The way I read these specific exhibits is that "Natural Mortality" (variable M) has dramatically declined since 2004. However, biomass (and abundance) have remained stable over that time period (unless you look at very young year class since "natural mortality" is the only way they die since no one is plugging for fry -- though I've seen JohnnyD try).

However, over that same time period, the 8+ class has declined (despite reduction in "M"). So this raises the question of what's happening to 8 year or older fish. They are not dying naturally (as someone insinuated earlier) since bass live much longer than that AND "M" (natural mortality) is declining. So it would be obvious to suspect that fishing (even by catch) is playing a role.

However, these fish move around a lot and as many of us know they haven't been showing up in the usual places (specifically some inshore areas) in the last few years. Maybe the scientists just aren't finding the bigger fish...I know I'm not :)

Thats kind of the thought I was getting at.
Maybe I am spoiled but a bass is a real deal when it's over 40 pounds.
And they are not as common as not that long ago.
Many reasons why I'm sure, you know as well as I that they have always been offshore.
Oceans a funny place.
That's why chasing Tuna is so much fun.

:exp:

too much:bs:

8 year old fish "dying of old age"...:rotflmao:

Dude...please....:rotf2:

Hey all...I got back from ASMFC on Friday and will ahve some coments and additional notes on a very strange meeting week.

For now check this out...

ASMFC will be one of the as of today 96 booths at the MSBA show...the person working the booth is a very attractive lady named Nichola who is the staffer for the Striped Bass Board...she keeps all the current info flowing and is as good a source for straigh info as there is on the coast...come talk to her...really.

Sorry to be so animated, but it is not "my" claim. It is in the ASMFC report you directed me to in order to gain some "perspective", thank you.

So again, their technical comittee says that using more realistic methods of estimating commercial catch, the commercial take is 52-59 % of the TOTAL coastwide take (unless I misunderstand what they are saying). Sort of shows that graph to be a whole lot of BS. Also suggests the commercial catch (and I note they refuse to include commercial poaching) is one helluva a lot more of an issue than convenient those suggesting the recreational sector is 80% to blame. Do you agree?

.........no offense taken....
I would agree that the commercial catch may be larger than years ago; as I originally stated, several years ago the quotas in the net states (MD, DE, NC,VI, Chesapeake) were increased....quotas in the other commercial states MA, RI, NY) have been relatively static. I think the reasoning for this increase was that those "breeding" states took such a large hit to their fishing economy during the moratorium years, that when the striped bass was declared recovered by ASMFC, they increased their quotas.
Also in the same paragraph you refer to it states-

"Following bias correction, ages 7+ F on striped bass would have
fallen by 38% to 54%. Current (2008) ages 7+ F was 0.27 based on original (uncorrected)
MRFSS harvest estimates, 0.16 after bias correction under scenario 1 and 0.14 after bias
correction under scenario 2. Despite the severe bias in MRFSS recreational landings and
discards, all recent (2000-2008) F estimates, derived either before and after bias
correction, would have remained well below our current overfishing threshold for striped
bass (i.e. F < Fmsy= 0.40).

So I think with what you cited they were talking about older fish (still a layman trying to interpret all this). Take note that they stated "well below our current overfishing threshold for striped
bass "......
Also, in the same report, page 8, the following was reported-

"In addition, a
recreational catch adjustment was made excluding the party-charter (PC) component of the
striped bass catch after 2004 because the MRFSS has adopted a specific survey for party-charter
fisheries since 2005."

Now, why are charter/ headboats catches not included in the the figures you reported? Are they quasi commercial? I still believe that that is where the largest piece of the striper pie is going...not to change the subject (but I will), if you do the numbers, COASTWIDE, there are a lot of bass being caught in that fishery, YEARLY. Look at whats going on down south now.

If I do have an agenda, it is that the striped bass fishery is a shared resource....that as a rod and reel commercial fisherman who has as much respect for these fish as you do, I get upset at being portayed as the bad guy..I have my quota, I abide by it, and I respect the right given to me to pursue them. And I do passionately care for their viability to continue to satisfy both camps (rec/commercial) in the future....

