Striped Bass Fishermen, Where's The Outrage on the Proposed Conservation Equivalencies???

[Roccus7]

I must say the lack of responses from my Learned Colleagues here regarding the Conservation Equivalencies blurbs posted here has been underwhelming at best, extremely disappointing at worst. I'm starting to feel that few of us care.

OK, I'm off the soap box and will "enable" all of you by posting the proposed CEs to date, with my editorial comments in red.

• Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts will NOT be submitting CEs, sticking to the ASMFC recommended 28-35" slot with a single fish per day.
  
  
• New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island have banded together on a CE that I consider a "R&R" CE, Regional and Rational. Also CT continues to abandon its "Bonus Tag" Program, Props to them.
  
  There are 2 options they are considering:
  • Option A: 30-<40" Slot for everyone
  • Option B:
    • 30-<40" Slot for Shore/Private Boats
    • 28-<37" for the For-Hire Fleet - Wish someone would figure out if For-Hire is commercial or not
      
• OK, that's not to bad, but now it's time to review what the fair Garbage, I mean Garden State is proposing. No surprise that it's another of their patented, "Kill 'em all" proposals, especially since it was formulated to target the 2015 Year Class and keep allowing them to keep a prime breeder.
  • A Slot of 24-28 or 29"
  • Bonus tags for either a 35 or 43" fish!!! Rumor has it that few tags are ever returned because they get reused.
    Let's hope that their Post-Sandy whine has been the fish have been taking a bee line from Cape May to LI is true and stripers have finally learned to stay away from NJ. I cannot say enough bad things about the state that issued my birth certificate...
• Well if you think NJ was bad, you can't even imagine what the Nobel Laureate Fishcrats of Maryland came up with for Chesapeake Bay fishing, which ASMFC recommended to be 1 fish @ 18". Of course there were multiple options based on differential equations that make a Chinese Takeout Menu of 1 from Column A, 2 from Column B look simple. Therefore I'll only present the absolute worst case which is what they want, Option 4. OK here goes, my comments in red:
  • Charter Captain can't keep a fish for a boat total - Nothing wrong with this
  • No Targeting Striped Bass for the month of April - Works for me
  • Above means "Trophy Season" starts May 1 - TROPHY SEASON?????
  • August 17-31 No Targeting Striped Bass - Yeah, like there's any striped bass fishing in the Bay in late August
  • Bag limit of 1 fish from Private, 2 fish "For-Hire" - Here we go again, you CAN be half pregnant!!
  • Early winter Closure, Dec 11 instead of Dec 15 - My goodness FOUR DAYS EARLY??? What a concession!!!

As of this writing there is no information regarding the remaining states like Delaware, Virginia, Potomac Area, North Carolina, et al.

OK, folks, start chiming in here. It's too bad that one councilor's resolution back in October NOT to allow CEs was resoundly defeated, but it figures. Until ASMFC's first priority becomes the health of the fishery with minimal consideration and pressure from commercial interests, we will continue to see individual States' CEs that show commercial slants with minimal fishery health considerations.

 

[pequa1]

Coming from a shooting sports background, I am used to throwing up my hands at the nonsense know-nothing politicos come up with. I will probably not fish for stripers at all here in NewYorkistan since while surfcasting from my town's ocean beach in the last three years I believe I took home one 30" and one 29" in about 15 to 20 trips. Clam bellying produced similar results as did casting tins under the bridges. I do not like torturing baby fish and will probably just go hunting and shooting and if the shoulder holds up return to archery next fall. I just can't wait to see what the asshats come up with regarding fluke.

 

[pequa1]

18" stripers for Maryland !!?? I think I have snagged bunker that large.

 

[Roccus7]

18" stripers for Maryland !!?? I think I have snagged bunker that large.

This inside Chesapeake Bay, not on the ocean side.

 

[wader]

18" stripers for Maryland !!?? I think I have snagged bunker that large.

agree - wayyyyyyyyyyy too small

I've seen these 18 inch fish in the fish markets down here on the Eastern Shore. Found hard to believe they were there. At first thought they might be hybrides/farmed fish - nice straight stripes on the sides confirmed they weren't.

