The thing is, banning conch harvesting in breeding season does very little to improve the local stocks. The conch will be planktonic for years before settling downstream from the DR. The same thing goes for lobster harvest. It can take several years for embryonic conch or lobsters to settle and in that time they can travel thousands of miles. Well far away from Dominican waters.
- Thread starter mountainannie
- Start date
DO NO EAT tHE LAMBI
why would they make a law banning it then? I mean, where is down stream from the DR? Venezuela? Jamaica?
I know little of the life of a conch.
I thought that was a something elze? without the "n" have never actually seen it spelled.. comes out looking like a sofa
I know a lot about their life cycle. Took a semester studying fisheries management in the Turks and Caicos Islands where conch and Spiny Lobster are their main export. Anything that targets breeding season is useless. The fisheries crash from over harvesting adults. Humans throughout the Caribbean only take in a small fraction of the total population. Where they need to improve is on minimum/maximum harvest size and what is called "recruitment," which is enticing the planktonic larvae to settle out of the water column and then providing shelter to prevent predation before reaching harvest weight. This can also mean managing other fishing that can indirectly affect the population.
Conch's main predators are skate, which eat them while they are still juveniles. Fewer than 1 in a 100 conch will survive from being an inch long to harvest size. By the time they are adults, there are few predators in the wild that eat them simply due to their size. If an Eagle Ray can't gulp them down, little else can.
They've tried to improve survival by collecting juveniles and putting them into enclosures that skates couldn't get into, but an interesting thing happened. The juveniles didn't grow the distinctive "horns" that conch normally have. They can somehow detect the absence of skates and then don't develop the horns.
[video=youtube;8R2zvE615dM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8R2zvE615dM[/video]
Conch's main predators are skate, which eat them while they are still juveniles. Fewer than 1 in a 100 conch will survive from being an inch long to harvest size. By the time they are adults, there are few predators in the wild that eat them simply due to their size. If an Eagle Ray can't gulp them down, little else can.
They've tried to improve survival by collecting juveniles and putting them into enclosures that skates couldn't get into, but an interesting thing happened. The juveniles didn't grow the distinctive "horns" that conch normally have. They can somehow detect the absence of skates and then don't develop the horns.
[video=youtube;8R2zvE615dM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8R2zvE615dM[/video]
Last edited:
You've got a species that doesn't hide, doesn't run away and often lives within a mile of the coastline. That makes management somewhat problematic. On the plus side, their range throughout the Caribbean is about the same size as North America. I don't think we have to worry about them going extinct any time soon.
So what does work? Refuge. You create zones where conch fishing is allowed and others where it's completely banned with strict penalties. Every couple years, you rotate the refuges to other areas, and the fishermen can over-harvest as much as they want where the stocks have recovered. In the Turks, they create refuge by banning the use of SCUBA. This limits the effective fishing range to a depth of about 20ft. If a boat gets caught fishing for conch with SCUBA gear on board and a pile of conch, the boat is seized.
Slot limits would be nice, but it's just not practical. That would require continuous monitoring of the shells harvested and telling the conch fishermen to toss back the juvenile conch they catch with no compensation. They don't usually care for this kind of enforcement and it's expensive to try to enforce. What's a slot limit? It means you don't harvest conch that are too small to be able to breed or the conch that are very mature females and can yield far more eggs than younger conch. Most of the conch harvested are juveniles so have never had a chance to reproduce. The juveniles don't run away either...
So what does work? Refuge. You create zones where conch fishing is allowed and others where it's completely banned with strict penalties. Every couple years, you rotate the refuges to other areas, and the fishermen can over-harvest as much as they want where the stocks have recovered. In the Turks, they create refuge by banning the use of SCUBA. This limits the effective fishing range to a depth of about 20ft. If a boat gets caught fishing for conch with SCUBA gear on board and a pile of conch, the boat is seized.
Slot limits would be nice, but it's just not practical. That would require continuous monitoring of the shells harvested and telling the conch fishermen to toss back the juvenile conch they catch with no compensation. They don't usually care for this kind of enforcement and it's expensive to try to enforce. What's a slot limit? It means you don't harvest conch that are too small to be able to breed or the conch that are very mature females and can yield far more eggs than younger conch. Most of the conch harvested are juveniles so have never had a chance to reproduce. The juveniles don't run away either...
Turks has a conch farm too.........
