NOAA over estimates rec catch

[Dx life Rx fishing]

Not sure if this was posted or if it would be good for this thread. I was reading that the NOAA has OVERESTIMATED the rec catch for most of the country by 30 to 40% I don't know how to post a link but I'm sure one of the mods or someone else will or can Google the article and post it here.

 

[WhatKnot]

Not sure if this was posted or if it would be good for this thread. I was reading that the NOAA has OVERESTIMATED the rec catch for most of the country by 30 to 40% I don't know how to post a link but I'm sure one of the mods or someone else will or can Google the article and post it here.

NOAA Says It Has Been Overestimating Recreational Saltwater Catch by 30 to 40 Percent

 

[Fishinatik]

Mrip isnt any good nor was Murphs before it theres no perfect way to estimate catches particularly with little to no dock intercepts to conduct proper catch surveys They need to stop this mrip system as it cant work

 

[Old Mud]

NOAA and NMFS. Both have been using their pet saying for years. "It's our best available science". Cop out for we just don't know. I have run into that saying Way to many times. Times when we had the science to prove them wrong and they would not accept that. Even when proven with pictures and video. (Date stamped) . This is all because of the Magnuson Stevens act that dictates the need for NOOA to enforce that act. Decisions will be made and we will be forced follow them. Right or wrong.

 

[captmike28]

NOAA and NMFS. Both have been using their pet saying for years. "It's our best available science". Cop out for we just don't know. I have run into that saying Way to many times. Times when we had the science to prove them wrong and they would not accept that. Even when proven with pictures and video. (Date stamped) . This is all because of the Magnuson Stevens act that dictates the need for NOOA to enforce that act. Decisions will be made and we will be forced follow them. Right or wrong.

"Best available science" ?#@ What a load of crap!

Correct me if I am wrong, Old Mud, but didn't that phrase spawn the old bumper sticker that read: "The National Marine Fisheries Service-Destroying Fisherman and their Communities since 1976"

Sad but true that most of this Government BS is all tied together and rarely benefits the hard-working Americans who pay their salaries.

 

[Old Mud]

"Best available science" ?#@ What a load of crap!

Correct me if I am wrong, Old Mud, but didn't that phrase spawn the old bumper sticker that read: "The National Marine Fisheries Service-Destroying Fisherman and their Communities since 1976"

Sad but true that most of this Government BS is all tied together and rarely benefits the hard-working Americans who pay their salaries.

Yes sir, you may be right. it's been so long that i don't remember but that sounds logical to me. But I am Old enough to look back and see the whole problem from the beginning. When NMFS was first formed their first mandate was to "maintain sustainable fisheries" Sounds good to me and i'm sincere about that. You have to ask yourself, How do we maintain a sustainable fishery we no NOTHING about ? What is the biomass of any given species ? That and a hundred other questions.

Well, the first order of business has to be sit down and "Brainstorm" . Scary! We have no reliable records of "Past history", Catch reports etc. We will look back at history and try to determine what the biomass of Cod was in the early 1900's. (I'm not sure of the exact date but you get the idea). Going buy what little paperwork we can find from that era and the many pictures that our history shows us lets come up with a plausible number of biomass. (AH, the dawn of "Our best available science" ).

No one and i mean NO ONE had a chance in HELL of getting even close. But we had to come up with a number , guesstimate or not lest we fail as regulators. And so it began, we were so destined to follow the blind. We made these numbers gospel. Fast forward to today. We have a Government entity that can't be touched. We can not elect the people we know or suspect will help us.NMFS has no one to answer to mainly because of the very people that control them have no idea of the facts themselves. I hate to make this sound political but fact is it is. Not Left or Right but Both parties choose to carry on status quo.

I think i'll go out and climb under my car and work on my rocker panels now. (Not a joke but funny none the less).

 

[captmike28]

I think the worst part of all of this is, as you have stated Old Mud, everyone knows that the majority of what we call "Fishing Regulations" and supposed scientific studies are nothing more than wild guesses. And also, that we are doomed to follow this pattern well past our time on this earth.

At least we have our own integrity, but I have no idea how these so called "scientists" and "legislators" can live with themselves knowing their entire careers are built on a complete fallacy.

At least we are fortunate enough to have lived during a time when there are still some fish left to catch. I feel really bad for our kids and grandkids who may have to wind up looking at pictures to find out what really captured our imaginations, kept us happy, and well fed!

 

[Roccus7]

The saddest example of "Worst Available Science" I've witnessed was at a cod meeting in Portland around 2011. The "scientists" who probably never had seen a cod, presented their models with a 100% mortality rate for cod releases. Tim Tower, Captain of The Bunny Clark, a Maine partyboat, had been tagging and releasing cod for years, got up and presented all the returns he's had on his tagged fish. "So, how can you have a 100% mortality rate when I have hard data of tagged codfish being recaught?"

There many very shocked faces on the scientific side. At least they relented and instituted a 80% mortality rate for returned fish. IMO, a more realistic number...

In fairness, they were telling a tale of Doom & Gloom for Gulf of Maine cod, which has turned out to be very true. A good friend of mine, a cod pinhooker out of NH, was telling me NMFS was out of their minds as they were full of chit, and the draconian limits put in place were killing his pinhooking side hustle. However every year his catch continually dropped like a rock, and just the other day he admitted that they were right, the cod have crashed. "But wait, didn't you tell me that they were full of crap?" "Yeah I did, but I was wrong."

Fisheries Management is a tough business in that there's an extreme amount of "crystal ball" reading, especially on the recreational side where hard data are few and far between. The cod crash was based on the commercial landing trends. Since fish like stripers are far more of a recreational target, models that depend on presumptive data like MRIP have huge error bars.

To me, the best data set for stripers are the yearly Young of the Year surveys in the key spawning estuaries. These surveys have been going on for over 50 years and have been accurate in predicting fish availability, a rare treat for managing a fishery. I'll never forget how everyone said in 1981 that somebody was going to crush Charlie Church's 1913 73 lb all tackle record, and Bobby Rochetta did that with his 76 lb fish which is still the NY State record.

 

[Matts]

There is a big difference between "best available data" and "best available science."
But best available data is not necessarily the best data, just the best data available to them. Best available data means you use what your have, regardless whether the data you have is accurate. That's what they do - base decisions on the best data in front of them.
But just because you make a decision based on the "data" in front of you does not make that data better than other data and does not make your decisions scientifically based decisions. Scientific decision making also involves analyzing the accuracy of your data.
The the best available science should have told them that their data is unreliable and that they are therefore not able to make scientific predictions based on the best science - unless and until they improve their data collection protocols.