ACCLIMATISATION SOCIETY

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 121, 16 February 1920, Page 2

ACCLIMATISATION SOCIETY

' PENALTIES FOE ILLEGAL PRAC- . TICES. At tho monthly council meeting of the Wellington Acclimatisation Society, the ranger reported that during the month of December last Ave convictions had been obtained for breaches of the Fisheries Act, Part 11. At Hunterville a man was fined £i and costs for fishing 'without a license! another was fined £2 and costs. for taking trout unlawfully.At Levin three men were fined >£2 and costs each for using gelignite in the Oliau River. The council, whilst complimenting the ranger upon his efficient work, expressed great dissatisfaction with tho inadequate fines imposed upon tho men', convicted of using explosives. Section 1 of clause 85 of-the Fisheries Act,Part II, ; provides a penalty not exceeding .£2O or, at the discretion of tlio Court, imprisonment for a term not over two months, with or without hard labour, in such cases. In a southern society's distrjet, it was pointed out, tlio Magistrates impose a penalty of two months with hard labour for using explosives, and it was Tegretted that tho ■ Courts do not.recosni.se the gravity of such on offence as the use of dynamite, gelignite, or other explosive, in waters heavily stocked with trout. It was pointed out that tho task of stocking the many rivers and streams of the Wellington Acclimatisation Society's district was a costly and laborious one, and it was most discouraging to the members and heart-breaking to an officer to find that a man who had blo.wn the bottom out of a trout river and had, after much time, t'ouble and expense been run down and convicted, ' was fined the minimum amount permitted under tlyj Act, viz., £i. ,