Catfish Trafficking Ring Busted in the South Allegedly Smuggled Trophy Cats into Pay Lakes and Across State Lines

Regulation enforcement officers have cited a sequence of pay lake operators, catfish anglers, and different suspects in a multi-state trafficking bust. The suspects have been allegedly concerned in harvesting catfish illegally and promoting them to varied pay lakes — generally transporting them throughout state traces to take action.

A complete of 9 perpetrators have been cited for 180 wildlife violations throughout Kentucky, Alabama, and Tennessee, Kentucky Division of Fish and Wildlife recreation warden Cody Fox tells Out of doors Life. All through 2023, anglers from Kentucky and Alabama caught hundreds of kilos of trophy catfish (each flatheads and blues) with out the requisite permits, after which transported and bought these catfish to varied pay lakes (that are privately owned lakes that anglers should pay to entry) all through the three states. 

Non-commercial anglers in Kentucky can solely harvest one trophy-sized catfish per day, and business anglers will need to have the correct permits to reap a couple of. Catfish 35 inches or bigger are thought-about “trophy-sized.” 

One lake particularly, Inexperienced Valley Pay Lake in Glasgow, Kentucky, was the focus of KDFW’s investigation. 

“Folks have been going to Barren River Lake and catching over their restrict of catfish and, in flip, taking these catfish and promoting them to Inexperienced Valley Pay Lake,” Fox says, explaining that non-permitted anglers cost much less for trophy catfish than permitted, business anglers would cost in a authorized transaction. “The pay lake is popping a revenue. These folks promoting catfish to Inexperienced Valley weren’t authorized business fishermen, and Barren River Lake is closed to any type of business fishing.” 

The unlawful gross sales dated again to 2023, and KDFW’s investigation started in 2024. Fox says he was initially tipped off by posts he noticed in his social media feeds, which confirmed proof of individuals harvesting over their authorized restrict of catfish at some close by pay lakes. He factors out that lots of these operations have since deleted quite a lot of content material from their Fb pages.

Search warrants and compliance checks revealed that the pay lake operators knowingly bought catfish caught from restricted waterways like Barren River Lake. They didn’t preserve any report of their purchases, and they didn’t have any data on file concerning the origins of the catfish in query.

“The pay lake proprietor is required by regulation to maintain sure paperwork concerning the place fish are coming from that enter their lake,” he says. “That is to handle security issues. Persons are catching and consuming [these fish]. Properly, they could possibly be coming from waters with excessive mercury content material, or different points. The operators are required by regulation to doc the place they’re shopping for the fish from, which they didn’t do.”

All through a sequence of compliance checks and search warrants, Fox and different investigators additionally caught wind of two Alabama catfish anglers who have been catching over-limits and promoting the fish to Inexperienced Valley, in addition to different pay lakes in Tennessee. At this level, KDFW notified each the Alabama Sport and Fish Division and the Tennessee Wildlife Assets Company. 

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The 2 Alabama suspects in the end caught and bought some 6,400 kilos of catfish to Inexperienced Valley earlier than getting caught. Any dwell transport of catfish exterior Alabama state traces is prohibited, Fox factors out, and as quickly as these anglers crossed the state border, in addition they violated the Lacey Act, which elevates any type of interstate wildlife violation to a federal crime. This meant that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service received concerned as nicely.

Many particulars behind the allegations stay underneath wraps because the case continues to be underneath investigation and within the early phases of the charging course of. However native information outlet WBKO filed a public data request with KDFW that exposed the identities and cost sheets for 5 of the 9 suspects:

• Melinda Carter, age unspecified, Glasgow, Kentucky, pay lake operator: 81 counts of shopping for, promoting, and transporting protected wildlife, 2 counts of violating pay lake operations laws. Court docket continuing pending.
• Danny Whitmire, 50, City Creek, Alabama, business fisherman: 7 counts of shopping for, promoting, and transporting protected wildlife, 2 counts of violating laws because of lack of transportation allow and dwell fish/bait supplier’s license. Court docket continuing pending.
• April White, 46, Bridgeport, Alabama, business fisherman: 7 counts of shopping for, promoting, and transporting protected wildlife, 2 counts of violationing laws for lack of transportation allow and dwell fish/bait supplier’s license. Court docket continuing pending. 
• Samuel Hatcher, 45, Glasgow, Kentucky, cooperating witness: pled responsible to 9 counts of measurement and creel violations, leading to a $450 high-quality.
• Brandon Patrick, 30, Glasgow, Kentucky: 68 counts of shopping for, promoting, and transporting protected wildlife, 4 counts of violating business fishing laws, extra unknown license violations. Court docket proceedings pending.

Pay lakes are widespread amongst anglers within the Southeast, particularly these with households or rookies, as they usually have wholesome populations of enormous fish which might be straightforward to catch. However Fox says these sorts of lakes have additionally turn out to be a problem for the company as a result of the small operations can simply fly underneath the radar.

“Pay lakes in Kentucky have only a few guidelines to comply with,” he says. “For them to be that negligent…it’s mainly a black market. These catfish are all thirty to seventy kilos for essentially the most half, and it may well take twelve to thirty years for a catfish to achieve that measurement. We have now seventy or eighty pay lakes in Kentucky, and quite a lot of them are doing the very same factor. This pay lake particularly introduced in over 9,000 kilos of catfish in a single yr alone. In fact, not each pay lake is doing this, however quite a lot of them are.”

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Fox acknowledges that lawful pay lakes are beneficial to anglers who, for no matter cause, won’t be capable to chase trophy fish in a extra pure setting. However KDFW has obtained ample suggestions (largely within the type of Fb feedback) from the general public about pay-lake schemes and their detrimental impact on catfish populations in public waterways. Fox hopes this investigation can show to the general public that they’re listening.   

“We’re getting extra restrictive with business catfishing and these pay lakes, as a result of it’s a problem of conservation,” he says. “It doesn’t matter what we submit on Fb. It could possibly be a deer case or a turkey case, and the feedback all complain about business catfishing. We’re attempting to place a cease to it one of the best we will and present most of the people that we’re attempting to preserve these fish.”