 

[pequa1]

Then again north of the GW they kill baby fish too

 

[Capt13]

They raised it to 20" on Chesapeake bay ...... for Virginia. Also closed down the season on December 31. It used to be open in January and I have seen photo's of nice fish taken inside the bay during that month.

I do know that a 20" striper makes a delicious dinner !!

 

[pequa1]

"I do know that a 20" striper makes a delicious dinner !! "

Which is why I would personally like to see a coastwide slot of 26 to 32.

 

[Roccus7]

They raised it to 20" on Chesapeake bay ...... for Virginia. Also closed down the season on December 31. It used to be open in January and I have seen photo's of nice fish taken inside the bay during that month.

I do know that a 20" striper makes a delicious dinner !!

"I do know that a 20" striper makes a delicious dinner !! "

Which is why I would personally like to see a coastwide slot of 26 to 32.

When I came to Maine 10 years ago, up until the 2016 season, Maine had a 20 - 26" slot, PRIMO dining slot.

 

[george]

• Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts will NOT be submitting CEs, sticking to the ASMFC recommended 28-35" slot with a single fish per day.

Ya can't argue with that.

• New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island have banded together on a CE that I consider a "R&R" CE, Regional and Rational. Also CT continues to abandon its "Bonus Tag" Program, Props to them. They "suspended" the bonus tag program, so what happens with those fish? Are they thrown back into the mix or are they not fishing the quota yet counting it? If they just go back into the mix, then they saved nothing.
• 
  There are 2 options they are considering:
  • Option A: 30-<40" Slot for everyone
  • Option B:
    • 30-<40" Slot for Shore/Private Boats

I'm a bit surprised here. Why not offer the 28-35 - inch ASMFC Recommendations? There are going to be a lot of 36-40-inch striped bass that will die just on release mortality alone.

28-<37" for the For-Hire Fleet - Wish someone would figure out if For-Hire is commercial or not

As for the split, we might as well get used to it. Private rec anglers have made it tough on the industry in the past leaving them little choice but to fight for their own category. I know it's divisive, and it's not officially their own "category" yet but it is inevitable.

• OK, that's not to bad, but now it's time to review what the fair Garbage, I mean Garden State is proposing. No surprise that it's another of their patented, "Kill 'em all" proposals, especially since it was formulated to target the 2015 Year Class and keep allowing them to keep a prime breeder.
  • A Slot of 24-28 or 29"
  • Bonus tags for either a 35 or 43" fish!!! Rumor has it that few tags are ever returned because they get reused.
    Let's hope that their Post-Sandy whine has been the fish have been taking a bee line from Cape May to LI is true and stripers have finally learned to stay away from NJ. I cannot say enough bad things about the state that issued my birth certificate...

Here my friend I disagree. As you're aware, the way things worked out, NJ didn't need to cut as much as most other states. I argue that they are saving fish with Bonus Tags as they are a result of NJ having Gamefish status. They take very few of those fish, where if it weren't a gamefish state the entire quota would be taken by draggers in by-catch, and gill nets, as they head in and out of the Hudson.

• Well if you think NJ was bad, you can't even imagine what the Nobel Laureate Fishcrats of Maryland came up with for Chesapeake Bay fishing, which ASMFC recommended to be 1 fish @ 18". Of course there were multiple options based on differential equations that make a Chinese Takeout Menu of 1 from Column A, 2 from Column B look simple. Therefore I'll only present the absolute worst case which is what they want, Option 4. OK here goes, my comments in red:
  • Charter Captain can't keep a fish for a boat total - Nothing wrong with this
  • No Targeting Striped Bass for the month of April - Works for me
  • Above means "Trophy Season" starts May 1 - TROPHY SEASON?????
  • August 17-31 No Targeting Striped Bass - Yeah, like there's any striped bass fishing in the Bay in late August
  • Bag limit of 1 fish from Private, 2 fish "For-Hire" - Here we go again, you CAN be half pregnant!!
  • Early winter Closure, Dec 11 instead of Dec 15 - My goodness FOUR DAYS EARLY??? What a concession!!!

I've become numb to the Bay as nothing they do and get away with surprises me. I do hate that Trophy Fishery.

As of this writing there is no information regarding the remaining states like Delaware, Virginia, Potomac Area, North Carolina, et al.

