Quote:
Originally Posted by zimmy
We have different definitions of asinine.
The reasons are three fold (or four):
1. Larger fish have dramatically more eggs. One dead 40 incher is like killing three 28"ers.
2. When the slot is small, about 50% of the harvested fish are males.
3. A harvest that selects for bigger fish will result in smaller fish over time. It has been documented repeatedly in population studies.
4. (the weakest of the three) there is a portion of fisherman who only keep a fish because it is big and they want to show it to people, not because they want it for food. Some of those people aren't going to keep a 27"er since it is less likely to impress someone.
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I'll give you 2 and 3 as reasonable points, but point #1 illustrates the ineffectiveness of SF's proposal.
Not only do they want to take pre-spawn fish, but their plan also includes taking +40" breeders.
The other problem is that a group of experienced fisherman often forget is that most people out there struggle to catch a "keeper" bass. But alot of these of these guys can get a schoolie or 3 - drop the size to 20" and mortality goes through the roof as all these people can now catch and kill a "keeper bass".
Look at what happened in Maine when they went with their slot - mortality skyrocketed, and their fishing went in the toilet.
I don't want to see a plan that failed miserably in 1 state get rolled out to all of New England and wreck everyone's fishing.
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