Well, the final #'s for 2008 aren't posted yet but I'm sure they came close if not hit the quota.. I know they were over 1/2 way there in a month..which Is down from years past but still a sh!tload of fish.
They have exceeded their quota of over 1,000,000lbs since 2003 (that's only because that's as far back as I could find records for). My info came from the Massachusetts Department of Fish and Game website... So..yes..that WILL have a huge effect on the SB population alone, imagine if they started cutting in in '03.

BTW.. I have had a MA comm. lic. in the past...and sold many fish legally.........and I will not discount getting it again,,,

IF THE STRIPED BASS POPULATION WAS IN TROUBLE LIKE IS BEING SAID BY SOME, THEN WHY ISN'T THE BLUE FISH HEARD HAVING PROBLEMS? I SAW MORE FISH THIS YEAR THAN EVER BEFORE. PERHAPS THERE IS MORE BAIT IN THE WATER THAN YOU THINK AND THE FISH ARN'T MOVING AROUND AS MUCH. JUST BECAUSE YOU WENT TO YOUR FAVORITE FISHING SPOT AND GOT SKUNKED DOSN'T MEAN THE BASS POPULATION IS HAVING A PROBLEM.

Ya know, I may be one of the few guys who is fluent in Clammish, but he makes sense to me, anyway...:kewl:

Discounting poaching and illegal sales, the numbers just don't work - for all intents and purposes, there aren't any verifiable figures for the take by recreational fisherman targeting striped bass. What is being used now barely even qualifies as a guesstimate, at best.

I don't wanna set fire to my own teepee here, but data collection on that - meaning OUR - side of the fence is way the hell beyond imprecise. It's my understanding that the point of the coming saltwater license is to provide NOAA or NMFS or AFC with more precise numbers on recreational catch to set sustainable size and possession limits to bring striped bass to a sustainable fishery for the future. I hope that's going to be the case but I've got my doubts.

Even if the rec take figures do end up giving the fisheries managers good data, what is it that they intend to do with it? Ya know, it's obvious to just about everyone how important this issue is - and you've got recs and comms in a pitched battle between the two user groups. Striped bass are a common resource for ALL of us.

You want to point a finger at someone? Try pointing it at the fisheries managers - they're not working in the best interests of either us, both recs and comms or the bass. That's the third group in this mess and the one ultimately inflicting the most damage.

An 8 year old kid could tell you why bass are in jeopardy, for chrissakes -

1. You're not letting 'em eat, and
2. You're not letting 'em make baby bass like they used to so there's not enough to catch.
3. Ya gotta leave 'em alone for a little while until they get better. All of ya.

The problem is, there's no political will to do the right thing in terms of habitat and forage - because it's going to be extremely expensive and step on some very big toes in a lot of non-fishing industries. It will also take a paradigm shift in the way in which people have been led to believe they have to live their lives in terms of consumption. And those two issues cover both habitat and forage.

Absolutely no one wants to see a moritorium again - but in a few years there may not be a choice. There's way too much anecdotal evidence from just this board alone that doesn't look good. Everybody will have to take a reduction on an equal basis on a common resource.

To me it seems like the coup de grace for the striper is ultimately going to be delivered by the fisheries managers, if it is indeed going to happen. They're the guys at the helm, not us.

fortunately
 

the animal farmers ,,,pigs & chickens ect. are seeing their animal waste as a source for making bio fuel and more money so eventually less of it will be washing into streams and rivers due to run -off...
but........
the use of pelleted grass fertilizers is a whole other dilemma
especially from golf courses ...and parks

i used to see mounds of cattle manure in texas bigger than a football field that was 30' tall... that's all gonna change....

Some good points mentioned in above posts. While a gamefish status in Mass may not make much difference in the "big picture" it would increase the numbers of surviving bass that call Mass waters home for much of the season. Just imagine how many pin hook boats pound Sow & Pigs and Gay Head during the season. Their take is a LOT of quality bass that, if there is no sale, will continue to populate local waters stabilizing the local population. Every bass that is not kept or sent to market is a bass that everyone has a chance of catching in the future. Of course every quality bass that is released increases the amount that a pin hooker can sell.

