"Raz" and Rob just wanted to make a day's pay dragging up whiting and ling (squirrel hake) in Ipswich Bay aboard the 45-foot Razzo in late August.
But the Randazzo brothers got a net full of grief, which took two hours to clear and also damaged the net.
This scenario is becomingly increasingly common, compliments of national fishery law's unrealistic language that requires first restoring and then maintaining all commercially-important fish stocks - even low-value ones detrimental to more lucrative species.
The Razzo, a 62-year-old classic Stonington dragger, had towed its fishing gear on the smooth bottom about 35 fathoms deep within Ipswich Bay's small-mesh regulated area for 11âÑ2 hours beginning around dawn,
"You could see the two towing wires (running from the trawl winches on deck and overhead off of the stern gantry down to the set of doors and funnel-shaped net) close a little. Sometimes the tide will do that," said Joseph "Raz" Randazzo, the Razzo's 43-year-old captain and owner. Raz seasonally harvests groundfish, whiting and ling inshore with his wooden stern trawler that's powered by a 8-71 Detroit diesel.
The brothers soon began hauling back the fishing gear to empty out its contents. Once the trawl doors had been winched tight to their respective gallous frame blocks, the scissor and ground cables further connecting the net to their doors "... went straight down. You could see there was a lot of strain," Raz said.
The fishermen's worst fear soon came true.
"We hoisted as much of the net up as we could. She was stuffed (from the cod end, where the catch accumulates, to the mouth) with over 15,000 pounds of dogfish. Dogfish are heavy."
Unlike dogfish sharks, the whiting and ling have swim bladders that make them buoyant when hauled up from the bottom.
The men next undid the cod end clip, hoping to release the 2- to 4-foot long, unwanted sharks.
"Their skin is like sandpaper, and their (dorsal fin) spines hook into the 2-inch twine. With the small mesh, once they are in, they are in. If they were cod, they would have gone right out," Raz said.
With the 61âÑ2 mesh the Randazzos use in their groundfish net, many of the dogfish "put their noses through the mesh and swim right out," Raz said.
The fishermen ended up towing their net backward as an alternative plan to clear it.
"We kept going around and around and taking up on the net. We spent two hours clearing it. There was a lot of strain and some damage to the net," said Raz, who kept shaking his head in frustration during the whole ordeal. "And they (some of the scientists and regulators) say there are no dogfish in the ocean."
"That was the first tow in the morning; that's usually your best tow. This was a good set, but of dogfish," Raz joked. "Our main goal was to clear the dogs and hope nobody got hurt."
The weather was tranquil during the ordeal. A vessel's rising and dipping in rougher conditions actually helps jolt dogfish out of the net during emptying.
During the first tow, "you could see them (dogfish) on the bottom (with the color sounding machine)," he said. "The dogfish look like clouds. You try to turn away from them. The day before, we made the same tow and only caught a few hundred pounds of dogfish.
"The old timers have told me, 'Every day in Bay is different'," said Raz, a multi-generational fisherman who has 28 years in the business.
Raz and Rob couldn't salvage any of the first tow's whiting and ling mixed in with the dogfish. Furthermore, they couldn't sell any of the dogfish because Period I of the dogfish's 8 million-pound annual quota for federally-permitted vessels closed Aug. 20. Boats could land up to 600 pounds a day before that. The dogfish yielded them around 25 cents per pound and, at least, helped pay for fuel.
Period II will re-open Nov. 1 and will run until the remainder of the quota is used up. As of early September, Massachusetts-permitted boats could bring in 2,000 pounds of dogfish a day. Vessels can only be either state- or federally-permitted.
The brothers were initially afraid to set out their fishing gear again, but they did and managed to stay clear of the dogs and salvage what was left of the day.
"I've been through this before," said Raz. Others have, too.
But the potential to get a net full of dogfish will only increase. Scientists said last year the dogfish stock is only 75 percent rebuilt.
