Thread: Outrageous!

How bloody outrageous is this, and stupid. Two kids, 6 yr olds get given fishing rods by grandparents. Parents apparently buy them trout licenses to try their hand at this new sport. Out on the boat one has trouble casting. Mum lends a hand with the rod. Bingo! Officer-on-the-job, apparently assisted by a good set of binoculars, toddles over and writes the mum up for fishing without a license. No fish caught of course. Mum summoned to appear in court - really! Gets diversion if she pays $600 to Fish & Game.

So now there's one family that will likely never go fishing again. All that needed to happen was Mum gets a schooling on the rules, is given the opportunity to buy a adult day license, which she offered to do only to be told, gleefully no doubt, "too late", and then maybe instead of being the big bad power-tripping Ranger, the guy helps teach the kids a bit about catching a fish.

Don't F&G spend a fortune trying to get kids into the sport? The optics of this are about as bad as.it gets..stupid!

Grifters gonna grift.

Why do we tolerate such organizations?

Yeah I read that the other day and thought "some wanker with a badge"

I did years of ranging including trout work - no way would she have gone to court if I has seen that - a bit of a chat at the boat turn it into a learning excercise thats it - she met a right indescribable that day - bugger should be stripped of his warrant - a Ranger in the field does have discretion - that is shamefull on F and G

Unless there is more to it than meets the eye...

For an organization that runs this......

https://www.fishandgame.org.nz/about...sh-in-schools/

Quote from their website

NZFG had identified the need to increase participation with young people and their families in angling and hunting to secure the organisation's future.

and this...

The Youth Programme is organised into five pillars that build on the FIS. These are:-

• Fish in Schools
• Take a Kid Fishing
• Teach a Kid Fishing
• Mentoring
• Creating Awareness

A perfect opportunity to carry out 4 of the 5 'building blocks in my view

...But it would seem they have shot themselves in the foot.

Should have been creating fishing for the future for the kids.Not killing it for life for the kids.

Originally Posted by Barry the hunter

turn it into a learning exercise

Yeah, spot on.

How many of us learnt by rote all the regulations around catching crays/paua/fish/ducks/trout/deer etc etc etc before we took our first step into a particular sport??

The ranger could have given them the benefit of his vast fishing knowledge and secured for life 2-4 more fisher people. Instead I suspect they will rightly be gunshy for quite some time.

she should have been given a warning or sold a license. anything else is just stupid
what would have happened if the kid reeled in a fish and couldnt de-hook it?

What an officious wanker.

I have seen people collecting shellfish, including the toddler that was floating in the tyre/collection bin. Some people do take the piss and try to bend their interpretation of the rules but this doesn't sound like it.

Take his badge No & name, photo. Then complaint to head of department. News paper article is good has done volumns for the PR of F&G. From there if it's still live, Social media exposurer of the moron involved, chances are if he lives local, the locals will know and hear about it, may not reside there for that long. If there is more to this story then F&G should pipe up.

While I think F&G may have gone overboard I often see a large number of big "kids" fishing in the childrens fishing ponds while "little johnny" or "little aimee" are running round throwing rocks or playing tag or ............................... when I walk the dog.
Children's ponds here have age restriction of 16 or less. Adults can cast the rod I believe, but that's it kids must do the rest. If the kids are not fishing then neither should the adults be. Its a great asset but I see a lot of folks taking the piss.
Adults fishing, Adults fishing when ponds are "closed" Families fishing when they are closed etc etc

Truth is its easier to catch a fish in the kids ponds.

I would wonder if there is something not being mentioned due to children being involved.

Originally Posted by mikee

While I think F&G may have gone overboard I often see a large number of big "kids" fishing in the childrens fishing ponds while "little johnny" or "little aimee" are running round throwing rocks or playing tag or ............................... when I walk the dog.
Children's ponds here have age restriction of 16 or less. Adults can cast the rod I believe, but that's it kids must do the rest. If the kids are not fishing then neither should the adults be. Its a great asset but I see a lot of folks taking the piss.
Adults fishing, Adults fishing when ponds are "closed" Families fishing when they are closed etc etc

Truth is its easier to catch a fish in the kids ponds.

I would wonder if there is something not being mentioned due to children being involved.

True, there's always two sides to a story. And we don't know what sort of grief or lip the family gave the ranger in question. The issue here tho is the optics out in the public arena. F & G comms/Public Relations person should have been across this and out in front of it big time. As it stands, it's a very damaging story that now is very difficult to counter. A smart comms release would have got the right message across without breaching privacy issues E. G., a comms piece along the lines of, " F&G are choosing court action over over a relatively minor offense where education and timely advice proved ineffective. F&G have a policy of zero tolerance for abuse of its staff"

Or some such. If the story had a tag like that, when it came out, we'd all understand.

I’m not convinced, Stuff ‘news’ reports goes through the filter of their agenda first, more commentary than news

If you think they are reporting facts then you’re part of that problem

I only ever met one ranger during duck season and they were great, I’m sure if stuff reported on my experience it wouldn’t read anything like that experience actually was

It would be interesting to understand F&G's side of the story