OK, folks, start chiming in here. It's too bad that one councilor's resolution back in October NOT to allow CEs was resoundly defeated, but it figures. Until ASMFC's first priority becomes the health of the fishery with minimal consideration and pressure from commercial interests, we will continue to see individual States' CEs that show commercial slants with minimal fishery health considerations.

 

[Roccus7]

What intrigues me is that the elephant in the room continues to be cutting down fishing pressure on stripers. Where I live it's truly the only inshore game in town, unless you consider catching mackerel and 6" pollack "fishing". They've reduced our cod season to the last 2 weeks in September, and we haven't seen any bluefish in the 10 years I've lived here.

I'm starting to think life is starting to resemble the musing of the melancholy Dane's lament in Act 3, Scene 1.


To fish, or not to fish? That is the question—

Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of release mortality,


Or to take arms against a sea of Fishcrats,

And, by opposing, end them? To quit, to fish—

No more—and by a quit to say we take up golf



Apologies to William S....

 

[pequa1]

Not so fast. Although I did not target the little bait stealers, blowfish (northern puffers?) returned big time to the south shore bays here. With climate change will some more southern species start coming up as well (snapper, croaker, more drum, etc.?)

 

[Roccus7]

Not so fast. Although I did not target the little bait stealers, blowfish (northern puffers?) returned big time to the south shore bays here. With climate change will some more southern species start coming up as well (snapper, croaker, more drum, etc.?)

Sea Bass have been spotted moving up North. Friend in NH has caught a few on different years down in Portsmouth. I even saw a minuscule one caught by a person fishing for mackerel with a Sabiki off the local Co-Op dock. That would be a dining treat...

 

[pequa1]

I can not make it out to the grounds in my bay boat to target them or porgy. The ones in the bay are way to small. Same with the legal length for blackfish except for the few that sit at the bridges near me. (Unless you are from an Asian nation...) I am stuck with fishing for fluke, weaks and the occasional bluefish. Surfcasting a bust the last two years. Action yes, dinner no.

 

[MakoMike]

FWIW, talking to Terry Stockwell before the last RAP meeting he said that they were finding the BSB more and more often in the ME waters where he fishes.

 

[Roccus7]

FWIW, talking to Terry Stockwell before the last RAP meeting he said that they were finding the BSB more and more often in the ME waters where he fishes.

Yes, they seem to be "moving on up", but yet to hit my hood in consistency. My buddy in Portsmouth, NH can target and catch them regularly. I'm waiting for tog to show up too, talk about prime tog grounds, miles and miles of ledge and rocky, underwater outcroppings.

 

[MakoMike]

My guess is that if they continue to proliferate in ME waters the lobstermen will force the state to try an extirpate them.

 

[Roccus7]

My guess is that if they continue to proliferate in ME waters the lobstermen will force the state to try an extirpate them.

Reminds me of a radio conversation with a lobsterman a few years ago. He couldn't figure out that he had a triggerfish in his trap. When I finally convinced him of what it was, he started to rant about some damn tropical fish ruining his fishing. However he quickly shut up when I told him it was good eating...

 

[Roccus7]

Totally disgusted w/ASMFC. They caved in to NJ and MD's ridiculous CE requests. There are no words to describe my disappointment. ASMFC's actions today showed just how much they can be played by greedy interests and it's not the commercial fishermen getting the breaks. Time for NOAA to manage striped bass, that will cure the greedy gimmes that have played ASMFC for the past 5 years. NJ & MD will "know from suffering" and I will LMAO!! Karma can be a truly heartless Bi-atch!!

 

[george]

Totally disgusted w/ASMFC. They caved in to NJ and MD's ridiculous CE requests. There are no words to describe my disappointment. ASMFC's actions today showed just how much they can be played by greedy interests and it's not the commercial fishermen getting the breaks. Time for NOAA to manage striped bass, that will cure the greedy gimmes that have played ASMFC for the past 5 years. NJ & MD will "know from suffering" and I will LMAO!! Karma can be a truly heartless Bi-atch!!

I don't get how you could be surprised by this. The handwriting was on the wall. Why keep pounding NJ - they have gamefish status! If every state had that this fishery would be in much better shape. MD, on the other hand always gets what they want. They always have and they always will. AS long as they keep footing the bill for striped bass studies, they will keep getting what they want.