Commercial fishermen are calling for tougher regulations on recreational fishing as they battle to protect their livelihoods.

Those who fish for a living say they are struggling to make ends meet — often forced to take a second job — while they are being undercut by people selling fish illegally on the roadsides and to restaurants.

They want recreational fishermen to face stricter bagging limits, policed at the docks, with a tagging system on fish sales to ensure all stick within the rules.

However, it is feared this could upset traditionalists who believe families should be allowed to go fishing for fun without any regulations.

Former fisherman Rick Vesely, who has been both a recreational fisherman and commercial fisherman and has now become a carpenter, told The Royal Gazette that illegal fishing is putting a toll on earning fishermen.

“The commercial guy is doing this for his livelihood — to put bread on the table and to send his children to school,” said Mr Vesely.

“The recreational guy has a nine-to-five job, has a boat that he is going out to spearfish, and nine times out of ten the fish that he spears will end up on our dinner plates in a restaurant somewhere because he knows a chef.

“We even have recreational guys selling it through the commercial guys. It cannot be addressed so I have been trying to get a tag system in place.”

Currently, recreational fishermen are subject to the same bag and size limits on inshore catches as the commercial fishermen who are subject to a $10,000 permit.

If new limits were introduced on recreational fishermen, the Department of Fisheries wardens would then be able to catch offenders by waiting at the docks and checking their boats.

Full-time commercial fisherman and lobster fisherman Dean Jones said: “Putting bag limits on recreational fishing would be the easiest thing to police.

“You put a limit of say two wahoos and two tunas for recreational, then if they see them with more at the dock, it is easy.”

One third-generation fisherman who took on a second career, in part to supplement his income, said: “There is no reason why recreational fishermen should be out on the edge catching 20 wahoos in a day if they don’t have a licence to sell them.

“Why would you need 20 wahoos? That is more fish than one person can eat in two years. Why are they allowed to do that?”

That man said of the state of the industry: “Fishing is in my blood — my father and my grandfather were fishermen.

“But even my dad would say for a young man trying to start his life out of that industry, he might as well take a gun and shoot himself in the head.”

Commercial fishermen are not free from blame, with many accused of breaching the bag and size limits of fish that are subject to restrictions.

Under the suggested tagging system, commercial fisherman would buy a certain number of tags in a year that must accompany any fish they sell; buyers would be prohibited from purchasing any fish without the tag.

But, with fishing off the dock with your child a cherished Bermuda tradition, Chris Flook, former collector of specimens for the Bermuda Government, warned of a potential backlash with changing legislation.

“All the commercial fishermen want recreational fishermen to have a licence and most sane societies do that,” Mr Flook said.

“Here, the big argument is how you stop a traditional, cultural activity of taking your children down to the rocks to fish. It’s a sticky wicket. It could be dealt with through extra regulations as long as it could be enforced.”