Quote:
Originally Posted by MakoMike
Because that's where the fish are! Every area that has BFT is being fished by R&R commercials and recreationals. Right now there is only one other place on the coast, which is right here off Rhode Island, that is holding any big fish.
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That's not entirely true. There are fish offshore right now - not to out anything specific online, but there are fish in other areas.
The main reason they want to fish in the bay is because their gear is extremely effective there. They can set on fish in shallow water and their gear hangs all the way to the bottom - the fish have very little chance to escape. And due to the nature of the seafloor in bay - predominantly sand or mud- they don't hang up the nets. There is also little current here (as opposeded to chatham or even P-Hill) so again, setting is easy.
Also, once the fish come into ther bay, they don't really move far - its a small place, and with a plane spotting, it becomes tiny.
Basically, Cape Cod Bay is a big fish bowl, and with airplanes and nets the size of a football field, they can get every fish they want with little downtime.
The meeting today was well attended, about 100 fisherman.
Mass fisheries has decided to close Cape Cod Bay to seining for 2008 they will have the rest of this year to fish.
It was a very controlled meeting - Leonard spoke for the seiners, Peter Weis for the GCTA/anti-seining contingent, and Rich Ruis answered questions about tuna fishing overall and ICCAT.
Now that this fight is done, I hope everyone can turn their collective attention to the bigger issues of the health of the stocks overall (or lackthereof) and the forage issues.
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