California Fishing

[puppet]

Originally Posted by niko

you want a mpa in the northeast? blasphemy, go live in cuba. the last thing fishermen around here need is an mpa. we need and nowadays have, for the most part, reasonable bag limits. most fisheries are in good shape and trending in the right direction. even cod, if we just lay off a few more years will bounce back. I thought they were doomed at one point but I catch so many I've changed my mind. I'm just kidding about cuba but my point is great fisheries but your citizens arnt allowed to fish. and for tidal pooling - you ought to go out with my kids, they find everything

hahahhaha...Yeah I get your point. It is sort of Blasphemous...sorry
Niko. I guess once they take it away you never get it back, but at
the same time I feel that it is better than gone completely.

I must admit. I have not felt the sting of the fishery in most of my
travels on the road. But deep in the western LI sound....its been a
ghostland for the last few years. This year the reports I hear form
Long Island are dismal.

I am not a scientist, but its strange that although my skill and
tactics have improved, my numbers in my local water were still
better almost a decade ago when I was green.

Not sure of your area...but In terms of tide pools on the cape, we
would find welcks, starfish, and a variety of critters all the time in
large quantities. Now its just the crabs mostly. It probably the
product of fertilizers and insecticide runoff.

A Californian tidal pool is just covered with life. Some rocks have
thousands of starfish and anemones covering them....even in LA
county. Comparatively, some NE shores seem kind of barren. Its not
that you cannot find some life in them, its just not the same quantity.

[niko]

I get it, theres less life for a multitude of reasons. water temps are up for sure so i think most species are trending north. the fishing was pretty easy 10-20 years ago. you could stick a fork in the ocean and catch bass so we got spoiled. there are less fish around too so we reduced bag limits and endorsed catch and release. the colder water up me seems to hold a lot more life in general. at low tide my kids can fill a bucket full of white leggers, juvi lobsters, starfish and another bucket full of green crab. I just don't like the path of a mpa, they work but at what cost? theres more than one way to skin this cat and I don't think we need to cut off vast swaths of ocean from human contact to have a healthy ocean. the science of fishery management is getting better every day and starting to catch up that will help immensely with managing species. come up for tuna season puppet