The Hazards of Not Properly Disposing of Angling Litter
MRRP Coordinator On Marine Debris: Without An Environment For The Fish To Live In, There Will Be No Fish For Anglers To Catch
Every year approximately 60 million anglers take to the waters of the US. Some anglers look for a trophy, some are wanting to put dinner on the table, some may just be looking to spend time with their family, the one thing they all have in common is their use of fishing line.
Unfortunately, some of these anglers, leave behind their fishing line and tackle. “What I call it is judgmental trash, because when the average Joe walks out on a fishing pier and sees all this garbage, typically he or she is going to think or say ‘wow, those anglers are really irresponsible’. We try to get people to take responsibility for their fishing gear”, said Mike Conneen executive director with Anglers for Conservation.
While fishing provides quality recreation for many people throughout the country, it can also cause issues for boaters, wildlife, and the environment if anglers don’t conduct themselves responsibly. “Anglers use a variety of everyday items when fishing that if not disposed of properly can turn into marine debris”, stated Elizabeth Winchester, the Monofilament Recovery and Recycling Program (MRRP) coordinator for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation (FWC) Commission. However, the most common improperly disposed-of piece of angling equipment has to be monofilament fishing line.
Programs like the Monofilament Recovery and Recycling Program (MRRP) play a vital role in collecting and encouraging responsible disposal of monofilament line. Much of the monofilament collected is sent to the Berkley Conservation Institute based out of Iowa. There, it is recycled and made into products such as tackle boxes, spools for line, and fish habitats. It is not made into more fishing line.
“The Monofilament Recovery and Recycling Program is a statewide (Florida) program dedicated to reducing damage caused by monofilament and fluorocarbon fishing line through a network of recycling bins and drop off locations as well as education and outreach events. We have fishing line recycling bins statewide including outdoor bins made out of PVC pipe near marinas, parks and boat ramps. We also have indoor cardboard bins that are found in tackle shops, nature centers, and other locations”, stated Winchester.
“Because fishing line is thin and often clear, it is very difficult for birds and animals to see, so they easily become entangled, resulting in injury, drowning, strangulation, or starvation. It is very difficult for people to see as well, and they drive over it in boats, which can entangle boat propellers causing a very costly repair. Fishing line has also been shown to have an effect on benthic habitats and species. Studies have shown that there is a positive correlation between fishing line presence and dead or damaged colonies of coral”, explained Winchester.
Organizations like the Anglers for Conservation are working to educate anglers on these hazards and ensure that they protect the resource for future generations. “I think it boils down to education in general and being accountable and responsible for their actions”, stated Conneen. “For us, I think when we talk about trying to teach old dogs new tricks, the people that are out there littering fishing debris; these people don’t like change. We try to focus our market on kids. You can teach kids early and they are going to learn from there. Hopefully, they will tell their parents. We have had a lot of success stories, where parents have come up to us and told us, ‘Hey, I never knew this and my son told me this and now I know’.”
Andy Garrett understands the hazards of monofilament line all too well. He has worked for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission for the last 18 years protecting wildlife. He is currently Florida’s manatee rescue coordinator. “We try to encourage people to recycle, we have a pretty active monofilament recycling program in Florida. Most public boat ramps have a PVC container to recycle their fishing line. We ask anglers not to discard their fishing line in the water, even small bits can end up in manatees and cause a problem”, stated Garrett.
The majority of manatee entanglements are caused by the crab pot fishery, but monofilament litter can negatively impact these peaceful sea mammals as well. “They do get monofilament wrapped around their flippers. From my experience, monofilament will start to cut into a flipper pretty quickly. If there’s trailing line, it can get caught on debris and can constrict the flipper and cut through and sometimes if left untreated, it can cut all the way to the bone and cause amputation”, explained Garrett.
“The other thing that we see is ingestion. Manatees do ingest monofilament fishing line. A lot of times they are able to pass small segments of fishing line, but there are instances where they can ingest a bird’s nest of fishing line that can impact their gut and cause digestive problems and lead to mortalities”, stated Garrett.
The manatee rescue program focuses not only on rescuing live manatees, but also serves as the manatee coroner. “People will call in dead manatees, and we will recover the carcass and do a necropsy to determine the cause of death. It’s not often that an entanglement will cause death, but they can cause serious injuries or amputations and things like that”, explained Garrett.
According to statistics from the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute from 2005 to 2015: 31 manatees were rescued due to monofilament entanglements, 397 manatee carcasses were found to have ingested monofilament line, 128 stranded bottlenose dolphins were entangled in hook and line gear, and 723 stranded sea turtles were documented with entanglements, or had ingested hook and line gear. In 2015 alone, 159 birds in Monroe County were rescued from hook and line gear.
While any human activity has the potential to impact the natural world, there are resource managers dedicated to ensuring a mutually beneficial coexistence. “It’s just trying to ask people to be as responsible as possible. The animals have to live there and humans want to use it for recreational use, so there needs to be a balance and a responsibility of people to do their part to try to keep it as clean as possible”, said Garrett.
“We are working hard to mitigate the problem of monofilament fishing line in our environment. We have education and outreach events that focus on marine conservation and teaching current and future anglers how to respect the environment. We emphasize that without an environment for the fish to live in, there will be no fish for anglers to catch”, explained Winchester.
“We generate a large percentage of Florida’s revenue through the fishing industry itself. If we can’t figure out how to keep our fishing industry sustainable in both our environment and ethical fishing, then we’re going to see a collapse of quite a bit of money in this state”, claimed Conneen.
Jared Langenegger
A graduate of New Mexico State University with B.S. in wildlife and fisheries science, Jared spent 15 years working in fisheries and parks management. He enjoys camping, fishing, hunting, painting, and wood working.
Make Sure To Check Out:
The Monofilament Recovery and Recycling Program, which is a Florida statewide project dedicated to reducing the environmental damage caused by discarded fishing line, and educating the public on the problems caused by monofilament line litter.