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I think there is plenty of room for more then one 36" fish. Again, I think the problem is with the commerical side and not the average sport guy who probably fishes 10 days a year for bass and catches fish half the time. You have to look at the numbers.
That said, there is no reason to take a lot of fish for sport, esp if you can't sell them.
I would be willing to limit sport catch to 1 fish but I want to eliminate commerical fishing for bass. If you are going to allow commerical fishing...then the sport guys should be allowed to take more as well. However...what is best for the fishery?.. I don't know if you have ever attended some of these meetings but it is a "me me me" fest. I can tell you the comm guys do not care if they wipe out the bass as long as they get to catch as much as they can. They honesty don't care.
I have not kept up with the very latest in the last few years...I just got tired of it...but the bottom line is
1) If you wiped out sport fishing for bass completely and allowed commerical fishing to continue...the fishery could get wiped out again.
2) If you wiped out commerical fishing for bass yet allowed sport fishing even without limits... the fishery would thrive.
If you look at the fiscal impact, the charter fishing business purduces more income then the netting and does less harm to the species as well, so (2) has less fiscal impact.
The netting of entire schools of fish (tons) does significant harm to the population of year-class fish. Sport fishing no matter how intense does not do nearly the damage.
IMO all striped bass that is sold in stores should be farm-raised.
All you have to do is take the price off the fish and keep the water clean and they will thrive.
What we want to aviod going back to these days...
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