Part of the issue with this, is that we (LA, TX, AL, FL, MS) are all in this together. Some states have way more snapper than other states, but it doesnt matter as it currently stands. Its a regional thing, not a state thing and is why it needs to be ran by the individual states. We are getting "punished" because FL doesnt have as many snapper.
The other issue most people have is with the sampling methods. You can probably go to any oil platform in 50+ feet of water and see an abundance of red snapper and think the population is just booming. Maybe it is right there, BUT biological sampling does NOT work that way. It seems silly, but I understand it. When you are taking a sample to look at population trends over time, you have to sample the same way every time. You can't pick out the best spots and do a sample there, you have to randomly sample. This is how deer browse surveys are done, quail whistle/covey counts are done, turkey gobble counts are done, songbird point counts are done, etc. etc. You go to the exact same spot every time. With waterfowl, you fly the same transects each year. Even though there may be 50,000 mallards sitting in flooded timber a mile outside the transect, or a thousand deer in Farmer Johns soybean patch, or 100 turkeys gobbling a mile down the road, those don't count.
The problem with oil platforms is that that particular oil platform is not always going to be there, so you can't include them. That being said, you could adjust the sampling methods to sample say oil platforms in a certain depth of water that have been there a certain amount of years and change it up if the platforms are removed, or something like that.
This all seems silly and we may not all agree on it, but I do understand it.
|