you make a lot of good points, it's about teaching and changing the culture more than railing "1@36" and "gamefish status" which have had little or no effect apparently on both the regs and the culture.....most of the local clubs have a couple of monthly meetings before the season starts and shops and show exhibitors are gearing up..... I'd guess that for many the focus is on how to hammer more fish rather than conservation and good fishing practices, everyone wants to point out how everyone else has it all wrong when the best way to long term improvement begins with individuals and the people that they interact regularly and how they view their part in all of this rather than regulations and pontifications. A lot of the obvious problems have been mentioned and in most cases they'll be improved sooner through a culture change rather than hoping for some magical change in status and in the long run, whether the concerns are overblown... or if a problem does exist and there is a significant rebound, an improved culture will help sustain it rather than simply run it right back into the ground....or sea....as it were:)

haha ... I was wondering about that . I guess they don't .. I'm enjoying all the new access though . Able to fish Cohasset now .. They like to keep us away from their women .

Pollution, water quality issues, tournaments, changes in migration paths, trawling, netting, better electronics, bait, anglers, politicians, greed, publicity, carelessness when handling c&r fish are all to blame.

I'm relatively young and its easy to see its def. not what it used to be. Unfortunately many of the factors above will be difficult, if not impossible to correct. In a perfect world I'd love to end all charter boats, commercial fishing, pollution, useless killing, etc. and go 100% C&R. Look what happened to the atlantic salmon fishery in massachusetts. CT and Merrimack Rivers were one of the most epic atlantic salmon runs in the world and they are pretty much extinct now. Set up a couple dams to warm the water up and ruin spawning habitat, pollute the water to standards we deem are clean, hammer the fish in the open ocean in their summering areas and set up nets across the river at the mouth... in a short 200 year timeframe the fish are gone. GONE and never to come back unless we remove all the dams and stop the heavy fishing pressure.

Right now, what we are seeing with the striped bass is how much we are impacting them year to year. We know that a few good commercial outfits can clean out an area over a couple years. Recs lining the canal are doing damage may-july. Spawning habitats are in trouble. WE found the winter over areas and are pounding them. Stripers are much more resilient than salmon, but still. There is only so much!

I don,t believe any of them, but I do believe the people who are out fishing all year whether from shore or boat.
I see less fish than just a few years ago.

I,m sure it,s very complex the reasons for all this, bottom line is we need to act now, not sit back and let it collapse.
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It's like spending your retirement now, though you haven't contributed anything into it for the last six years.

A common human axiom is " Well, I didn't see that coming "

Do you know the difference between an optimist and a pessimist ?
The pessimist is better informed ! :)

[QUOTE=scottw;921350]you make a lot of good points, it's about teaching and changing the culture more than railing "1@36" and "gamefish status" which have had little or no effect apparently on both the regs and the culture....

yes it's ALL about teaching the culture. as in teaching the culture about gamefish status and changing rec regs. this would would have a monumental effect on this fishery.....in a good way :).

How about this. Forget game fish status and make it illegal to fish. Then a few preaching game fish status and also happen to profit by selling their plugs will be out of business also.
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C&R would be fine with me. The typical guy who hires a charter for fillets/meatpacking wouldn't like it, but many of those guys could care less about the fish they catch. They don't respect the fish like some guys here do. 90% of the guys who take those charters wouldnt stand a chance catching those fish on their own. Theyre too lazy to maintain a boat themselves and dont want to put in the hardwork to learn what the fish do. When those fish are gone, they move on to another hobby without a care. But they are part of the rec equation - you got a pro headhunter putting these guys on fish every day.

Numbers are down. Anybody that keeps a log, or puts in about the same amount of time, in the same places, year after year can testify. I think "we" are the best indicator of what is going on. I think "we" are the people that need to pledge to release more fish. I know I have. This is where it starts. Forums like this that reach the masses. Maybe it's the pain meds talking, but how about an "I will" for all who agree to stop keeping as many fish. Let's face it. Striped bass are our passion. Otherwise we wouldn't be participants in a great site like this. If the trend continues, there won't be a need for a site like this. Therefor, I'll start. I will.

gee ronnie...really :rotf2:, i care MORE about this fishery than striper plugs- not my fault the the health of the fishery and my business go hand in hand. i can just as easily build bft, musky, lmb, costa rica plugs and probablly make more cake. i would not go out of bussines, how about you?:rotf2: next.

You're leaving out the part about you charter guys that walk the line of being a commercial entity regulated as recreational fishermen being SOL as well.

Forget Gamefish Status... 5 tags per license, 36" limit and call it a day. Even for someone terrible at cleaning a fish, 5 fish at 36" should get them at least 25-30lbs of meat per year. Few families are eating 30lbs of striped bass per year. And if they are, they should stop because the fish isn't even all that good for you with all the toxins and heavy metals.

Well if noaa/dmf/vatican don't do ANYTHING then all the comms and charters will be out of business.