DZ

ya DZ, I do think about that when I release a quality fish , say in the canal during comm season, and i kind of bums me out but then again that fish doesn't have any chance at all if I kept it or another rec. caught and kept it. I'll just keep releasing what I can and hope for the best.



Did clammer really write that?

If our stocks are in trouble do you think it is wise to take a fish that has not yet had the chance to spawn..And easier to catch..
Perhaps a slot of 1 @ 28-34 inches would be better along with one over 45 inches.A truer trophy size type allotment.

I happen to agree I think the stocks are off.I think there are many reasons why from the big trawlers taking herring and mackerel and the like to seals who are ravenous feeders of the forage fish also to the condition of the waters in the breeding grounds.The Hudson fishery is in no great shakes either.The herring run which coincides with the migratory spawning run of the bass is gone....I think at this point any step towards conservation is a good one. We have to start somewhere and build off of it.You cannot ask the herring boats to stop taking the forage till we do what we can on our end as rec's to protect the fishery.
I think one only has to look at the situation of the cod stoicks to see the management of the waters of the GOM need some serious attention..I have seen too many fisheries disappear to never return..

Tony good points... From the MD fish/game website:
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/fisheries...tripedbass.asp

# Female striped bass can mature as early as age 4; however, it takes several years (age 8 or older) for spawning females to reach full productivity.
# Males can mature as early as age 2.

I'm still a 1 fish 36" advocate; it will reduce the amount of fish taken by a lot;

So maybe a little larger slot is appropriate. I'd be more in favor of a larger upper limit; i.e. One @ 28-24" and 45" (just saw you posted the same slot size) and above...

This follows with my earlier post in that it is hard to convince many recreational fisherman to release fish as long as there is a commercial fishery. If you stop commercial fishing it would be easier to convince people to release fish. Plus even more important it would be easier to put stricter catch limits on the recreational fisherman because you would be saving the fish for them.

I wonder if we learned anything from the past. If the numbers are even close to right we are killing bass at a higher rate then we were in the early 70s. Maine, NJ and NH do not allow commercial fishing, if a big user state like Mass stops it may really start the ball rolling. So don't under estimate what this may do.

I am also fine with one at 36"..Makes everything easier..
You cannot believe or maybe you can the education/enforcement nightmare of multiple slot limits..Just go to any busy tackle shop on a saturday afternoon as they try to educate their customers..:conf:
We had something like this in NJ a few years ago.

I don't feel like we are killing more now than back in the 70's. Back then everything was kept regardless of size becuase there were minimal, if any, regulations other than the 16" size limit.

The Mass commercial season is a joke to me not due to the amount thats harvested, but that its a free for all. The biggest issue for me is the ability for an out of stater to purchase a license and harvest the Mass quota. Its simply assinine as there is no reciprocal with other states that allow commercial harvest. I don't support full exclusivity on the license, meaning only "full time" commercials can or should harvest all the fish. The Mass resident taxpayers should reap the benefit of exclusivity versus allowing any other states to participate.

My personal take is there's still a lot of fish, although there may be fewer than 10 years ago following the moratorium. I don't fully buy the Myco epidemic either. I think its seemingly more prevalent because its being talked about more. I'm also basing my views on what I've experienced and I haven't seen many myco laced fish in my travels.

I have seen em where I fish.The infected fish that is.They are nasty they run from a few sores to full on popcorn puss balls.
I have at times cut my line so's not to have to touch em.
Nasty stuff..
Even if you don't believe the stocks are in trouble.Why not err on the side of protecting the fish.??
It's the safe bet..

B/B

Your right .. anyone can get a Ma. commercial license / that why [I thnk} its in the neighborhood of 5000 of them .

In RI it is a very limited entry .. I believe there are 2 or 3 available for 2009 .
So the last few springs /when we have had alot of market size bass in the bay ......... guys that wanted in .were SOL >>. it least RI is very strick of issuing any kind of commerciL FISHING LICENSE . you can,t get a quohaug license or clam license either // again that fishery too will let a very few into that industry / soley based on the stock & license that didn,t renew for one reason or another .
Back when licenses were readly available / ..everyone had them Inculding out of start anglers // & there are still OOS anglers the fish RI commercially
When they put the freeze on the catching & keeping & selling of stripers . many of these people didn,t renew their licenses ... I can,t count the number of guys that are pissed they let thier licenses go ..
even many diggers / that,s a tough way to make a living & often when a guy has a opportunity to get a real job // they grabbed it ... then things went sour & they also are SOL .

