Justin Laack
Indian Study
5/9/08
please enjoy reading this paper. I have been working on it since February gathering info, talking with people, etc, etc. If it seems biased then I’m Sorry, and sorry for wasteing your time reading it. This assignment was for a Native Indian studies class, we were suppose to pick a native topic that we found interesting and write a 6 page paper on it. I chose this topic because I wanted to find more information out on how the indians were able to net again and how the lake is being effected. I hope you find it informative and a good read.
TRIBAL NETTING AND EXPLOITING A RESOURCE!!!
Controversy over legal rights
When a person thinks of Mille Lacs Lake they think of it as the most famous walleye lake in the state, big walleyes and the infamous walleye killing gillnet. Mille lacs is one of the greatest walleye producing lakes in the state. There are a few problems with Mille Lacs though; it is the only lake in the State where it is bad if there is good fishing. Also every spring eight Indian tribes come to the lake to participate in ceremonial harvesting of walleyes using gillnets.
Since this is such a controversial issue, this paper is not intended to be racist in any shape or form, let alone in any thoughts or ideas I have created in my writing! It is a matter of equal rights for all of mankind.
Court Battle over Treaty of 1837
In 1990, the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians filed a lawsuit against the state of Minnesota in federal district court. The band stated that an 1837 treaty with the U.S. government gave them the right to hunt, fish, and gather free of state regulation on land ceded in the treaty. To avoid a lengthy and costly court battle, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources proposed a settlement that would have required the band to withdraw their lawsuit, limit the walleye harvest to 24,000 pounds per year, and adhere to a band conservation code. In return, the state would pay the band $8.6 million, set 7,500 acres of land aside, and give exclusive fishing rights on 4.5% of Lake Mille Lacs. This agreement also included traditional spearing and netting practices.
During the 1993 session, the Minnesota Legislature barely defeated the agreed settlement by the Band and the DNR. Legislators turned down the settlement arguing that the use of gill nets would decimate the walleye population and harm tourism. Today it seems like this might be coming true. More on this later. Treaty activists argued that the use of gillnets and spears was a very important part in keeping with Indian culture and that their use would be limited. The bill was not passed by the House. At the cost of taxpayers, the Band continued their lawsuit. According to local historian and avid fisherman Joe Fellegy, “the Band could have cared less about getting the rights to net and spear, it was more that they wanted the money for the resource.”
The lawsuit was then divided into two phases. The first phase would decide if the Band did indeed still have their rights, and the second phase would decide on the Band’s fish and game allocation and any state regulations. In the first phase in 1994, the U.S. district court judge ruled that the Mille Lacs Band did in fact still have the right to hunt, fish, and gather that which stated in the 1837 treaty. The second phase ended in 1997 when the district judge decided that the Band would be regulated by the Band’s Conservation Code rather than state laws. The state filed an appeal to the eighth U.S. District Court of Appeals. To no avail, the state’s arguments were denied.
Netting Netting Supreme Court Battle
In 1998 the case went to the U.S. Supreme Court. This is when landowners around the lake became involved as well as the Bands from Wisconsin. In the late 1980s and into the early 90s the state of Wisconsin had been involved in its own legal battle with Indians. The Indians ended up winning their case, to continue fishing by traditional methods. During the first few years of tribal netting, there was great anger among sportsmen towards the Indians. There were many encounters at boat landings and on the water. Sportsmen crowded the boat landings hollering and holding up signs that said “Save a walleye Spear an Indian, and timber nigger.” Some sportsmen drove their boats around as the Indians were trying to net in order to make waves to rock the boats and make it harder to spear. This was broadcast on Wisconsin television and the media went wild with the story, making it seem as if this was going on at every access and all sportsmen were being racist. In some instances the National Guard had to come in and maintain control at the landings.
The Wisconsin Bands knew that when they filed a lawsuit in Minnesota, the state of Minnesota would be scared and frightened of what had happened in Wisconsin. Therefore the state would not want any conflict, and it was a good bet that what ever the Wisconsin Band wanted they would get it within reasonable means. In March of 1999 the U.S. Supreme Court that the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa did indeed retain the rights from the 1837 treaty. In December of 1999 the U.S. District Court judge ordered the state of Minnesota to pay the legal expenses of the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa and six other bands from Wisconsin. This totaled 3.95 million dollars.
All of these legal battles were the result of a simple little treaty in 1837. This thirty-eight word (one sentence) treaty was under heavier scrutiny than other treaties. In those thirty-eight words it stated “the Chippewa would be allowed during the President’s pleasure to hunt and fish on the ceded lands.” This privilege was then revoked in 1850 by President Taylor. This did not hold up in court; the privilege would be revoked when the land was wanted, not when the President shows a “need” for the land. Then in 1855 the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa gave up all right, title and interest in any other land in the Minnesota territory, in exchange for monetary payments, goods and services and the establishment of a 61,000 acre reservation on the South shore of the lake. This revoked the privileges stated in the treaty of 1837, plain and simple.
Netting
Band netting came back to the lake in 1998. Since then the lake has been on a rollercoaster. The courts ruled that the total harvest allocation would be split between the Band and sport anglers. The lake has seen several slot fish changes (size of fish a person can keep). In slow fishing years anglers have been able to keep bigger fish (anything under 22 inches). In years with good fishing anglers have seen this shrink down to their being only able to keep fish between 14 and 16 inches, in order to stay under the state harvest allocation. This is the only lake which it is bad to have a good walleye bite going.
