Dangers of Entanglement Netting

One of the problems with trying to capture turtles using entanglement nets, at least in the Gulf of Mexico, is the constant threat of sargassum. Huge masses of sargassum would float in and become entangled in the nets resulting in endless hours of net cleaning and not much catching. The worst part was that you could see the sargassum coming, but there wasn't anything you could do about it. Blue crabs were a close second on the "pain in the neck" scale, and bull sharks were probably third.