We /the average guy doesn,t even know how many people actually sell fish .
the state does because we have log books that have to be filled out in detail on a daily basis & turned into the state quarterly ;
the reason being / the average commercial fisherman does n,t know .. if that @ one time RI issued a Multi-purpose license / which almost covered all kinds of commercial fisheries . This lincense is no longet available thru the state . The only way one of these can be transferred / if a fisherman has documated proof of so many landing in a certain period of time & he sells his whole business . his complete fishing rig // & even then the paperwork is passed thru the level in the dem & is approved by a high level offical '
getting back to the M/P licenses that are still active .. we don,t know how many are being used for what .. some may be being used for only one fishery / while others may being used in a few / I know alot of guys th a t have the M/P license that only are doing one fishery / but they were wise enough to keep paying the additional fee to keep the M/P ,,, that has always given them a option / Most of us way back used it for mainly digging & fishing / no clue now ;;


Slip >>>yA possed out of the plug forum :wave:

LOTS of GOOOOD points being stated here;

i firstly and foremostly have to agree with the Fixing of the Forage.

gamefish status seems, imho, to be a moot point if the increased #'s of stripers must work harder to locate their first choice and best nutritional value ~bunker, lb for lb~ bang for the buck that they have been foraging on for centuries. could the increase in the "racers" population be a result of myco bact. AND a decrease in READILY available menhaden???

i imagine this racer stock having to swim farther and farther and already low on nutrition from their nutriously deficient breeding grounds~~~~~~~~~then as they return to their migratory haunts, the same lack of menhaden than say X number of years ago, contributes to a "sickly" stock base that might be more susceptable to myco bacteriosis where they breed and less nourished when they return to the same menhaden depleted OBX. seems like a vicious, multiplying, and repeating cycle that has yet to reach it's MAX potential for disaster,,,,,,,,,,

i say that the Omega Proteins of the world need to diversify and find alternative sources for fish oil and they can plant soy beans for chicken feed!! why not farm the menhaden and leave the wild ones ALONE?? i'm no rocket scientist; but it seems to me that a soy bean field would be onehelluvalot cheaper to service and maintain than a fleet of purse seiners and their spotter planes~~ FOGEDDAH BOUT the indisputable damage that has been done to the Atlantic Coast Stock of Menhaden. human GREED knows no bounds and often will not stop until her obese adzzz is getting her stomach stapled with a fistful of oreos(bunker) in onehand, boatloads of CASH in the other, and her feet firmly planted on the necks of stripers,,,,,,,,,,,,,

on a another tine of this multi-pronged discussion,

while i am quite sure that Mister McKenna's anecdotal observations are very true and accurate,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,from my limited experience and in the "samplings" that i found from '08 i ran into schoolies first in the spring to june from DI to GLCSTR, then i had a better year than in '07 for keepers by size and pb and less racers than '06 and '07 combined. also, the Fall began with a run of schoolies after a great year of big fish up Cape Ann way, and i missed the blitzes due to mucho work. my numbers may be skewed and i fished much less than in '07, but i C&R many fish that covered the entire spectrum of sizes and what seems to be the "right" pattern of progression?? and for the first time in three years i ran into fall morning boos and a deep of the night beached fall inshore cod on the Other Cape in '08. what this ALL means, is for the marinebiologists, but from this layman's perspective seems "normal".

lastly, regarding the liscensing/slots/fisheries mngmnt debate,

i will say this,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,i will concurr with Bryan and others in that we need slots or 1@36"+ with just a coupla provisos. WHEN the feds/states enact this liscensing tariff, i hope and pray that the monies are targeted monies that will and MUST go back into research, enforcement, and parks and recreation.

notsomuch for me and my selfish desires to win back some of the shoreline from the bluebloods and their politicos, but in the interest of proferring the opportunity to pass-on the quintessential NE experience to the generations that will follow,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,our legacy must not only deal with the matters at hand ~~and they ARE multiple~~but we must also consider our children and our children's children.