This past fall the DNR did test netting to see what the fish population looked like. These tests showed very poor walleye year classes and was the worst in over thirty years. This followed one of the best fishing seasons anglers have seen, with a slot change on July 9 to keep the state harvest under its allotment. The DNR decided they should drop the state harvest level from 400,000 pounds of walleye in 2007 to 300,000 pounds for the 2008 fishing season. In regards to protecting the resource, the Bands decided to go ahead and raise their allocation from 100,000 pounds to 122,000 pounds. The state took the conservative route and the Bands took the greed route.
These test nets were put out at a very poor time. The DNR set them in less than ten feet of water, calm sunny hot days in the middle of September with water temperatures in the low to mid 70’s. It’s no wonder the nets were poor. I think the DNR is way off in their models saying that the lake is in trouble. The problem lies within the tribal right to use gillnets. They (Indians) put these nets out in the spring when the fish are full of eggs and are getting ready to spawn. Minnesota is the only state in the U.S. that allows netting during the spawning season. The females that get caught in these nets do not get the chance to reproduce. Granted, 90 % of the fish taken are males, but there still are big females that get caught. In fact, a fellow fisherman and Mille Lacs resident, Bob Carlson has been watching this spring’s netting season closely. He observed that one boat brought in over 700 pounds of fish in just one day of netting, many six, seven, eight pound female walleyes that did not get to lay their eggs.
Enough is Enough
This netting problem has been going on for ten years now. Each year more and more nets get put out on the lake. In 1998 319 nets were set, in 2005 2,018 nets were put out this is a big jump. Since they have netted, there have been numerous accounts of fish being dumped along the roadsides and even behind the high school. There were some whole fish and some filleted fish. This neglect towards a resource and a town is not tolerable.
Sportsmen have been writing and sending pictures to people in public positions for years now documenting this neglect, to no avail. These officials want nothing to do with this and most media want nothing to do with it, if they were to say anything let alone ask questions, they would be labeled as being racist. This is why nothing has been done about certain people raping a resource.
2008 netting season
The first nets were set out on April 26 on the northwest corner of the lake, and it has been a problem since. Starting on April 25 the weather channel stated that the wind would be changing to the southeast, pushing ice to the northwest corner. On the night of the 27th netters went out belligerent to the conditions that were going to be changing, and set nets out in the northwest corner anyway, proving that they do not care about this resource and it is more about greed. At 3:00 A.M. the ice started moving in, trapping 12 to 14 nets. The Mille Lacs Band was able to get all of their nets out, but the Wisconsin Bands were not able to. These nets continue to catch fish regardless if they are tangled up and stuck underneath the ice. The Mille Lacs Messenger a local newspaper got wind of this and ran an article stating it was the Mille Lacs Band who lost the nets and “the ice suddenly shifted.” It was great that they came out to investigate, but they made it seem like it was an accident, favoring the Indians. If these people cared about the resource they would not have even put those nets out there. It was not a matter of subsistence; it was a matter of greed and disrespect to the resource. These pictures show the netters trying to navigate through the ice to get their nets.
Unequal Rights
This act of carelessness has gotten almost every sport angler who fishes Mille Lacs fired up. Today is May 8th and all of these nets have not been found yet! Each day these nets are in the water, they are killing fish that may never be recovered. No citations have been issued yet either. It states on the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission (GLIFWC) website that nets that are set out at night have to be brought in by noon the following day. If not citations will be issued. The DNR also states that they cannot do anything until it is a matter of public safety or resource conservation. Nets floating around with dead fish must not count for this. If a sport fisherman caught a walleye and left it on a stringer for more than one day he would be given a ticket immediately. What is the difference here? Other than discrimination towards one group and special privileges too another. After the ice moved out one would think that these careless netters would be out looking for their nets the first chance they got, this was not the case.
Not all of these people who net exploit and waste the resource. It is a select few who give Band members a bad name. It is the Bands from Wisconsin who don’t care about this resource. They come over here take from the lake and waste. They take over our public accesses and set up tents, which clearly states no camping. They don’t spend a dime here and they wonder why we have a problem with them using gillnets.
The only thing Bands have to say to us sport anglers is that last year our hooking mortality rate was more than 125,000 pounds of walleye. This is more than they can net. The problem is that they don’t consider gillnet mortality. There isn’t even a study about it. Not every fish that gets tangled in a net is captured. How many of those fish end up dying later on? They argue that we have fancy equipment to catch fish. Yes, we may have fancy equipment, but we still have to catch our fish by hook and line and only can keep four. They are pulling up nets that can have 200-300 pounds of walleyes in them in just one night of netting!
If they were to just use traditional spearing methods, we sportsmen would not have a problem with it. It just seems like this netting process is not watched as closely as they say it is. The DNR is not doing anything about it. Sportsmen are starting to get the word out now as to what is actually going on during these procedures. We have made phone calls to public officials, newspapers, media, GLIFWC and the DNR. We are making a stand that these gillnets need to be banned and these equal rights need to be looked at once again. It is still at the pleasure of the president, with enough backing and a proper document gets written up that has the right words in it, and the president signs it, these rights would be taken away.
Works cited
Carlson, Bob. “Netting Pictures.” Email to idofishing.com April 2008
Clark, Vivian. “Nets stuck in ice on west side of Mille Lacs.” May 5 2008. Mille Lacs Messenger. 8 May 2008 <http://www.millelacsmessenger.com>.
Fellegy, Joe. Telephone interview. 2 May 2008
<http://www.geog.umn.edu/faculty/squires/research>
<http://www.glifwc.org/regulations>