Think we need to look at charters a little different. Like I said earlier I looking at them as bus drivers taking recreational fisherman out to the fish. When I was a kid in the late 50s there were 3 party boats working out of the NJ Highlands where the captains had been fisherman and changed their businesses over to running party boats. Pre 200 mile limits made it hard even than to make a living fishing. A hundred years earlier thousands of people could make their living from the sea but just like many other occupations technology changed all of that. Charters may be the answer for still being able to continue working at sea for many of the small boat fisherman. May not be their ideal job but it is a job. But of course if the stock dumps down then commercials, recs and plug makers are all out of work.

I guess the head of ASMFC isn't reading his own stock assessments because they show a big decrease since 2004 based on the 2011 report.

"Abundance and Biomass: Striped bass total abundance and biomass were estimated using the SCA model (Figures 7 and 8; Tables 11 and 12). Abundance increased steadily from 8.3 million fish in 1982 to a
peak of 67.5 million in 2004 then declined to 42.3 million fish in 2010. Abundance of striped bass age 8 and greater, representing approximately fish 28” and greater, was lowest in 1985 but then increased to a series high in 2004. Abundance of age 8+ fish decreased from 9.7 million fish in 2004 to 5.9 million fish
in 2010. Total biomass followed a similar pattern increasing from a low in 1984 to a peak of 111,877 mt in 2002. Biomass since 2002 has declined to 87,771 mt in 2010"

So are you saying that if we make stripers a game fjsh that hou will goout of business sounds like a terrible business plan to me relying on a nonsustainable item for.a.ljving
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Atleast as a gamefish they may be.caught again
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No. I'm not one drinking the cool aid that things are as bad as these tree Huggers are preaching.
Also not talking out of both sides of my mouth.
We got some in this tread who have killed & sold fish for years (lots of species besides bass) and preaching about collapse.
Guess they found religion and are born again.
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Some people learn from mistakes made in the past and others never learn and just keep repeating them.

Well Raider I've always kinda laughed at the boston Harbor charter idea of gut hook with a treble n relese. seen it too many times. Sad way to go it. Just remember that a change in tactics or gear goes a long way to sustainability.These fish aren't throw aways just to get a buck. I've had loads of tag returns over the years that came off eel caught fish an plug caught fish that were released.Al Anderson has done it for years while chartering an he's still out there doing it. He knows that every one that swims away he has a chance of hooking again in a few yrs.Keeps the charters happy.I've taken many people fishing over the yrs that went home with some sweet pictures an left the fish swimming. not a bad thing. A change here n there goes a long way. Denial got us the last moratorium. People hear about something like that they don't book charters cause they think you can't fish for stripers. You do a little conservation changes and advertise it an it goes a long way towards business.Plus it helps there to be fish to chase in the future.

Let's be clear about "the last time"

Unlimited daily take with an 18" minimum size, unlimited commercial season, with legal dragging and haul seining caused the last collapse. (Not to mention massive pollution in the Hudson and Cheasapeake spawning grounds).


That's a far cry from 2 @ 28".

And I realize they still use nets in N.C., and I think that's ridiculous. If commercial guys can't get their limit down there hook and line during those migrations, they should find another job.

Let's say for the sake of arguing things aren't as bad as they are being made out to be, even still, wouldn't you as someone who relys on a fishery to make a living, want to make it sustainable so you can pass your business down to future generations? I don't get why would comm's and charter captains NOT want to do everything in their power to ensure they have a future making a living off the sea? Why the resistance? Why wouldn't you want to question if the stocks are in danger or not?

I'm gonna have to dig out the article from after the last crash where a charter captain regretted doing three 6 pack trips a day livelining bunker and piling big bass in the boat day after day. The super duper catch a pile of big fish charter guys are making a buck right now down south doing just that, you can see the pics on the internet in their ads.

If the 2772 permit holders who didn't sell one fish actually sold a few each, the season would be over in a week. Which would make the whole thing pointless.

There's more than one way to get across town. Just because we aren't taking the same route, doesn't mean the destination is different.

"Well Raider I've always kinda laughed at the boston Harbor charter idea of gut hook with a treble n relese."
Hey Ron,
You have never been on a boat with me and certainly not on my boat.
I hope you are not suggesting that we release gut hooked fish to die from my boat.

This thread has brought out some attitudes.

I don't know raider ron at all but I bet he is not a gut hook and release guy.
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The comment is pointed at the practice I've seen in the harbor on more than a few occasions while fishing in the harbor. If you don't do it great but you see it done out there .Yet it is rare to see anyone try to change the practice by educating others that it is a destructive practice.It's still practiced to this day by many. The point is that change is educational by all even when things are not our own practice. the responsability is even greater with a Capt liscence as people look up to us. When they see us ignore things like this they think we condone them too.I've had more than a few heated discussions with friends over issues like this as they're just plain wrong like yo yo ing.We need to lead by our pratices and actions to include teaching others what is good and what isn't.

I have only live lined a couple of times and did it with scup and 8/0 circle hooks. They worked just fine and we only had one gut hook out of probably 50 bass. I think Maine made it illegal to use anything but circles with bait, did MA change the law also, or was there any talk about it?