certainly the Narragansetts from the 1200's - 1700's were responsible enough to ensure that their future peoples had stripers to eat, sell, trade. are we THAT much more shallow and THAT less considerate of one of God's greatest provisions (to include the oceans, the forage, and the species) that we could repeat the atrocities of 80's and the decimation of the American Bison?? both were proud species that flourished and were managed most effectively without phd's, science, mangmt councils, or a gov't that could care less about what's GOOD for its God given resources. these precious commodities were respected by a peoples that knew their intrinsic values for the GOOD of the whole planet and for the enrichment of their immediate, intermediate, and their lives ad infinitum.

i am fully aware that THESE are different times, but WHO
made them this different and at WHAT monumentous COSTS??
for once i would like to see the US of A proact instead of react,
since the latter is always too little too late and wreaks irrepairable
damage more often than NOT!!!

just sum thoughts,,,,,,,,,gents,,,,,,,,,,carry on!
:grins: :grins: :grins:

Some of the same people who complain about taking 2 bass a day will take 2-3 dozen bunker or other baitfish per day and have no problem with it at all. I grew up catching bass with live pogies. Then they disappeared from our waters. As soon as they came back everyone hit them hard and acted like they discovered that live bait catches big bass. No kidding!! We all have look at life in the oceans differently than we once did. Protect it from the bottom up. You can,t have numbers of Stripers skyrocket while baitfish numbers drop. So protect the baitfish and where they live first. Otherwise it won,t work. IMO

Well said Mike....this bit above is the actual bottom line...less than 6 recreaitonal fishers at the last dozen hearings on bunker and river herring...this is why we loose.

Nature knows what it,s doing. It,s been doing it for millions of years. And now your going to step in with a better plan. laughable..priceless.

i would LOVE to be more visual,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

yet, aren't most of these meetings when
us blue collar guys are working :bl: :bl:??

if memory serves the last couple of meetings were being held
around 10:30 and in Providence, when i work/live in Boston/NShore.

makes it kinda tough to participate, but i did send an email
the last time you told us to fire something off about the
herring bycatch losses,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,what can i do on w/ends, brah??

I have sent my request to Sen Menard and my reps asking them not to support this bill. I do not think that MA commercial fisherman, including myself on a part-time basis, should be shut out of the fisheries. I do not buy the SF line. That being said, I posted my thoughts about the desease elsewhere and the need to "think about the fishery" and got my a-hole ripped. If the response I received is any indication of the response being sent to the legislature this bill is gonna have a tough time going through.

How can anyone call closing the Commercial Season a moot point? If you really think the recreational set is doing more damage, which over the season they might be, you're still saving over a million pounds of commercial bass not to mention the tens-of-thousands of pounds of hardly mentioned cull fish that get tossed over the side when the 31st to 50th bass of the day is bigger than one they kept earlier that morning.

If you're going to keep the season open. Make it 5 fish per day 7 days a week, all season long, that way there is no "free for all" as BackBeach put it and the market doesn;t flood. You can sell your 20 or 30 at $2.00 pp when the market is flooded or you can stabilize the market by guranteeing a fresh, daily supply the restaurants will put it on the menu and the price will go UP.

Next, make it MA residents only. These two changes would keep the guys who save their vacation time to go fishing everyday to make extra money off the water. No one can justify taking time off to sell 5 fish per day.

If you all want your chance to save the bait
Vote on the new Menhaden Bill in MA, they are trying to open our inshore waters to purse seining for Menhaden again.

We need to organize a F()KING bus trip for this one!

I still think we should close the commercial fishery, we're NOT saving ANYTHING by keeping it open and that really IS the BOTTOM LINE.

-Dave

oooh and not to mention the tens of thousands of pogies that the commerical fleet kills and rigs daily for live, chunk and yo-yo baits. Now what's your next move? :hee:

Dave, the comm fleet is not killing tens of thousands daily,not even close. It may not even be weekly.There are a limited amount of guys supplying bait stores with fresh pogies, but the comm fishermen don't even come close to taking those kind of numbers.

You don't think so? I could be wrong... but I know more than a few guys who won't head out until they have 300 to rig for yo-yoing, chumming and chunking. Maybe TENS of thousands was a bit of an exaggeration but I don't think thousands is.

