Ormerer hunts in vain for sense in OAP prosecution

Monday 21st February 2011, 2:29PM GMT.

Skye Jackson, 11, left, and Courtney Wray, 13, enjoy their first spot of ormering at Lihou headland yesterday. (Picture by Adrian Miller, 1096648)

AS ORMERERS took advantage of yesterday’s low tide concerns were expressed about the recent prosecution of two men.

The men, aged 53 and 74, were both fined £150 in the Magistrate’s Court last week for taking undersized ormers on the first ormering tide of the year.

But the convictions have been criticised by fishermen and other ormerers, who say taking the men to court was a waste of money.

Tessa Le Gallez, 32, has been ormering since she was a child.

‘I think what they did to those two men was disgraceful,’ she said.

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1
The Truth

February 21, 2011 at 3:20 pm

Can the GEP or anyone who actually knows, not someone who heard it from a bloke down the pub, tell us what the actual sizes of ALL the undersize ormers these men were found with were please.

All the GEP has said is “Mr Falla had five that were too small, with three measuring 2mm short of the 80mm limit. Mr Domaille had six ormers that were too small” and so people have jumped all over this 2mm figure, and yet the other 8 of the 11 that were undersize are obviously smaller than 78mm, and I wonder exactly how much smaller.

PS. What has the fact that one of them was a pensioner got to do with the story? Does that mean he should be exempt from the law?

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2
dan pinchemain

February 21, 2011 at 6:45 pm

quite right too, the size limits are there to protect the fish stocks, and shouldnt and cant be flaunted by anyone, irrelevant of there age or circumstances.

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3
damo

February 22, 2011 at 2:05 am

Whilst i feel sorry for them, i am in fact an avid ormerer and the law is there for a reason, being to protect stocks…

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4
Firestorm

February 22, 2011 at 10:36 am

If your not sure if an ormer is big enough then you leave it. The size and times you can take ormers works perfectly well to preserve stocks. But a note to the sea fisheries some times you might want to take a walk down the beach and have a look at the few individuals who like to go swimming then dive down for the ormers I thought that was illegal.

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