.

In a separate action, the commission approved closing all special-permit hunts for deer and elk on the Yakima Training Center for the 2008-hunting season due to U.S. Army training schedules at the center. In addition, the commission approved four land transactions, including the acquisition of 815 acres in Okanogan and two properties in Yakima County to protect habitat for fish and wildlife. It also approved the transfer to WDFW of 604 acres owned by the Cascade Land Conservancy in Grays Harbor and Pacific counties.

The commission also selected six citizens to serve as advisors to the Columbia River Fish Working Group, created by the Washington and Oregon fish and wildlife commissions to recommend management options for spring and summer chinook fisheries on the lower river.

Citizen advisors from both states will work with commissioners and fishery managers on the Working Group to develop management recommendations for consideration by the two commissions in December. Washington's advisors include two members representing sport fisheries, two representing commercial fisheries and two representing local communities.

In considering its own operations, commissioners voted to move two of its upcoming meetings - previously scheduled in Ellensburg and Leavenworth - to Olympia to reduce travel costs for staff. Concerned about tight revenue projections in the coming years, the commission also directed WDFW staff to explore options for scheduling some public meetings via videoconferencing to reduce travel costs and expand public participation.

Updated information on future commission meetings will be posted on the commission's website at http://wdfw.wa.gov/com/meetings.htm .

The commission was also briefed by WDFW staff on:

* Ongoing efforts to reduce the department's operational costs.
* Proposed amendments to commercial fish and shellfish reporting requirements.
* Legislative initiatives under discussion regarding minimum-age requirements for hunting.

For information about future commission meetings, contact the commission office at (360) 902-2267 or see the WDFW website at http://wdfw.wa.gov/com/meetings.htm .

The hunting community has had the admin penalty in place for a while. Now it is being added to the recreational crabbing community. I'm all for good data collection that can build a solid scientific resource management plan.

But....before we had the mandatory CRC reporting requirements, WDFW biologists used phone surveys to extrapolate catch data. As I recall, the licenses pulled involved less than 20,000 and not all of them were actually interviewed. In 2007 somewhere in the neighborhood of 60,000 CRC reports returned (30% of the 200K CRCs). I'm assuming the responses were across the board from no crabbing to the folks who were out regularly. I'm not a statistician, but it would appear that the larger sample size should provide better data the smaller sample universe.

A 100% sample size should be strived for. I'm going to save myself $10 a year by reporting my catch information. I just wonder just how many CRC reports are needed for a statistically valid data set on recreational crab harvest.

I'm thinking about just sitting out next year's PS crabbing.

I'll wait until I see some kind of a way to get a reciept when I turn in my harvest tag.

They're supposed to have a validation # in place for returns in 2009. This year, I just made copies of the responses to track this years report.

If they put out drop boxes @ all or most license dealers like they used to have they would get a better return rate.Or hand over your old one to get a new one and have the dealer turn them in.Good luck,
STRIKE ZONE

Instead of a penalty, maybe an incentive would be better, say a drawing for a lifetime fishing license done annually for those returning their CCR reports.

You know what Doug, thats a brilliant Idea. I can't beleive noone in the WDFW came up with that..... (sarcasm)

Before all these studies and $10.00 for a crab card, we had a 270 days crab season with six crabs a day, now we have 70 days and five crabs. What next, 35 days and two hermaphrodite crabs?

When you report, your name will go into a draw for a 2009 license.


As an incentive, sport crabbers who submit their catch reports by the Sept. 15 deadline will be entered in a raffle to win one of 10 free 2009 combination licenses, which allow the holder to fish for a variety of freshwater and saltwater species.

P77, it is $3 for the CRC. $10 for not reporting.

Sure would like to see the audit completed. MGT submitted their report months ago. Sonntag's office is doing their "Quality Assurance Process" on the data. No telling when it will be out, but probably after the elections.