Basing regulations on this entire "user group" and "shared resource" thing is utter nonsense. This is not protection of the species, it is protection of the user group. This group takes this, this group takes that, he has more than I do, if we don't catch them it will leave more for them..makes me :yak5:

Just do what you have to so that the fish is protected, let the chips fall where they may. It is what it is. If it means a shut down, fine. Just protect the fish.

Asking a comm fisherman is it OK if we make "your" fish a gamefish is like taking crack from an addict. Of course he will kick and scream. They should not be seeking the opinions of any of the user groups. Regulators must take their head out of their ass and do what is right for the fish.

The amount of "data" out there is mind-numbing. Read that thing, it could be shot down by anyone. Who knows how good the data really is? Selectively using this data and making correction after correction to it which is further error prone makes for any result you want. It would not surprise me if behind the scenes they know what answer they want before they get started.

We need to take conservative action and err on the side of safety, regulators should be concerned about the fish and ignore side effects to the fishermen.

They are included in the overall numbers as recreational caught fish. They are not included in the MRFSS numbers because charter/party boats have to report hard numbers and are included in a different survey. Thus the charter/party numbers were excluded from any correction factor that was applied to the MRFSS numbers.

Are you saying that the striped bass population is endangered? You'll have a tough time getting anyone to agree with that. Everyone seems to agree that the population of breeding fish is healthy enough to support some amount of harvest. So once you reach that point, then it's just a question of how much harvest and who gets to do the killing.

The commercial percentage is not going up because they are catching more fish, it is going up because the recreational fishermen are catching (and never were) nowhere near the numbers they are being estimated to catch (this is discussed in detail in the expanded section on the flaw in the MRFSS sampling methodology).

The percentage of commercial caught bass does not change...it stays at over 50%......relative to the entire coastwide catch, because the coastwide recreational catch is made up of Recreational (MRFSS measured charter survey + MRFSS estimated non-charter catch) and only the later number is wildly off (70% overestimate x millions of fisherman leads to a huge total overestimate). The accurate charter estimates undoubtably make up a large percentage of the actual 40 % of fish the recreational sector uses.

The number is not of great concern to the ASMFC.....indeed it is comforting to them since it means total fishing pressure is not as high as they assumed.....which translates into there supposedly being more fish that can safely be caught......hence the vote to consider increasing commercial quotas further.

Now this might make sense if the actual numbers of fish were what they like to estimate, but if there are that many fish why are recreational catch NUMBERS (not poundage) plummeting so fast? Maybe the survey is so flawed it can't be trusted....or maybe there are not as many fish as they estimate and the dimishing success of the millions of average anglers coastwide reflects that.

So where do you think this is headed as the millions of average anglers begin to recognize that they are "getting" maybe 20% of the overall quota (commercial 55% per the technical comittee report/Charter say 25%) and that number is dropping fast?

At very least they ought to redraw that annoying graph and pie chart to show what is really happening and people stop using it to support a position it does not support.

I'll say it agian... I do not know of a single charter boat running six packs that reports their catch of striped bass as they were never required to, with the exception of NY and those numbers are whatever they say they are. who is wieghing those fish in and tallying the weight??? Same Crap like the NJ Bonus Tag Program, the less you report, the less headaches and the more fish you can kill right??? Wonder if the boats in va and nc are????? Charter boats kill the most bass, no question....

Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

From some of the research I've done, more and more evidence is popping up that the charters are killing a significant portion of bass.

If there are charter captains that think it's wrong how many bass are killed by the charter industry, they should take the dollar signs off of striped bass and stop chartering and commercial fishing.

Hmmmmm. . . . Follow the money.
Millions of angry recs may be starting to get a voice soon.
Storms a brewing.

......multiple use of a shared resource is the only equatable way...striped bass are a multi-use fish..........food is honorable........rec is honorable(even though respected Oceanographer Jacques Cousteau stated fish resources should be used for food...not for fun).........Cow Hunter is correct as the rec/charter group is putting a big dent is striper biomass coastwide.....

Not everybody can afford to fish for fun, nor would they, some of us make a living on the water... My point is, I don't know personally of a single charter boat captain that would have a problem to 1 fish per angler... So we have to stop fishing for money because the charter regs are to lax???? Make the Same money if its 1 fish per angler or 2 fish per angler with half the mortality... Am I the Only one that sees this???
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

Curious. . . what % of Charter boat are also commercial fishing boats ?
I have no idea,
Just throwing it out there.

