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| 10/30/2007 9:42:00 AM | Email this article • Print this article | New rules will change the nature of boating and fishing
Bait sellers and anglers will adjust to biological security
Ed Culhane
Reporter
Emergency rules enacted to stop the spread of the fish-killing disease VHS are likely to become permanent rules by next spring, signaling a fundamental change in the way anglers will come to think about fishing.
Just as frequent flyers have learned to accept increased security at the nation's airports and change their attitudes about public safety, boaters and anglers will be conscripted into the war against biological invaders, foreign agents that often cannot be seen.
The institutional term is "bio-security" and it means folks will have to get used to the idea you just can't transfer water, plants or fish tissue from one body of water to another.
While it still isn't clear whether VHS, or viral hemorrhagic septicemia, represents a truly horrible threat, it is unlikely biological security will be relaxed in the future, just as the absence of airline hijackings won't mean an end to screening passengers at terminals.
"We all want to get to the point where boaters and fishermen act responsibly," said Mike Staggs, director of fisheries management for the state Department of Natural Resources. "People will have to work through it. People have to hear the message over and over and then figure out their alternatives. Eventually it will become second nature, and it will be more acceptable."
The emergency rules adopted Wednesday by the state Natural Resources Board will become enforceable statewide as soon as they are published next week, DNR officials said.
The rules require boaters and anglers, before they leave any body of water in Wisconsin, to drain all water from their boats, trailers and gear, and to make sure all fish they take away are dead, including bait fish.
Since dumping unused bait in lakes is prohibited, this means anglers must dispose of any leftover bait fish at the landing or drain the bait bucket and kill the bait fish before taking them home for disposal.
Habits will change with time
Fishing guides and anglers will adjust their buying habits. Muskie fishermen will be less likely to purchase a surplus supply of large suckers in the fall to avoid the necessity of disposing of expensive bait.
"We've noticed that just in our sucker sales this fall," said Ben Gollon of Gollon Brothers Wholesale Bait in Stevens Point. "Sales of suckers are way down. I think they are buying them as needed."
Under the new emergency rule it will be illegal for anyone to transport by land into Wisconsin any water in boats, live wells or other fishing gear. VHS can survive in water up to 14 days. The disease, also spread by infected fish, can be deadly to a broad range of fish species, including most game fish in Wisconsin.
There is a general prohibition against using dead fish as bait, though there are several exceptions to this rule. This will affect ice fishing in the Northwoods this fall because the popular technique of using frozen or refrigerated smelt with tip-up rigs as bait for northern pike will be illegal on inland waters.
"The simple message is, 'Don't use dead bait,'" Staggs said. "There really aren't any obvious safe sources of these fish. We know that's going to impact some people, especially with tip-up fishing."
Gollon said his family run business will not distribute smelt this year. Smelt are often harvested in Lake Erie, which is heavily infested with VHS, or Lake Michigan, where the disease was first detected this year.
"The chance of finding a clean batch of smelt is pretty thin," Gollon said. "We're going to stop handling it, stop supplying it. It's not a safe thing to use because freezing doesn't kill the virus. In the Northwoods, we're better off not using the stuff."
Golden shiner minnows or small suckers will work as a substitute, Gollon said, although many ice anglers have a strong preference for the attractive properties of oily smelt.
"The smelt do work good late in the season, there's no doubt about that," Gollon said.
Entrepreneurs step up to the plate
As is always the case when rules change, entrepreneurs are already thinking of market solutions.
David Robinson of Robinson Wholesale, a large bait distributor in Genoa City, said his firm is working on a chemical means to preserve smelt in a way that kills the VHS virus. Since this will not require freezing or refrigeration, these baits will be legal under an exception to the dead bait fish rule. He said he is working with the DNR and hopes to have the product on the market, in a package that will be recognizable to conservation wardens, by this winter.
Bait distributors have been working under the new rules since May when VHS was first discovered in Lake Winnebago and emergency rules were put into effect on a large portion of Wisconsin waters. These include a slew of new regulations from the state Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection."
The new reporting and testing requirements have been a huge headache. Bait wholesalers, who purchase wild harvested and farm raised minnows from Minnesota, Arkansas and other VHS-free states, must have their minnows tested monthly to ensure they are disease free.
"I'm getting a lot more gray hairs the last few months," Gollon said. "It's making it more difficult to get the type of bait fishermen want. We're working with vets that are a thousand miles away. Getting the paperwork back and forth has been a challenge."
Still, business has been pretty good.
"It hasn't affected us as much as gas prices," said Larry Hilger of Hilger & Sons in Antigo. " I think a lot of people stayed around and took local vacations because of the price of gas."
Bait dealers said the regulatory hurdles will become less intense once everyone, including the agencies, figures out what they are doing.
"I really give them credit for doing as good a job as they are doing," Gollon said of the understaffed DATCP crew.
Robinson said the new rules protect dealers as well as the resource since they depend on good fishing to stay in business.
"Some of this will be helpful in the long run," Robinson said. "The minnows are safe. Down the road, as the regulators learn what they are doing better, we'll get more sensible regulations."
Staggs said he's already heard some creative thinking in response to the rules. For instance, a guide or angler might equip the bed of a pickup truck with an aerated bait tank and then just take what was needed onto any given lake. As long as the angler avoids the temptation to return unused minnows to the tank - and refrained from driving the truck onto lake ice in the winter - this would probably be legal.
Some of this might seem like an enforcement nightmare, but wardens said the new rules are no different from other regulations.
"It's going to take voluntary compliance on the part of fishermen in order to prevent the spread of the disease," said conservation warden Tom Van Haren, a policy specialist in Madison. "That's true of most all of our laws. We depend on people following the rules. We can't check everybody."
The state's chief warden, Randy Stark, was there when the citizen members of the Natural Resources Board heard from various speakers and debated the issues. He said he left feeling good about the democratic process.
"You could see people were really trying to do the right thing for the resources," he said.
The board took a stronger, more conservative approach to protecting fisheries than was proposed by the DNR. Staggs said he didn't have a problem with that.
"There are no wrong or right answers here," he said. "My main issue is there has to be action on a permanent rule by December if we want to avoid a gap in coverage."
Three lobbying groups representing anglers testified in favor of extending the rules statewide - the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation, Wisconsin Trout Unlimited and the Wisconsin Council of Sport Fishing Organizations.
"I think that's part of the reason the board went ahead and did this," Staggs said. "I don't think the board heard a lot of push back."
Ed Culhane can be reached at ed@lakelandtimes.com.
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