Huge fishing net hauled off Portelet rocks
A HUGE fishing net has been hauled off the beach at Portelet after volunteers got together to tackle the massive piece of litter.
Pierre Ehmann spotted the estimated 100-metre- long net last weekend.
He emailed the States about it but heard nothing back, so several days later, along with some other litter pickers, decided to move it themselves.
The group, which included Richard Lord, Luc De La Mare and Matt Gill, set about the heavy and smelly task.
‘To start with I tried to roll it, but it was quite heavy so we cut it into three pieces.
‘If it had washed up on the shore we would have been able to just drag it up but because of where it was we had to haul it over rocks and all sorts.
‘On the first day there were the four of us and it was just a case of cutting it into sections and manhandling it along the beach.
‘It was really heavy and by the time we got to the spot where we could pull it up with the car it was soaked in sand so it was even heavier.’
More volunteers joined the effort and they managed to get it up the slipway and Agriculture, Countryside and Land Management Services picked it up.
Lost and abandoned fishing nets are called ‘ghost nets’ because they are derelict gear which continues to drift for years.
They kill indiscriminately, including wildlife like seabirds and dolphins.
In the Portelet net there were around 10 smooth hound sharks, two cod and possibly a ray, but it was so disintegrated that it was difficult to determine.
The net is believed to have come from a French trawler.
Mr Ehmann hopes that the incident will raise awareness of the dangers of ghost gear and the impact on ocean life.
‘The materials this particular fisherman had used were bad, and also they took little responsibility for removing them from the sea.’
‘It’s terrible to have these ghost nets floating around in the water
‘It must have turned up on one of the spring tides. It was above the shoreline, so it wouldn’t necessarily have washed back out to sea for a while, but there was the potential for it to wash back out to sea and cause damage. It felt really good to remove the net from the beach. It was right to take that stuff out of the environment.’
