Barnegat bay:

[AndyS]

New Jersey Conservation Officers Association:

In early May, CPO Capri and Lt. Harp conducted an overnight boat patrol and observed a vessel traveling across Barnegat Bay in the dark without using navigational lights. CPO Capri and Lt. Harp were able to follow the trail of bubbles left by the vessel and establish the general direction of travel. CPO Capri and Lt. Harp began searching the area and found three gillnets, each 300-feet in length, which were set and actively fishing in the bay. Before dawn, the suspect returned to the nets and began hauling them onto his vessel. CPO Capri and Lt. Harp, who had been waiting in the dark for several hours at this point, apprehended the individual. The three nets, containing white perch, striped bass, bluefish, horseshoe crabs, menhaden, gizzard shad, and blue crabs, were seized. The individual responsible is facing multiple counts of unauthorized use of a gillnet, failure to properly mark gillnet, failure to mark nets with identification, failure to mark gillnet stake, taking of striped bass with net, possession of horseshoe crab with gillnet, and failure to utilize navigational lights at night. From the May 2023 Bureau of Law Enforcement Report to the Fish and Game Council.