Official Luthiers Forum!

As the title suggests, there are issues, although most are all concerned with getting shell into the US.

First .. a recent true story. A client of mine has a friend who abotu 6 weeks ago was crossing into the US from Sarnia Ontario. he was going on vactaion, and was randomly stopped for inspection. Whiel searchingthe trunk, they ask whats int eh guitar case .. well a guitar. They take it out and give it a good once over. it was a deJonge SS, a few years old. It was not made with any CITES woods, but did have an abalone rosette. they take it into the customs office and continue checking it out. They get out a book of some sort, adn compare pictures of shell int eh book to that of whats int he rosette .. yep,its shell. Without any paperwork/permit of any kind in the hands of the owner, they confiscate the guitar. you are essentially smuggling this shell (and thus the guitar) into the US they say. So they keep the guitar, and send hiim on, with no apparent recourse. The guitar is gone, forever. Said person has contacted his lawyer here in Canada, and he has advised him that yep, nothing he can do to help him. So for now anyway, he is out a nice guitar ...

So, I have done some looking into what are the rules and regs around shell. It is an animal by-product, and according to advisory 1104, USDA, no permit is required. But as far as I can tell, you will need a letter or whatever from the manufacturer/importer of what the species is, and that is hasnt come into any contact with cows, horses, swine or birds. My educated guess says none of that happens in processing shell. Since I have client in the US getting guitars with shell inlay/rosettes later this year, it would be nice to know ....

Has anyone in the US run into this (importing shell), and would know what the rules truly are ???

As far as I know, there are no such regs concerning importing shell into Canada ( I last brought some in about 8 months ago ..)

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Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

Tony;
check in with Andy Depaule on this.
He brings in lots of shell from Asia.

Mc

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Mike Collins

Tony,

You need to contact US Fish and Wildlife and get a permit for each guitar you send across the border with shell installed. These used to be $50 but I am thinking that they are more like $100 or so each now. Makers like Ted Thompson has moved away from any shell inlay for US bound guitars because of the cost, paperwork and worry involved with using shell. From my short experience recently shipping wood to the likes of Taylor and PRS the Lacey Act stuff is pretty simple, just list the woods by scientific name and be prepared to follow with some description (at least) and maybe even proof of their origin in that the Act wants to conform that the wood was legally optained directly back to the source. For me it was simply listing the woods. If you are using wood that is on any "endangered" list there may be more required...not sure!

Shane

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Canada

Danny : I love it...!!!!!
Tom

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A person who has never made a mistake has never made anything!!!

Some good discussion on this topic at the Woodstock Festival, with a panel, led by Michael Gurian, Matt Umanov, and Tom Ribbecke.

Bottom line is that the Lacey Act is a sweeping, nonsensical law, with such broad implications that there's no possibility that the government will be able to apply it consistently. In short, reaaally bad legislation. I plan to do some more research to better understand what it really means.

They also discussed the challenges that US Fish and Game can put on anyone posessing or importing natural products like bone, etc.

Good intentions (protection of limited natural resources) with some very wrongheaded laws, which will cause heartache at times for luthiers and players.

Hey Tony,

From what I know Shane is right on with having to get a permit from Fish and Wildlife. I know of Canadian builders who have had couriers hold up instruments because they didn't have the Lacey stuff in order. Also from what I've heard talking to other people it can be more than $100 for the permit from Fish and Wildlife. I've moved away from using shell on guitars going to the US. I've also switched to African Mahogany for necks on US bound instruments. That way I can honestly say that my instruments going to the US are Lacey compliant and I can prove it. I don't like that I've had to make those changes, but I'm not going to risk having a customers guitar confiscated while crossing the boarder. So I'm trying some different options for Logo and position markers, mainly recon stone and some types of wood.

I don't agree with the Lacey act and it will never accomplish what they want it to, but at this point there is not much that can be done about it. The form is easy enough to fill out and I just put a copy in with my UPS paperwork. Google Lacey Act Form and you should be able to find it.

Josh

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Josh House

Canadian Luthier Supply
http://www.canadianluthiersupply.com
https://www.facebook.com/canadianluthiersupply?ref=hl
House Guitars - Custom Built Acoustic Instruments.
http://www.houseguitars.com

I kind of figured that a permit might be required Shane .. but the USDA website material makes it look like you dont need one for shellfish, and their products. you can get right to the goods directly off greenfield's site BTW. If its up to someone to interpret .... look out ...

I am also thinking that its my clients who need the permit, because they are the ones importing the guitar .. not sure. Anyway, its just another money grab if all they are doing is processing paper and rubber stamping a permit.

