Anybody who has been out here since at least the 80’s will remember the sight of teams of fishermen pulling in a net onto the beach – something now totally illegal.

Fishermen and beach users all along the Costa Tropical are up in arms over the constant presence of illegal fishing nets. The problem is that as they are illegally placed, there are no buoys to warn people to their presence.

If you are out swimming and stumble into one, you’re in grave danger of becoming tangled in it and drowning. There was such as case back in 2012.

The type of nets that we’re talking about are trammel nets (trasmallo). Legally they can be used if clearly marked out but they must be at least 200 metres off the beach. Problems start when they are used just off the beach, around 50 metres from the shore.

Well, one group of fishing enthusiasts has lodged a complaint backed by 338 signatures, plus another 1,042 online ones before Seprona (Guardia Civil Environmental Unit). The petition also calls for more patrols to detect these lethal nets.

The fish caught in these nets, furtively collected in the early hours, can be seen on street corners being hawked in buckets. With a couple of accomplices keeping a look out at strategic points, they have disappeared long before a municipal-police patrol arrives, only to return again once the ‘danger’ has passed by.

This kind of fishing takes place from Castell de Ferro to La Herradura, especially in the summer. The nets are dropped during the night using small rowing boats or motor fishing boats and pulled in in the early hours of dawn. (See accompanying video above).

Everybody knows who is doing it but in a small community, nobody is going to speak out. And one can be forgiven for thinking that the municipal police know who they are, too and that the foot patrols are perfunctory rather than designed to catch anybody red-handed selling illegal catches on street corners.

(News: Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)