K: IMO, you paint a infairly biased and simplistic picture of both fishermen and scientists. While the situation may differ in your local, I have seen similar negative viewpoints when dealing with law enforcement folks before.

I worked both sides of the field for 36 odd career years, first representing fishermen and then inside government, closely beside government bioplogists/scientists. My observation is both have information to contribute, and both make errors and have the capacity to be wrong.

For example, the fishermen off northern Newfoundland overfished northern cod (a huge resource) to near extinction - they highgraded huge amounts of bycatch overboard), they cheated on catch figures,and believed there was no limit to the amount they could and could never harm the future stocks. They were wrong.

However, many of the "highly educated" biologists-scientists were enablers, and were sure that their estimates of the stocks (that fishermen operated under) showed that huge catches could be removed without harming the stocks. They were wrong.

The result: Huge historically strong stocks took a huge tumble in the mid 90's and never returned.

Where do two "wrongs" get you? Not to two separate "rights". To increased trust and cooperation, respect is required and a recognizition that each has knowledge to contribute for a joint cause. Neither group has all the answers or resources and can't do it alone.

By the way, I was fortunate to have played a founding role in setting up a group that for the past 20 years gets fishermen and scientists together to share knowledge, learn from each other, cooperate in science projects to make the fisheries healthier. Below is a link:Fishermen/scientists group