Turks and Caicos Islands | Information | Turks and Caicos Business - Vacation - Traveling
I always thought that would be a good RD idea
Turks and Caicos Islands | Information | Turks and Caicos Business - Vacation - Traveling
I always thought that would be a good RD idea
It was in the experimental stages when I was there in 2000. I think they were doing something about retaining the eggs after spawning so the larvae would settle locally and then growing them to a couple inches long.
Good posts, Peter.
The Provo Conch Farm began in the mid-80s. Very interesting life cycle. They give thousands of spawn and live up to 25 years.
The Provo Conch Farm began in the mid-80s. Very interesting life cycle. They give thousands of spawn and live up to 25 years.
Make conch jerky for off-season. Sirena/Nacional often sell frozen conch. The white meat is already stripped for you. Here's what you do:
- even with fresh conch, it's better to stiffen it up at first with a little freezer time
- finely slice the white meat into strips like bacon ? slice diagonally to get wider strips
- spread out the strips in the microwave and run it on high
- watch while the strips curl a little, turn brown and give off a glorious cooked conch aroma
- when the strips really do look like bacon, take out to cool and do more
- when dry and cool, place the strips in something like an old peanut butter jar
Keeps forever. Works as a great cocktail snack. Not tough. Flavor is LOUD!
well since we have fisheries expert on board. what about that poisonous fish that the divers say are ruining their bthe life of the coral reef? I forget what it is called but the French say you can eat them if they are properly prepared?
I guess this has turned into a WOW eat the Lambi thread..
I guess this has turned into a WOW eat the Lambi thread..
That's the lionfish. There is a thread on them around here somewhere. Quite a devastating species because they are reef fish and munch on up to a 1000 small and juvenile commercial fish a month each. Because they are an invasive, the local reef fish don't recognize them as predators. They say that eliminating 25% of the lionfish a month is what's needed just to keep a population from growing. The have venomous spines that can be very painful if you get stung, but they are edible. They clip the spines wearing gloves and then they can be cooked or sold for meat. People get tired of a pet fish and then "let it free." They should be employing the conch fishermen to kill lionfish in the prohibited season. They aren't hard to kill because they rely on their spines for protection. A Hawaiian sling spear is the best way to kill them.
When dealing with a species like that, the way to go is to target individual reefs, try to wipe it out completely, and then move to another area. You've got a logarithmic growth rate, so as mentioned knocking out 25% month does next to nothing. If that's true, it would mean they reproduce at 33% per month. If you knock out 75% in a reef in one month, it will take something over six months for them to get back to their start population.
By the way, the same theory works for mice and other vermin. If you have a coordinated campaign to knock out mice or mosquitoes for a week or two, you can actually impact the populations. Laying out a couple traps now and then has little effect. In Ecology, this is covered somewhat in the concept of additive vs compensatory mortality, but that's something you can wiki...
By the way, the same theory works for mice and other vermin. If you have a coordinated campaign to knock out mice or mosquitoes for a week or two, you can actually impact the populations. Laying out a couple traps now and then has little effect. In Ecology, this is covered somewhat in the concept of additive vs compensatory mortality, but that's something you can wiki...
Conch smugglers facing 10 years in prison??
BBC News - Dominican Republic: Conch meat smugglers 'foiled'
BBC News - Dominican Republic: Conch meat smugglers 'foiled'
Can the lion fish be poisonous to the consumer, the eater, if the spines are not removed properly? Are the spines venomous to the diver .. once the fish is dead? To a kitchen crew? I saw them on a menu and wanted to do my part by ordering it but was still a bit scared.
The best Puerto Rican empanadillas (pastelitos) are made from the Box Fish, or Chap?n. The Box Fish has poisonous parts too. Yuca, a Dominican staple, was prepared as a ritual suicide drink by Tainos who wanted to escape the tortures of the Conquistadores. While the Lion Fish also has poisonous parts, the meat is delicious.
You want to save us from the Lion Fish's depredations? Don't fight it. Eat it! Make it popular with a 12 month season.
If you want to help, or to just better understand the Lion Fish issue, go to Reef Check or HERE to contribute.
Also check out Jos? Alejandro Alverez' photo gallery. Fantastic!
You want to save us from the Lion Fish's depredations? Don't fight it. Eat it! Make it popular with a 12 month season.
If you want to help, or to just better understand the Lion Fish issue, go to Reef Check or HERE to contribute.
Also check out Jos? Alejandro Alverez' photo gallery. Fantastic!