08/22/2017
FWC Lionfish Events - PSA
Hello fellow divers,
My name is Donny with the Northeast Florida Lionfish Blast in Jacksonville, FL. I have an interesting lionfish tale to tell about this past year’s tournament.
My friends and I, a few years back, noticed that we had a lionfish issue on the rise. As a group of four divers that drink beer and shoot fish, we decided to be proactive and do our part, so we started organizing a tournament. None of us are affiliated with any dive shops, retailers, or the FWC, we’re doing this tournament for “fun”. Well, it was fun. We met a bunch of great divers, killed over 11,500 lionfish in 5 years, and spurred interest in recreational/commercial harvesting in our area. We worked hard and put on a great raffle and tournament that paid out 100% of money that we received, no pay rolled officers here.
A few years ago the FWC began offering tournament assistance for lionfish tournaments as long as they met certain criteria. We were pretty excited, more funding meant we could pay out more people! Lionfish wholesale sales were not prevalent at this time. One of the requirements for funding is to have a specified number of participants. At first it was 10 participants, then this year it changed to a slightly different format basing assistance amount on number of participants. This has never been a problem for our tournament because we have a good core of divers ready to compete and we have had at least 25 divers every year. This year we found out that not every diver who signed up for our tournament was a “FWC defined participant.”
We received acknowledgement of our $1500 tournament assistance in March and began marketing our tournament to be as successful as possible, and it was our best year ever over 4000 lionfish! The problem lies in the following statement:
“Participants are defined as divers or saltwater anglers who are registered for the specified tournament, successfully harvest lionfish within the tournament timeline, and turn in their caught lionfish to the respective tournament weigh-in.”
Out of our minimum of 25 divers each year, we always had at least 10 guys bringing in fish. To meet the new standards, we needed 20 participants. We had 20 go diving and 18 divers returned with lionfish, most of which wound up on dinner plates at home and at restaurants. When it came time to settle up with the FWC after supplying them with all our tournament info, we were informed that we were now only receiving $1000. Now $500 isn’t a big deal when you just “shuffle” money around and make allotments elsewhere, we had paid out all of our tournament prizes at the tournament wrap up party on LRAD day. Our top two places receive their portion of prize money once funding has been received from FWC. Luckily I had to great guys sitting in 1st and 2nd this year. I explained the situation and they agreed that they would take a reduced prize because they didn’t want me to have to pay them out of my pocket.
I write this message as a Public Service Announcement, as they say, no good deed goes unpunished. If you have participated in FWC surveys, helped them by tagging fish, or participated in one of their tournaments you are walking a slippery path. You will lose the ability to utilize your resources, give them the minimal data that they need to make regulation decisions, and heck, they may even take money out of your pockets. I encourage you to shoot, buy, eat, and sell lionfish, but stay away from the FWC, they are here for their own agendas not those of the fishing community.
Happy Hunting,
Donny
