|
IMO, the best indicator of the coast-wide state of the fishery is the price the markets are paying. When I sold bass for the last time in 1985, the cull was $3.25 to $3.50 a pound for mediums, $2.50 or so for large. I fished with some guys back then, at the Cape, who were real aces, guys who sold thousands of fish a year from the 60s thru the 80s. One of them, who fished 200 nights a year both from the surf and boats, tallied a grand total of 108 bass for the year 1983.
The price today usually ranges from 75 cents to about a buck and a half a pound. Adjust that for inflation, and the guys selling their fish for a quarter a pound in the 60s were doing better. I liken the state of the fishery today to that in the 60s, plenty of small to teen fish, enough big fish around so the guys who know their stuff and who can get to the "big fish" spots frequently can put up some impressive numbers. I think the real reason you don't see the big fish in as many places now as you did in the 70s and 80s is more related to the absence of massive schools of big bait. In the 80s, you had shoals of pogies in every tidal river between Fall River and the Merrimack, whiting in the Canal all summer, small pollock in the east end, too. Those forage species have been seined pretty hard and aren't around in the numbers, so the big fish aren't inshore in as many places.
One other factor--you had some really p***-poor YOY indices between 1982 and 1989. Those 15-20 year old fish would be the ones that normally would make up the bulk of the 20-40 pounders.
Find concentrations of big bait, or sand eels present in numbers to make it worth their while for the cows to come home, and you'll find big fish anytime.
|