NFC Chimes in on New Hampshire Legal Baitfish Proposal...
NFC’s comments, highlighted red text, in regard to the current legal baitfish list in new Hampshire…
The New Hampshire chapter of NFC recently reviewed the states legal baitfish list. Our findings were forwarded to New Hampshire Fish and Game for review and ideally action. Prior to this, NH NFC formally challenged a sweeping fishing regulations change proposal that would have greatly expanded the number of waters where live fish as bait could be used.
The analysis of NH’s legal baitfish list was triggered by a public comment made by Director of Fisheries, Dianne Timmins, that all legal baitfish species were native to the state. One, emerald shiner, was clearly not native to NH, and had been recently removed from Maine’s legal baitfish list due to concerns over their potential to introduce Viral Hemorrhagic Septicemia (VHS,) a serious, highly contagious, and often fatal viral disease.
“Emerald shiners (Notropis atherinoides) are a federally listed susceptible species. They often carry the virus [VHS] without showing any obvious external symptoms, making them silent carriers...”
While NFC applauds NHFG’s proposal to remove emerald shiners from the legal baitfish list, more should be done than is being proposed. Specifically, NFC identified two species of legal baitfish with limited native range and current distribution within New Hampshire.
“In many jurisdictions, wild-harvested emerald shiners cannot be commercially sold, transported across state lines, or moved between bodies of water unless they are officially tested and certified VHS-free...”
NFC also uncovered several biologically incorrect definitions that could mislead anglers and make enforcement and prosecution of violations difficult at best. That these incorrect definitions stood as long as they did shows a general lack of concern in regard to the use of live fish as bait.
While NHFG acknowledged the mistakes noted by NFC, and informed us that they would be making some changes based on our findings, they fell short of what should have been done. As is unfortunately often the case, NHFG is placing a higher value on fishing than they are fish…
“According to NHFG, [creek chubsucker] are also ‘commonly’ confused with bridle shiners, a state-level threatened species... ”
Below for NFC’s formal response to NHFG’s recent legal baitfish list maintenance proposal:
