Are the chickens comming home to roost?
 

Been talking with my friends, it seems that there is a lack of fish along the whole coast. I have not hit any decent fish slow trolling live eels at night from the kayak (usually so good it shouldn't be legal, don't worry I don't keep any fish) canal is dead and I haven't herd of any fish over twenty pounds locally. Even the commercial guys I talked to at the gas station complained noting over twenty pounds. My question is do you think that fish greed and mismanagement have finally come home to roost? Just curious on other opinions as I have been thinking for the last several years that a new moratorium is on the way. and this time I fear that the bass might not recover

NY, NJ etc hammered em this spring, in my humble opinion its more of a weather factor than anything else.

However i will agree they need to crack down on the bi catch in the Carolinas.
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

Sure we did...I almost had a night where I caught three...but it turned out to be sea robins...I switched over to fluke fishing after last seven nights without a bump. This is probably the worst I have seen this in last twenty years amongst people I fish with. Granted we are googans and all the bass are offshore. The water is too cold. Sandy screwed thing up. The fertilizer runoff. The water clarity. The season is three week behind...and yes , I did hear that they are passing in ezz now to bypass crippling local ny/night taxes.
someone in ny/nj I am sure had a banner spring..just not no one I know
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

Good thing we can dismiss this as just another gagoon who doesn't know any good fisherman :smash:

Been following your posts on FB and SJ, and feel you are spot on Z....

I've been around long enough to have heard guys singing those same songs back in the early 1980s. :(

good read that just went up...http://www.reel-time.com/articles/co.../eat-bluefish/

... and I was in graduate school working on a thesis to justify increasing the minimum size from the then 16 inch min. Oh yea, I remember the lean years last time around and I too have been crying wolf for the last couple of years.

It's really hard to deny something is going on - it's just not what is used to be, I don't care who or where you are

Well... I saw this coming a long time ago. You can only wring a wet towel so much until it's dry.
That said, it's not dry yet, but getting close
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

I recently talked with 8-10 Jersey "Sharpies" they had 2 decent days this year...these guys would know.

I believe most thought we were full of it when we said this was coming 5 years ago. Well, in my opinion, its here now. I put my boat in April 9. I found the first pogies in Narr Bay on May 2nd. I have over 100 hours on the boat this year and have had 1 real good day and 2 fair days. Nothing over 25# and most 15 to 20#.
There is no doubt the bass are in trouble again. I will now live through my second collapse of the Striper species.

Can't wait to see what kind of action if any the ASMFC will take.

It's like a doughnut when you start eating all meat from the edges then all you're left with is a hole.

Bass are getting harder to find on the edge of the range and fishing for them is now are less consistent in the middle part of their range MA,RI CT. Fish the surf without the electronics of a WWII destroyer and you'll see it.

Bill Wetzel posted that this is the worst June he has ever experienced in Montauk. That is a lot of Montauk years and hard fishing.

Nobody in the ASMFC fishes so......they are clueless!
:smash:

just listening and observing this season, i can't recall a more stark contrast between shore and boat folks in terms of opinion and intent...

I don't consider myself a sharpie but, I had one decent outing this year. and I had to go to the northern tip of NJ to have it. Even the boat guys I know are having difficulty finding them on a consistent basis.

I agree with you and yet a lot of fishermen are calling for doing the same thing as was done after the last collapse- increase the size of legal bass. Well this didn't work so well the last time - why not try something different. A wise man once said a fool keeps trying the same methods and expects the results to change.
I have nothing against the commercial fishermen; I just think that once they catch their targeted species any bycatch should also be counted against the quota of that species, ie., stripers caught along with menhaden or dogfish. If the fish is dead why throw it back to feed the birds but it counts against the quota for commercially caught stripers.
I'd like to see a slot limit similar to the one used in Maine, yet without the large category- take a picture and if you want a mount get one made of fiberglass- they last longer.
Just my $.02 Ron

Ayup.
The first Derby's I fished were when you couldn't keep a bass. Didn't matter, I remember being there for a week with hundreds of other guys and no one caught even a schoolie.
We're headed that way again, due to more than one reason too.

dunno if that's true..... I'm a boat guy (albeit I Suck), but Piemma and clammer are both boat guys that forgot more than I will ever know. (I'm pretty sure Mike was actually born on the bay while his mother was fighting a fish) They aren't seeing any great fishing that you speak of. Some boats in SOME regions sure, but it's not the overall trend by any means.

Not sure what this means, but there seems to be alot of fish in this size class.

Soap Box

All of the screaming in the world won't work unless there is something approaching a unified voice. People need to attend the public hearings and meetings.

/Soap Box

For all of the people stating "we could walk on 'em last week over here" there are a lot less places with a lot less frequency where that is happening. Ther plethorta of less than a decade ago of this saved fish is no longer plethorus

The fish only were in the river good for about a month this year. I would guess I caught around 30 keeper sized fish during that month. I was looking at some of my old logs (2000-2003) I was getting well over 100 back then. That was when I was just getting into surfcasting too. I know I am a much better fisherman now than then. My numbers should be going up not down.

Very true John,

Thing I get a kick of is no one on this thread is saying thats it...I'm selling the boat, all my rods and going golfing to help protect the species. Even if you don't keep your affecting the mortality rate of all your releases.

Give me a break, life is short, go fishing and try to enjoy it. Most things run in cycles and imo we are coming down from one now.

BB, 20# fish is 10 years old more or less. So what we are seeing is the fish that are left from 2004 and 2005 YOY. Both of those years were huge YOY classes.

And there won't be much left to take their place when they are gone.... not for quite awhile.

http://blog.trcp.org/2013/08/07/the-...-striped-bass/

I know this is from last year and it's one guys' blog on it but read it anyway
worth the time

You are right Joe.

Their history is to be reactive, rather than pro-active.

Catch reductions were on the table 3 years ago---until the YOY numbers came out in the fall. Tabled. All was well again.

For "maximum sustainable yield" 3 bad years in a row should trigger catch reductions.You can't sustain what ain't sustaining themselves naturally.

We used to call nice fish 40 pounds. Then it was 30 pounds then 20.....not a good direction to be heading.
God, I'd hate to think of targeting blues again just to get tight on a consistent basis.
At least the blues the last go round were jumbos....not now.
This may suck for a while !
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device