Minnesota News: Native Fish Bill moving to the Senate!
For the 2024 Minnesota Legislative session, a new version of the No Junk Fish Bill has been authored. It is called the Native Fish Bill. You can read the full bill HERE. If passed, this will be the first comprehensive native fish protections in the country.
This fresh Native Fish Bill will separate native rough fish from carp in angling regulations. It also clearly defines this new Native Rough Fish category of fishes as 26 species covering 10 genera.
Here is an excerpt from the bill, noting changes to verbiage on the fish included -
Native rough fish.
"Native rough fish" means carp, buffalo, sucker, sheepshead,
bowfin, gar, goldeye, and bullhead, Amiidae (bowfin), Catostomidae (bigmouth, smallmouth,
and black buffalo; white, blue, spotted, and longnose sucker; northern hogsucker; quillback;
river and highfin carpsucker; and black, river, shorthead, golden, silver, and greater redhorse),
Hiodontidae (goldeye and mooneye), Ictaluridae (black, brown, and yellow bullhead),
Lepisosteidae (longnose and shortnose gar), and Sciaenidae (freshwater drum), except for
any fish species listed as endangered, threatened, or of special concern in Minnesota Rules,
chapter 6134.
The Native FIsh Bill has passed House committee hearings and has now been authored as a standalone bill for the Senate. The bill is supported and endorsed by the Minnesota DNR. NF4T board member Tyler Winter has been giving testimonial at these hearings in support, and much credit goes to his work on it.
We'd also like to thank our partners at The Izaak Walton League, Nature Conservancy, Minnesota Conservation Federation, and others for rallying support for this bill. Thank you!
Stay tuned to NF4T for updates!
NF4T director Tyler Winter has been spending time in St. Paul at Environmental committee hearings.
Native Fish For Tomorrow at 2024 DNR Roundtable
Four NF4T board members were invited to the 2024 Minnnesota DNR Roundtable held on January 20. The Roundtable brings an incredibly diverse group of stakeholders for the Outdoors and conservation. It's a great opportunity to network with like-minded folks and advocate for our native rough fish!
One of the topics for a breakout session was the work being done for Native Roughfish protection. Shannon Fisher, Fisheries Populations Monitoring and Regulations Manager with the MN DNR led the session and talked about the Rough FIsh workgroup, public surveys and agency research that has recently been done.
Other session topics included the threat of forward-facing sonar to our fisheries, a great update on Invasive Carp monitoring and plans to stop their spread, and also barotrauma concerns from targeting fish in very deep water.
NF4T directors Eric Kolcinski, Tyler Winter, Heath Sershen and Drew Geving at the MN DNR Roundtable
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