Dick Russell
The anti-conservation comments made by fishing charter Capt. Buddy Vanderhoop in the July issue of Martha’s Vineyard Magazine about shooting cormorants are outrageous.
“They have no predators here — except me. It’s so much fun to shoot ’em!” Mr. Vanderhoop told the interviewer. Recounting shotgunning a large number of cormorants in 2003 on Wampanoag land, he continued: “Because it was done on tribal property, the state couldn’t prosecute me, but the tribe banned me from the herring creek for a year.”
Twenty-five years ago, the striped bass were on the verge of disappearing altogether from our waters. Federal scientists trying to pinpoint a cause listed pollution in the Chesapeake Bay spawning grounds as one probable reason — from residues of the banned pesticide DDT to the new phenomenon of acid rain. The other factor was clearly overfishing, and only this could be addressed immediately.