Quote:
Originally Posted by CowHunter
Yes for 18-21 days or so in Mass u can keep and sell 30 a day..On the other hand I can fish stripers 12 months a year recreationally if I wanted to, and in NJ we can buy bonus tags and keep an extra fish every day till the quota is filled, 360,000lbs or so.. I can run 2 charters a day in NJ and come back to the dock with boat limits of 8-10 fish, (Even more if everyone has a tag 12-15)a trip, 7 days a week during the season... Now you guys up north dont see pressure, you should see the 100's of NY,NJ boats for miles that will make the MA com rod and reelers look like a tiny speck... Yeah we can go on.
Knock down the rec catch to one fish.. The com catch I could care less what they do, but it aint going away so Ill fish it, after all its gonna get filled with or without me anyway, (Or you can sit home like Sandman and Complain About it), at least there is a quota and the season is closed when its hit. Recreationally its on 7 days a week, 12 months a year from ME to NC with a few closed areas during seasons....
All there is is Finger Pointing and Blaming Others instead of fixing the problem. Sounds like Democrats and Republicans!
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I agree that as long as there is a commercial harvest you might just as well take advantage of it. Being from NJ and fishing the Highlands area every year I am well aware of the number of charters and the party boats also targeting stripers. I'm aware of the numbers of fish recs kill compared to commercial. I went to both the Mass and NH hearing on the commercial harvest increase to lobby against them and wrote letters and attended the recent herring hearings. I do not blame anyone other than ASMFC for what is happening. Their job is to manage the fishery in the best interest of the public and I think they are failing to do it. The big money from stripers and the greatest human factor comes from recreational fishing. If the stock numbers can only support a two fish limit for the public that would indicate to me that there are not enough fish to support a commercial fishery. If the public needs to be limited to one fish that is fine with me but is even more proof that there should be no commercial season. I'm not looking to turn the commercial harvest over to the recs like New Jersey did. I'm looking to reduce the catch by that amount. I also believe that stopping commercial fishing will stop most of what has recently happened in NC and Maryland. If you can not sell them it will greatly reduce these activities.
Maybe because NH people experience the stock drops earlier then others we are more sensitive to it. Most all of the people I know practice catch and release. Maybe keep one or two a season usually due to deep hooks. The NH members on the ASMFC striper board are also strong supports of reducing the catch.
I do also write letters and support other aspects of commercial fishing. I can not understand why there is no rec limit on haddock and some of the other ground fish. Why they don't set it at 10 like cod is beyond me. In this case I'm more than happy to give the extra fish to the commercial guys. For most fish, except maybe something like scup, once you go above 5 thats enough.