How do you know this though? Do you know every commercial fisherman? Just the ammount of guys on the pigs, around the islands and gay head would easily add to up to a few thousand pogies each day if they had 40 each. (I know they take many more than that). And we're no even counting the Cape guys, the guys around Nantucket and the rest of the Vineyard and the Boston Harbor heading north. The more I think about it, the more I think 10,000 might be a possible daily bunker kill, during the commercial season.

Maybe we should make livelining and chunking illegal? :laughs:

In a nut shell, everything should be cut way back - commercial & recreational take for bass, commercial & recreational take for forage, etc...

Now, as pointed out in other posts, if all we are doing is arguing here about it in a circular fashion, we're probably going to argue and argue while the problem gets worse. What Would it take to get people INVOLVED?

This is where I'm trying to go.

The problem I keep seeing is that people almost seem afraid to fight for any version of this. Especially on here. Now I am not saying that I'm some hero, because I'm just as guilty as the next guy.

If not for people like BasicPatrick and the very-few others that are the one loud voice on the behalf of the millions of recreational fishermen we would be toally sunk. The way the panels that vote on these things are skewed right now, there's already a foot of water on the deck.

Doesn't anyone own a bus...? :laughs: that would be awesome to show up in an S-B.com bus and storm these very important meetings.

Well, you're either on the bus or off the bus, like the Pranksters used to say -

I'm in - no, actually, I'm on -

This isn't state by state because it does little to mandate a change in just one portion of the striped bass range - but it could be the start of a groundswell of support for tighter regs on BOTH sides of the issues - and we - recs and comms - BOTH have to take a hit on limits to preserve a common resource.

You can sort out the rest of the crap later but that aspect will never be fully resolved anyway as to who was to blame - there's plenty of it to go around and no one is faultless. The pissing contest just gets in the way of the objective and we all have a stake in the effort one way or another.

This could be the start of a groundswell at a grassroots level - the time could very well be right. Just keep your ****ing finger in your pocket for now and stop wasting time and energy if you actually want to get something done about it.

Hmmmm....I don't suppose anyone on this board owns a bus, do they? ;)

Funny, while editing it appears a couple of other posts popped up with the same question...:hihi:

Let's try and do this then.

If we're going to have a loud voice, we're going to have to make it easy for people to have their voices heard. A bus trip sounds easy enough and it would probably be a blast.

Patrick, if you're reading this thread. Have they set a date for this Menhaden Meeting?

This has worked before. I was talking to a well-known writer yesterday who told me the story about when MA was trying to impose a saltwater license where the money was to be destined for the "general fund". They organized a bunch of anglers and protested. Governer Weld stopped by to ask what the commotion was about, the next week's cover of The Fisherman was governer Weld holding one of the protesters signs. The next week, this writer and his friend were witness to the tearing up of the bill.

So it can work.

Hey, baahhdy - godtham guy, this heah could be pretty good - everbody knows we got troublesh ova heah with the stroipesh...:hihi:


All attempts at injecting a little levity into a serious situation aside, it could work well if the effort maintains a centrist position on behalf of the fishery.

But how r u gonna get them to the bus??? Door to door pick up?? Could be a long trip.... Better be a beer bus..:cheers: And throw in a few Hooters girls..That'll get Clammer on board..:fury::love::):drool:

The meetings are Jan 26th Gloucester 6pm
Jan 27th Plymouth 6pm.
I think

we all have our own opinions / & that will never change ..

but its much more complicated than geting a bus of guys & storm [one] meeting .

As Crafy stated .. you get fisherman to agree ..then you walk on water ;

when I was allowed to be a real commercial fisherman & alot younger [[not this tease to applease B/S ;

I went to TOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many hearings & meetings ;;& demostrations ;;

it is very difficult / close to impossible to get the fisherman to agree on anything ;;

I wish I had the photos of the protest at the statehouse /also the hundreds of boats in the shellfish fleet that made the long trip [[BACK Then} to the Brown Unitervisity boathouse on the seekonk river >>>>>>>> that day & the boats back then equaled possible diasiaster // weather wise ;;
Also a few of us // under complete secreticy [sp\ made nighttime journey,s to NYC to meet with high ranking goverment officials ;;
WE,ll ><><>< we never won a battle or a war ...... there is always something/someone much more powerful behind the curtain ;;