I believe the real number of killed bass on charter boats is rather staggering, it's way above what is estimated, but then I'm no scientist... Trapperpierre us probably one of the most knowledgeable fisherman on here, he's been pointing out the charter boat impact for years... I know the guy loves striped bass more than many, I can bet that he's got more 60 and 50lbers on this board than anyone on this board...
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

some boats are strictly charter...some are strickly commercial ...some of the boats(not all) ..some days they sail as charters...some days they sail as commercial.........hard cap documented data landings from commercial...undocumented large catches from rec/charter...............the commercial catches are fully documented..........the huge catches of bass that are from the rec/charter group are not fully recorded.....when these figures are obtained???we will have proof of the massive rec/charter catches of our beloved striped bass...........numbers? all comercial striper anglers are registered by state......also, charter boats have lists again by each state they fish from/in............check state data bases..

Sorry, I just can't see how anyone on here can believe these fish are near extinction??? What cause people can't catch 40-50 bass a trip every single day??? I mean there are days it's no problem but really... Every single day??? I should of never bought that new boat knowing the end was near and I should stop fishing for hire or money so there could be more easy to catch striped bass in the ocean! Get rid of the illegal poaching in Va an Nc that is so obvious. You can't compare that to sw ledge or the sub bouy, millions of pounds are poached where the fish are supposed to be protected. A closed area!! Why go after the guys that fish legit???
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

I still don't believe that 55% commercial figure....just as you don't believe what I'm saying...as someone else mentioned in this thread, it can all be massaged to what our indivudual bias is.

I will reiterate, the coastwide commercial quota is mostly coming from the net fishery in the Chesapeake -check the quota numbers out here-

http://www.asmfc.org/speciesDocument...BassRegs08.pdf

6,432,727 lbs comes from DE,MD,PRFC,VI,NC, NY (mostly net fishery)

239,299 lbs from RI (145, 972 from R&R, the rest from the trap fishery)
1,107,485 lbs MA, hook & line

.........so now, according to what you have stated, 55 % of the striped bass mortality is coming from the commercial fishery-
7,779,511 lbs....so that means 3,500,780 lbs of fish are being killed by recreational (including charter/headboat) fisherman up and down the east coast? By "millions" of average anglers?? I think its alot more than that.....

Most of the guys were not fishing in 81.

You guys will see. Nothing but Bluefish for 3 or 4 years. A schoolie will make the sports page and a 30# fish will be a thing of the past.

I lived through it once. I will quit this time and just golf. Two moritoriums in one lifetime is too much.

Probably a small single digit figure if your going down the entire striper coast.. Don't understand what difference that makes, com quota is a com quota... I only know of a few guides that com fish in mass and ri..
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device

I was there too, in fact, in the years leading up to then (started fishin in 72)...same area as you, and I did not see those dire conditions. In fact, Block Island was quite good those years (as was Valiant)...I caught some of my biggest fish then. Narragansett Bay wasn't very good, but that's another story. No way is the present fishery anywhere near as bad as that (remember, there were no regs back then...except min length of 16"...I believe the moratorium was in the mid-80's) even along the coast, you still got fish...any night, I could plug (pichney dannies) the middle wall and get 8-10 middle size fish....also there was fish in all the outside spots (Pigs, Vineyard, Elizabethans, Race) in late 70's early 80's...it just took hard work...
...and I did continue to fish (and release) during the moratorium...because I love to fish...
By the way, these days I still fish hard and play golf too..........and I'll be 62 in July

I suppose in a perfect world.
The com kill is documented.
The charter kill SHOULD be documented. (easy to do for an honest man)
The rec kill SHOULD be documented. (easy to do if you care )
Then you would have just the facts, mam.
And all this ridiculous finger pointing would go away.

Well, the new saltwater fishing license requirement certainly sets the stage for the documentation you're calling for.

The truth is out there !

You can't handle the truth!

Not many can ,Paul.
So if I win the Panama trip wanna go ?

I don't know about most of the states you listed but NY is about 50%-50% between R&R and Gillnets.