In my humble opinion I find it silly and kind of pisses me off, when we have so many people mad at legitimate and LEGAL charter guys that intend to follow the law. It is legal for them to petition for the 2nd fish, if they get that approved then so be it. If they go with the 1 @ 28 and one in the "trophy class" it is not the same as 2 fish killed since out of 3 or 4 clients maybe 1 or 2 of them will catch the larger bass to keep. I can see how it could be a 28% cut in bass killed, using this match. Some charters may catch all of their quota of the larger bass, but a lot of them wont always catch the 2nd larger fish.

I am not a charter guy, but from reading all of this anger and BS... I am in 100% agreement with Buckman.

Legal charters following the law (if they get the 2 fish exception) should not be a reason for people on here to blast them for making an honest LEGAL living..... blame the law not the charters.... I remember reading on here about empty meeting halls and only a few attending them.... kind of like not voting and complaining about who won......

Not a great analogy and the theme of it is a tired one. Yes, we would all catch more fish if we could fish 8 hours a day, every day. If we all fished that much we would find the remaining schools and be able to exploit them. The only thing that has caused it to be harder to catch stripers is that there are dramatically fewer stripers. The idea that 99% of fisherman of fisherman are catching fewer fish because they don't adapt is obnoxious.

No, I'm saying that with increased minimum sizes the same amount of fish will be killed. Do you limit out every day you go fishing. Could you kill more fish if there was no size limit?

We went through this discussion many times on the NEFMC recreational advisory committee, it not the actual amount of fish brought home that motivates people to book a charter, its the expectation that if they catch a fish they can bring it home. For example, when we had a ten fish limit on cod catches, the statistics showed that the "average" catch on a charter boat was only 4 fish, but people wouldn't book a charter for only 4 fish, but they would if they thought they could keep 10 fish if they caught them.

And look where cod is now.
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You're tempting me back into this thread 👊
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There's the thinking that you are 99% of the fisherman, you are not.
Just keep standing on that rock waiting for the fish to come back.

the idea that really pisses me off in all this is that charter guys think they deserve a double standard..... that somehow they're "making a living on the water" entitles them to have a different set of rules than what applies to the general public. EQUALLY
even though it is a public resource, that exists in the public domain. charter guys didn't do anything more to help rebuild the fishery, and certainly flourished when bass made their comeback. now they should share in the reductions to the fishery
EQUALLY

Everyone knows why Cod collapsed and its not from rods and reels and charter guys...it's from catch shares & draggers...period.
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Right on point in my opinion. Great post!

Agree with the above, we all made our bed, we all own the results. Nature took care of all this stuff on it's own before man came along, prey populations bloomed, predator populations followed, prey dropped due to increased predation and predator followed suit. Nobody above us on the food chain or we wouldn't be debating this and with politics and the almighty $$$$ in the mix, nothing is easy or quick.

This just came across my desk, NJ has submitted its proposals to the ASMFC:

http://www.thefisherman.com/index.cf...9&ParentCat=19

:fence:We are all sharing the reduction EQUALLY. All we are asking is for a different option to achieve the same outcome.

"To comply with this directive, the Council is considering two options and both of them allow for a possession of two striped bass"

Looks like New Jersey is asking for 2 fish also...
Everyone to there bunkers! :fence:

Do you really think that the decrease in cod populations have anything to do with recreational anglers?

My point is that expectations, not actual catch, have a great influence on charter bookings.

The for hire fleet not only made money but grew under the 1 fish @ 28" Striped Bass regulation...to deny that fact is insane.

Since the current proposals only have a 50% chance of achieving the mortality reduction AND since the fact is that IF the new regulations do not achieve that reduction the next step would have to be closed seasons with some teeth, I have a pretty important suggestion for all those that are going to attend the upcoming hearings in MA & RI.

PLEASE MAKE SURE TO COMMENT THAT IF SPLIT REGULATIONS ARE PASSED SPLIT ACCOUNTABILITY MUST GO ALONG WITH THOSE REGULATIONS. IF THE MORTALITY REDUCTION IS NOT MET, THE NEXT ROUND OF ACCOUNTABILITY (AKA REDUCTIONS) SHOULD BE BASED ON DATA. IF 2 FISH OPTIONS FOR THE FOR HIRE FLEET DO NOT ACHEIVE THE REDUCTION BUT 1@28 FOR PRIVATE ANGLERS DOES, WHEN THE TIME COMES TO CLOSE PART OF MAY OR SEPTEMBER SHOULD ONLY APPLY TO THE FLEETS THAT DID NOT ACHEIVE THE REQUIRED REDUCTIONS.

SPLIT MEASURES SHOULD BE SPLIT ACROSS ALL ASPECTS OF MANAGEMENT.

Maybe not overall, but south of Block Island the last 5 years, yes, I think rod/reel rec, charter and head pounced on a relatively small school of fish, and now the fishery is suffering....

