One fishermen’s spokesman told FISHupdate.com that the new by-catch limit had come “out of the blue” and appeared to have been slipped into the TAC regulation for this year.

“This is causing a lot of concern and surprise and will undoubtedly hit a number of boats, particularly those line boats pursuing a directed dogfish fishery.”

He felt the move would inevitably lead to more discarding and the development also called into question the fleet’s ability to catch the UK share of dogfish in the North Sea totalling 470 tonnes and a total West Coast waters share of 739 tonnes.

“The industry is having to come to terms with what is undoubtedly bad news and there is a lot of concern about it,” he said.

Dogfish have long been an important component of the fleet's catching profile and boats tend to come on concentrations of the species, which underlines the potential difficulties of the new rule.

www.fishupdate.com is published by Special Publications. Special Publications also publish FISHupdate magazine, Fish Farmer, the Fish Industry Yearbook, the Scottish Seafood Processors Federation Diary, the Fish Farmer Handbook and a range of wallplanners.

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