Just a few days left to report.

http://fishhunt.dfw.wa.gov/wdfw/puget_sound_crab_catch.html

I reluctantly sent mine in, personally I think its a bunch of BS that we have a summer and winter crab punch card. Just another way to get more money out us sportsman. Im sick and tired of all the miss management of almost all the stocks these guys manage. No matter what they do its the sportsman that get penalized by new ways to fine us, reduced limits and reduced seasons, while we watch the commercial guys continue the rampage of our resources.
Just a little venting about how messed up our WDFW has gotten.

You're just living up to your login name, oldfisherman.

If you're truly "old", you are allowed to sit on the rocker on your front porch, and tell us young whipper-snappers how it was back in they day and how it's all messed up now.

Hell, you're even allowed to drink cheap beer and piss yourself, if you feel like it. You've EARNED that right!

I'm listening!



PS. If you were a young whipper-snapper, like myself, I'd probably tell you to just STFU, do everyone a favor and stop buying a license, and give up fishing.

Liars use numbers, but the numbers don't lie.

I wish every sportfisher would return thier' CRC. Then Staff at DFW would not be able to extrapolate the sport harvest and perhaps would lead to equitable distribution of our public resource.

Ya right Slabhunter, I might have been born in the night, but it wasn't last night.....

For a "Very Complete History" on the so called Quality Assured Audits performed under contract by MGT, y'all might want to explore this link ( http://www.baylinerownersclub.org/forum/showthread.php?t=4792 ) and become very ill at the political suppression (until after Generalissimo Christine's Re-Election) of the audit results. The so called Quality Assurances being applied have gone on longer than the actual audit by MGT. When the "warning" appeared in the Peninsula Daily News, I got to frustrated with the State that I wrote a letter to the editor as follows:

The Friday 8/29th PDN Matt Schubert’s column, State gets crabby? The column says “The state Fish and Wildlife Commission will meet next week in Olympia to consider a proposal to impose a $10 penalty on Puget Sound sports crabbers who fail to adhere to catch-reporting requirements.” I had to laugh real loud at that one! Maybe they should also consider a $10 penalty on the Governors and State Auditors Offices for the time they are taking to “Perform Quality Assurances” to the Performance Audit of the entire WDFW Crab Catch Reporting System/Process. MGT (Seattle Audit Firm) started the performance audit of the program last November. They completed it with findings and recommendations at the end of February this year. Since then The Governor and State Auditor have been “Improving” the findings and recommendations. This “Improving” is taking longer than it took to actually do the audit. I wonder, are they just slow? Didn’t get the results they expected? Waiting for the election cycle to pass before “Questionable Results” are released? I think I will withhold my Sports Crabbing Catch Record card until such time that the State releases the Audit Findings & Recommendations.

John Q – Freshwater Bay

And by the way, the MGT Audit firm also performed a Performance Audit of the Puget Sound Chinook Hatchery program, and I betcha that is really giving Christine/Sonntag/WDFW and the Big Time Political Contributors (TRIBES/CASINOS!!!!!!!) a large case of intestinal distress.

What I propose is that next April when we all belly up to the bar and buy licenses, specify that you do NOT want a crabbing endorsement on your license until the Crab allocations are radically revised from Commercial Crabbers (all 221 active licenses) to Sports Crabbers.

I am good with the penality program

I think the average user needs incentive to report

And I also think the average lisence buyer maybe doesn't get any crab?

Beats the stoopid phone surveys IMHO

Will someon explain to me why we have 2 crab punch cards, and only 1 punch card for all other fish. And another question I have is how do the commercials(both tribal/non-tribal) report their catches and does anyone do any verification?

Thanks for any info on this....

1 card for summer and 1 card for winter.

Thanks Jerry, but why the _______do we have 1 for summer and 1 for winter when all other cards are good for the year? Thats what I want to know. I think it gives an opportunity for more revenue via BS fines like this etc. etc....

I think it allows for a summer and winter season. Since the catch numbers seem to vary so much you can either have a conservative season (short) or try and make adjustments. Adjustment requires data. The CRCs are cheaper than having samplers at every port every day.

System is not perfect, but better data will cost more.