Should All Fish Be Regulated?

[crabby]

Recently there has been a haddock fishery off of Montauk. Haddock have not been in these waters in many years. Should there be regulations for them in place even though they are not usually caught in NY waters?

Trigger Fish are another species that show up for a short while when conditions are right, yet we have no regs on size or cull limits. Blowfish which were once so plentiful that you were hard pressed to catch anything else, are now few and far between as adult catches.

Do these and other fish need to be regulated? Your thoughts.

 

[buddha162]

I've been saying this for years...YES!

There should be a "reasonable" creel limit on everything: skates, sea robins, triggers, etc. No studies or surveys necessary...it's important to proactively regulate species *before* people turn on them. For instance, more and more folks are wise to how tasty robins are...and I've seen some heinous acts of greed when it comes to that species.

 

[george]

Hello Crabby and thanks for registering and now helping out with moderating! It is appreciated! And buddah162 thanks for joining us.

You bring up a good point, one that I have considered in the past. For the most part, fisheries are managed on historical figures. These fish aren't caught very often, and when you combine that with the limited numbers of intercepts (anglers that are surveyed), it's virtually impossible to find a starting point. We could always guess, kind of like when our porgy season was cut short based on 24-intercepts. But without any history we have no clue what or how to regulate.

With that said, did you know we already have an 18" minimum size limit with a 365 day season for Haddock now? We also regulate Cobia. Sure we've all heard of one caught here and there but I personally have never caught a Cobia in NY waters. And in 25-years of publishing Nor'east Saltwater, I've never even seen a photo of one caught in NY waters. I'd be curious if anyone reading this has. Yet we somehow have determined that we are allowed 2 cobia a day at a 37-inch minimum. Where did they come up with those regs?

I do agree when we see a fishery being exploited, as could very well be the of sea robbins, action should be taken before they disappear. Just as we saw in the case of bergalls.

 

[Capt13]

.......Do these and other fish need to be regulated? Your thoughts.

My opinion is a strong NO !

Besides too many over-complicated regs already (half of which don't really make sense) no, not necessary.

Its my thought that these fish are on the outer fringes of their range ....... to me, putting regulations into effect will have virtually no impact. Waste of time and money.

 

[buddha162]

Yet we somehow have determined that we are allowed 2 cobia a day at a 37-inch minimum. Where did they come up with those regs?

The one species I find most interesting re this conversation is sheepshead. There are, were, apparently a handful of spots producing sheeps in the greater NY/NJ area for the past few years (big 15+lbers), and a handful of very discreet yakkers were on that bite, releasing every fish. Then word got out and some boaters joined the fray...last I heard those sheeps were fished out completely.

Point is, you never know what species are swimming into our neck of the woods these days. Redfish and sheepshead in jbay...wonder if grouper will show up next lol.

The bag limits on triggers/robins/skates I'm talking about could be something new, not built around the MSY model. Call it an antidote to gross behavior...I mean no one should be taking bucket fulls of ANYTHING, just bc it's not regulated. Look at the photos of blowfish on fb, it should make any true sportsman sick. There used to be millions of bergals in Shark River NJ, now there is ZERO. These are not invasive species...it's a goddamn shame to see personal greed played out on that level.

 

[buddha162]

to me, putting regulations into effect will have virtually no impact. Waste of time and money.

It will have an impact on the population here. And how much would it cost to slap a simple 15-20 fish bag limit on everything?

 

[Roccus7]

Interesting topic and I've been on the Bonanza end of many species we don't see much of anymore including blowfish (My first fish, look what it started!!), mackerel and whiting. I'll leave weakfish out since they're so cyclic they must throw the "Nobel Laureates" at NOAA into a perpetual "Three Fingered Salute", ALT-CTRL-DEL, loop. Anyway, I remember potato sacks full of whiting and full-sized garbage cans of mackerel coming off my boat years ago. Yes, all got used, but I ran all around the neighborhood giving away the day's bounty. And of course, my family did eat a good chunk of these fish. Now I'd kill for decent blowfish fry. So yes, we do need smart regulations for all fish.

Now let's consider this topic from a different perspective, what about fish you're catching now that you didn't catch 50 - 60 years ago? From a Mid LI Sound centric point of view, in the early 60s a 5 lb bluefish was like catching a blue marlin!! For years the only bluefish most people saw were 1 - 2 lbs. Yes some sharpies fishing eels at night at Middle Grounds got double digit fish, but the average Joe did not. Fluke around Mid-Sound??? Sundials yes, fluke no!! Sea bass, you kidding, those are ocean fish??!! Large porgies??? Yeah there were some sharpie pin hookers that caught them but once again, the average porgies caught were 6 inches and less. What's the point here?? Very simple, as these species started showing up in numbers and size in the 80s, management helped ensure that they would thrive for the future which they have. Therefore, I believe that judicious regulations are important, even for "exotic" and "trash" fish.

 

[Capt13]

Nice summation of Sound fishing Rocccus. Ditto on the bluefish. We trolled up an 8# fish on wire late 60's .... it was a surprise. We filled half a garbage can with Mackerel many times ..... only stopping after dad would ask what we were going to do with them. They were caught in Huntington Bay ..... on christmas trees. '69, '70.

Right on the money with the porgy and sea bass comments too!

In their over zealous attempt to micro manage individual species, I firmly believe that there have been major mistakes made. These mistakes have led to throwing the natural "scheme of things" out of whack. Quoting what you wrote in another thread :

And then you have the Fisheries Managers that use the "Best Available Science" to continue to manage single species instead of managing ecosystems. The single species insanity results in sinusoidal peaks and valleys in species as restrictions allow them to flourish and then it's suddenly realized there's a glut and we have to increase the pressure on them because they're forcing out other species so let's increase the catch, which then starts the downward fall.

As intelligent as the fisheries management people are, they lack the common sense to see the big picture.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for regs ...... they are absolutely necessary when the dollar value of a fish becomes so high they start being traded, bartered or sold by Recs. Overall I feel we are getting "regulated to death". In the 90's I never understood the reasoning behind changing the fluke regs every year. Sometimes increasing size limits by a half an inch. Insanity.

Set a reg, leave it in place 3, maybe 5 years and then evaluate the effect. A fluid, and constantly changing (nature, weather, etc) entity can't be controlled by highly intelligent gentlemen analyzing graphs and charts....... don't even get me started on (what has always come up in the past) the validity and accuracy of the data they are using to make these decisions.

Maybe some time should be devoted to assessing the effect (damage) of the 10's of millions of juvenile Scup and Sea Bass that are now part of the Long Island sound ecosystem every year. They have upset the balance of things.

Back to Crabby's question again ......... let's not start regulating fish in our waters that, at this time, don't need regulating.