If you can do it /I sincerly wish you the best .
But personally / been there / done that .. & what time I have left .isn,t going to be spent getting pissed off & on & frustrated ..
I.ll fish as long as I can / & can enjoy whayever kind it can be ;;

My number is getting closer / so I.m trying to enjoy what time I have :::::

Best of luck / I really mean it >>>MIKE

ya gotta start somewhere

Dave ;;

your right / but after / so many times & effort // I,m tired ;;

best of luck ;;


PS ;;going nuts ,its not even close to fishable :crying:

Clammer, you're a wise man, my friend -

I'm in the middle of a project right now and I was going to post this earlier but I opted to get some work done -

It's this: You have to realize that's a pretty tall tree you're taking an axe to - with deep roots.

Where ever you start, the end battle is really the reduction fishery and Omega Protein on the menhaden issue.

Omega was a subsidiary of the Zapata Corporation and Zapata was owned by George H.W.Bush, if memory serves.

Tall tree, deep roots and who knows where they go...:huh:

Fisheries managers are also appointees, not elected officials - and they have to toe the line. If I'm wrong on that, I'll admit to it when proven otherwise.

All that having been said, I'd be willing to throw a hat in the ring as time and work schedules allow - but this is just the opening salvo if that's what you have in mind.

Just don't expect shock and awe on the part of the managers - that didn't work either the last time around. It'll be a long campaign.

And to go anywhere at all with it, you're going to have to have everyone rowing the boat in the same direction, like Clammer said.

Uh oh...now it looks like not only am I fluent in Clammish, but we're pretty much on the same channel...:laughs:

Nothing wrong with that - he's got common sense and I know you don't get that for free...:kewl:

To put Omega out of business you're going to have convince an awful lot of politicans to throw their consitituents out of work. To give you an idea of what you are up against, the VA state legislature voted to give omega the menhaden they wanted even if it meant going out of compliance with the ASMFC. Good luck, but I think you're wasting you time, unless and until the menhaden population becomes "overfished" which they are not currently.

I don't fish there too often to be honest.I do not know many comm. guys in MA either. I just know they don't all use pogies and not many comm guys chum.30 or 40 baits is enough to get out there and be effective. It is usually not a fleet out there the way you might envision it.Combine this with the amount of days you can actually fish commercially......

If you look at what is happening in Area 1A right now there will be no herring fishing from 1/1/09 through 5/30/09. Much of this is due to a write in campaign by sport fisherman. There are on going meetings to put in place further restrictions.

http://www.wildlife.state.nh.us/News...rg_010709.html

Many of the state fishing commissions have an automatic Email system to alert you of up coming meeting and when there looking for public input. If you can't make the meetings write a letter. The sport fishing community is huge and when you throw in the tackle companies and boat manufactures we could have a real say. Instead a much small commericial fishery group has to much say.

I think you all are misunderstanding the intent of what I am saying.

If it took a bus, I might consider trying. But if you look at the fact that it takes 4000 crowbars and 10000000000 pounds of dynamite to get the average recreational angler off his ass to even show up at a meeting (and lately to even voice his or her opinion on a pressing issue online!), the bus and the "storm" are used more in the metaphorical sense. I am trying to encourage people to get involved in something. But all I hear is Clammer poo-pooing it "it's too hard, I'm too tired" and sadly, that is the voice of the New England recreational angler. Then you hear Sea Dangles, saying "Nope it ain't like that, they don't all use pogies." As if that somehow makes my point invalid and leaves the "X" number of pogies killed as OK. Then we hear the overwhelming voices that say that stopping the commercial season will have "no effect" we all know that is not true... but it's EASY. And that's what we all want easy. Easy so we can bitch later about it and type angrily at each other, easy so someone else can do it, easy because it's a lost cause. And it is a lost cause if you all stay home to watch rerruns of SVU or House on the nights of these meetings.

So by all means, sit at home and brood, but don't ever talk about saving the bait or the bass again if you're not willing to do something about it. Because that just makes you look like an idiot.

I'll see you at the Plymouth Meeting, because that's the one that is the easiest one for me to get to.

:eek: