Quote:
Originally Posted by Dave Liquorice[_2_]
On Sun, 10 Jul 2011 18:34:27 +0100, Mike Lyle wrote:
I've always wanted to have a go, but as well as a good spot you need a
licence from the Environment Agency and I'm not sure how easy it is to
get one now.
The native white clawed crayfish is protected. The signal crayfish is
an invasive pest that also carries a fungal disease that is lethal to
the white clawed crayfish. I think the EA would encourage you to take
as many signal crayfish as you can. .
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No - googling will show you that this is not the case.
Various problems are described with encouraging people to trap
1) mistaken identity (a man was prosecuted for having trapped and killed 40 native crayfish under the impression that they were signal crayfish)
2) transferring the plague from one site to another on wellies etc
3) inadvertent (or other) re-release of the signal crayfish. (There's anecdotal evidence of someone trapping for the first time, getting cold feet about killing, then releasing the crayfish, not at the site where he caight them, but in the local river)
3) crayfish eat smaller crayfish - if you catch the large ones, you remove a predator of the small ones, so paradoxically can make the problem worse
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