Another thing about managing for hire and private anglers separately is that representation on management bodies, advisory panels, expenditures of license fees, expenditures of research funding etc etc all must change as well.

When was it ever 1 fish at 28 inches?

Come on Pat, you know better than that. No one is going to track reductions in F by mode. Just like the separate measures for scup, sea bass, etc. Plus add into the equation that every state is likely to have at least slightly different measures. Just look at what Toby posted about NJ. To do what you suggest would require the ASMFC to track F by state, and you know that isn't going to happen.

Bryan, south of BI is a separate stock from the GOM, there is still an unlimited bag limit and continued recreational fishing in that area. (not that I totally disagree with you assertion).

Fair question, and the answer is yes, it is possible.

May I ask a question? Is there any data to suggest that if charters were limited to keeping 1 fish instead of 2, that your bookings would decrease? What's so magical about that second fish, that it makes it a significant inflection point on the supply/demand curve?

I am limited to my personal experience here. I don't like 6-pack type of fishing (I'm a light tackle guy), but I usually do 2 trips per year on a 6-pack boat - one with my kids and nephews, one with college buddies as a reunion. If the bag limit were cut to 1 per guy, it would not cross my mind, not for a nanosecond, of cancelling the trips. Obviously that's just me.

They can't all be doing it just for the meat, because it's a whole lot cheaper to go buy fresh fish at a fish market (though that's not as fresh as just off the boat). Some pepole like the entire experience of fishing, and not everyone is in it solely for the meat. Maybe the party boats who groundfish, that's a situation where th egoal is filling th efreezer.

I could certainly be wrong. And the scientists could certainly be wrong as well, about the health of the stocks.

If CT boats were limited to 1 fish per guy, and RI boats coul dtake 2, I'd be convinced that th elaws were screwing the CT guys. If veeryone is limited to 1 fish...I'd just be suprised if your bookings decreased noticably, because the overall experience of the fishing trip hasn't changed that much. But that's just me, and you know your business better than I ever will, but I do think I have my finger on the pulse of the average Joe out there.

But if it's a bad law (and that's a big "if"), and if the charter guys are advocating for that law based solely on greed (and that's not a big "if"), an dthat law gives some people more of a right to a public resource than the rest of us (and that's not debatable) it's fair to criticize them.

There are bad laws. People who advocate for bad laws for personal profit, potentially ta the expense of a public resource, are fair game for criticism.

Bob, I don't know whether you were fishing back then, but guys were singing that same "there's plenty of bass, they're all offshore where the bait is" song back in the early and mid 1980s. ;)

i remember that.

Totally Agree Mike...I actually don't think under the current data collection programs that it is even possible...however to make that argument are you also admitting ASMFC can't predict F (fishing mortality) under a split regulation. I think the split regulation is likely to result in failing to achieve the mortality reduction...and I for one do not think risking loss of May or September is worth the benefit to the industry.

Prior to the Am 6 increase to 2 @ 28" the coastal regs were 1 @ 28" for quite a few years. I still have all of that analysis in a box somewhere in my closet.

I'm sure it was for more than one year but it was in 1999

I'm not sure when it went to 2 but that should have been changed back sooner and we would not be here where we are now obviously

oops, Patrick beat me to it

The reduction numbers you are quoting are based on those regulations applied evenly for all rec anglers that fish for striped bass as a broad category. I think it's fair to say that the average charter captain is well above average at putting fish on the boat when compared to the recreational fishermen as a broad group and the charter captains should be capable of putting clients on 2 fish over 33". This is especially true in areas around Block Island and Montauk where the average fish they are getting is well over 33". For charters operating in those areas (and some others I'm sure) going from 2@28 to 2@33 will have no significant impact on what their clients can take home and the charters will be taking no where near a 25% reduction.

If the decision was go from 2@28 to 2@33 for everyone then the charter fleet would likely not have taken as big of a hit and the majority of the 29% reduction would likely have come from those average or below average rec fishermen who have a hard time getting a keeper sized fish as it is, or from those who fish areas that mainly hold smaller fish. But if charters get 2@33" which doesn't have much of an impact on what they can keep and recreational (non charter) get 1@28" which probably doesn't have much of an impact on what they are keeping now where is the reduction coming from?

If you start dividing recreational angers into smaller groups and then let each group select their best option (the option that will have the least impact on what they can keep) the percentages don't hold and we end up right where we started.

exactly....

I was still involved with fresh water tournament bass fishing, I don't think I flipped back to the salt until after things started to pick up again. I think some of the early and late migratory routes are still basically instinctual, is bait a factor at times, sure it is; but I've been around tons of bait the last several years with nothing bothering it. I'm not buying into any argument that the bait is offshore and that's why we all perceive the stocks to be suffering.