I hope this happens soon

[l.i.fish.in.vt]

Mark,you are required to file report catchs in mass,whether you fish or not.i have to agree with Kenny,same guys complaining every year,one constant complainer even mentions that he had one of his best years ever.are bass stocks down? i say yes but they are down from the peak.people got use to easy fishing now that you have to do a little work to catch people complain they are gone.in the last 5 years i have caught more fish more consistantly than ever before.without the annouance of others,because they are afraid of walking a few feet from there vehicle.if popular places like Race point,Montauk, Smiths point,Democrat,etc,are slow than the cries are the fish are gone.more often than not the fish are a few miles away were a select few are hammering them.maybe some should count how many fish pass thru the canal each spring or how many bass were schooled up off Chatham,the number of fish that were off fire island 2 years ago,or the numbers off Jersey last fall winter.as far asthe Moratoruim,i am curouis,did the remaing bass decide to spawn because some states decided to ban the keeping of them or did some enviornmental factors line up just right in order for a sucessful spawn?in my 50 plus years of working playing on the water i have seen differant types of sea life come and go in cycles.

[Jackbass]

Originally Posted by l.i.fish.in.vt

Mark,you are required to file report catchs in mass,whether you fish or not.

My bad point taken.

I agree, you and I both know of a handful of guys who sit out at a certain spot and fish the same water every day year after year and say the fishing is terrible when down the road there are fish to be caught.

The one individual from that video that makes me really take notice is Wetzel simply because we have mutual friends and I know the guy kills himself to be on top of bait and fish patterns.

Regardless I honestly hope we are down in the cycle and things improve. Like I said before I was encouraged by the numbers of really small fish I saw this year. Just hope they make it to adulthood. By my estimation they were probably 3 or 4 year old fish which leadsr to believe that last years class should have us swimming in schoolie bass in a couple of years. Not my favorite fish to catch naturally but when my daughter is a teenager I should be able to put her on some nice fish(if she still thinks I am cool then, god knows her mother doesn't lol)
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

[zimmy]

Originally Posted by l.i.fish.in.vt

as far asthe Moratoruim,i am curouis,did the remaing bass decide to spawn because some states decided to ban the keeping of them or did some enviornmental factors line up just right in order for a sucessful spawn?.

It reduced the harvest so that the few remaining fish could stay alive to spawn. The abundance in the mid 80's was incredibly low, like 1/20th what it is today by weight. Without the moratorium, it is likely they would have gone the way of cod. We don't need a moratorium today, but a reduction in harvest would help the documented continuous downward trend in abundance over the last decade. Based on the published data, there are at least 30 million fewer spawning females than 10 years ago and the numbered has decreased every year.

[Sea Flat]

I agree with a lot that lifishinvt says, but I truly believe that we can all do our part. Fish stocks are down, can't really argue it. Are they horrible? NO. Having said that I think in order for us to keep them where they are we could cut down from two fish to one for recs and also reduce the amount of commercial a little and we can get close to a sustainable fishery that will not have to go through so much craziness every 20 years.