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Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

Just remember Tony, this is not a USDA requirement it is a USFW requirement. So there are a few different branches of government that are requiring documentation. Another of my Canadian customers called just last week because one of his guitars was stuck in customs looking for paper work. It was Lacey Act stuff and they didn't ask about the shell so his fingers were crossed. I will ask how he made out. The problem is that there are no clear instructions on any of this and no fee schedules or exact documents to fill out and the audit of the process is inconsistent. So it is really "shipper beware!". As for who does this stuff, well I know that it was Ted Thompson and David Webber that actually applied for and paid the fees to the USFW to cover off the shell on their guitars heading into the states. And in many cases the shell was originally purchased from the US.....

Shane

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Canada

I don't think permits are required for someone to carry a guitar that is a personal, non-business property into the US. They are required for importers and exporters of commercial goods.

No Lacey Act declaration is currently being required by US customs for personal effects carried by the owner. But the item must be CITES and Endangered Species Act compliant. The only shell restricted under CITES or the ESA is white abalone; I think it's from South Africa. Thing is, no white abalone is used by any guitar maker or inlay supplier for lutherie. But the border people apparently don't know that. There's another story about a guitar seized for this reason in the western US in John Thomas's Fretboard Journal article (must reading). Tony's friend needs another lawyer. He can get his guitar back by documenting what kind of shell was used, with affidavits tracing it back to its source, if that is possible.

Until the badly written and arbitrarily enforced Lacey Act gets sorted out, it's best to leave good guitars at home.

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Howard Klepper
http://www.klepperguitars.com

When all else fails, clean the shop.

Another lawyer ?? .. by the time all the work gets done, and with some travel to the US likely needed, taking on US customs and Fish and Game, and maybe even going to court ??? .. might as well buy another guitar .. or 3 ... and maybe a new car to get them in ...

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Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

I wonder what eventually happens to the guitar. I picture a customs, or Fish and Game agent playing it in their living room.

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I didn't mean to say it, but I meant what I said.
http://www.brackettinstruments.com/

I often go to Detroit with my guitar and twice recently I have been asked what the woods were that it was constructed with. It is like they had a recent memo about watching for banned woods and such.

Fred

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Fred Tellier
http://www.fetellierguitars.com
Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/FE-Tellier-Guitars/163451547003866

What are the chances of this? (serious question)
Is anyone taking a viable run at it??

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Dave
Milton, ON

Actually, NAMM is working on it. One idea that's been floated is to be able to get your guitar a "passport" that says it complies with all laws, so you only have to prove it once. But the shortage of funding for gummint agencies is a problem here. And that would only help with individual guitars. Some way of getting certified as a builder/manufacturer would be good, but I have no idea what is being looked at there by NAMM.

Some builders had a conference call with a NAMM rep and lawyer a couple of months ago. I can't say it was very encouraging--the lawyer was uninformed about a couple of things (yet willing to shoot from the hip about them!). But they are trying to do something.

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Howard Klepper
http://www.klepperguitars.com

When all else fails, clean the shop.

Thanks for the info Howard .. that passport idea would be nice.

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Tony Karol
www.karol-guitars.com
"let my passion .. fulfill yours"

My understanding is that the US enforces the CITES treaty through the mechanisms of the Lacey Act. From what I can see the LA is pretty sweeping: it's basically illegal to sell anything that contains any 'wild' materials that were obtained illegally anywhere along the supply chain. The catch is that you, the seller, are required to do your 'due diligence' to prove the legality of the stuff you're selling. It's a can of worms.

The issue with pearl seems to hinge on the fact that there is no way of telling oyster shell from white South African abalone. One heavy user of shell that I've spoken with also says that the FWS folks are simply not accepting _any_ level of paperwork as 'proof' of provenance. They seem to be opperating under the 'when you're a hammer' everything looks like a nail' rule: we're all smugglers until we can prove otherwise.

We suffer, in part, from having been under the radar for so long. Right now Lacey enforcement at the border is supposed to concentrate on items or shipments of lumber that cost more than $2000. That's a fair amount of raw lumber or veneer, but not many guitars.

I imagine the whole thing will get sorted out eventually, but how long it will take, and how much expensive foolishness will be perpetrated in the meantime is anybody's guess. Those confiscated instruments, apparently, are used as 'educational tools': they put them in airport displays to tell people what they should not try to carry across the border. Maybe the foolishness will stop when they run out of airports...

Thanks guys. Hope NAMM makes headway & some clearer thinking prevails. The whole thing is one of those "...you've got to be kidding..." situations. Management by fear! Very sad. Pray for sanity.

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Dave
Milton, ON

That wouldn't be much of a problem. Who uses oyster shell?

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Howard Klepper
http://www.klepperguitars.com

When all else fails, clean the shop.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was always under the impression that the bulk of commercial Mother of Pearl came from Black Lipped oysters?