Oct. OTW

[Pete_G]

One more thing about spots:

Someone probably knew about your "secret" spot or a spot you consider "yours" before you. I'm really don't think there any "new" spots being discovered. Just spots that have become hidden over time or are such a long walk to reach it discourages people from going.

People love to say "my" spot but it really doesn't mean much.

[choggieman]

Ctjimmy - we know each other, don't we? You want examples...How many breachways will have a few extra lanterns for the fall run this year? How many times will the increase in trash be evident this year. You kow the spot I have had beef with you over on your site ctfisherman. You know the spot that krispy is taking exception to posting over. Both spots have seen an influx of new faces and lots of these new faces aren't upstanding fishermen like yourself. Public access is not a problem at the spot you and I battled over, but the trash, the poaching-herring and undersize fish, and the general disreguard of these new faces for what we have is deplorable. The spot krispy is angered over is subject to loss of access at a moments notice and the disreguard for that place is running rampant. When we give super explicit details to anyone with a computer or anyone who can read a magazine, we suffer. How would you like it if I followed you a couple of nights with my camera and ensured that every person that ever picked up a rod and reel knew the spots you fish, when to fish them and what to fish with? You post about public places with access to all, but how about if I made sure everyone knew about the places you fish that you do not post about. Can you see where I am coming from? You could just as easily teach a few solid individuals from the plethora of knowledge you keep, and give back to fellow fishermen that way, instead you choose to post for all to see, including the individuals that are the reason we see the litter and lose access. This article is just like your posts on the other site, and you see the majority of fishermen do not care for spot burning, the way I do not. Yet you keep going.
I could go on and on , and I seem to be picking on you alone, but that article reminded me a battles from the past over to burn or not to burn and your face is one I will never forget.
I apologize if I have mistaken you for someone else.................but I doubt it.

[jimmyCT]

choggie - There are quite a few spots that are provided for public access and are generally common knowledge. If someone is looking for that type of spot, it wont take them long to find one of these public spots. I just listed quite a few ways to find reports and location in my first post.

Im not necessarily saying i support all these sources of information, but Im not going to complain about places like tackle shops giving out information or an on the water article. Its taken me almost 25 years of constant work to use these sources of information to become a better fisherman. Yes, on the water has always had articles like that. Its pretty funny to say, okay, its 2005, you cant do that anymore.

I just feel this is not helping your cause. Do you think that on the water or fishing magazines are going to stop giving out information? You need to pick battles more carefully if you want to keep places quiet. You might not think there are actual private places out there, but if you dont look, you just wont know... Ive brought a few select guys on this board to some private spots, they know

The fact is that alot of spots other then breachways have been crowded. In your case, I believe I rember you complaining about a place (trying not to be to detailed) on the CT river that was overrun with alot of people. Yet, do you remember ever seeing a report or article on that location? It just started by word of mouth by a group of friends.. Am I correct?

Even the breachways, like charlesotwn are not that bad. If I go there on a weekend when its croweded, I just fish the back channels and generally end up with more fish then anyone out front. If I fish the thames river, I go downriver and have areas and unlimited fish to myself. I dunno. Its hard to give examples without naming spots.

I dunno, there is a bit of balance needed and there are more ways then one to make a place crowded. But when you guys start challenging the very basic spots, ability of OTW to write an article about a well known place, you take a step backward in getting the privacy you want. In the scheme of things, Steve Mckennas article will have almost no inpact. The only thing you that was burned was a relationship with a great fishermen, Steve.

If anything, for your own cause... the spots mentioned here so far bring attention to them... Someone reading this is going to think.. If the "breachways" are so great that we have to keep them quiet, then.. obviously its going to be the first spot they want to see.. I dunno.

I just really think this is out of hand. The large majority of decent fishermen out there have no opinon or care about this type of topic. Its just that they wont participate in threads like this, or even in this site. Alot of the best anglers I know wont spend any time on this site because of threads like this. Even guys like #^&#^&#^&#^&#^&#^& have made hints questioning why they would spend time here when its like this. This thread is like the same 30 guys over and over for 10 pages...

Another thing you need to look into is why someone would post a spot, maybe there are reasons out there.... This site has quite a few ill behaved individuals if you encourter them on the water. Its safter to have other people around with these clowns out there.

[Nebe]

THERE ARE LOTS OF FISH ON THE BACK BEACHES OF THE CAPE RIGHT NOW!!!! \\\ LOOK FOR A JEEP AND A TOOTWESS GUY FISHING MENTAL ALL BY HIMSELF>

hehehe

[JohnR]

Hmmm, how to keep this short ????

My biggest concern is not losing access to places to fish and a big part of that is parking. All of the spots in Steve's article have been written several times in the past few years. Maybe not to the detail but they've all been written. They have all been in the reports section of xyz123 website, the fisherman, projo, beacon, times, globe, herald, OTW online, etc. While I think it was not a good idea on Steve's part to write such detailed spot info, he wasn't the first and he won't be the last. He is a decent guy and either did not consider or underestimated the consequences, at least for the spots, but I'm willing to bet he figured he would be helping out people with that article. I'm sure the intention was not to burn spots. My issue is access and the loss of it if everyone is blurbing spots and reports. If people share info, things usually spread a lot more slowly than a big article in OTW. This is where people need to be responsible with access and throwing spots out - regardless who or where its done, is just not that responisble in my opinion. Anyone that tells you they learned every spot on their own is BS'ing. Everyone has learned something from someone or somewhere, including the articles, books, sites, etc.

My point is these things have to be done in balance and done responsibly as it is not worth losing the ACCESS!! That is all the counts, the access. Last year when people we saying go to such and such and there was a ton of fish last night, the next day was busy. A lot of first time to that spot people not knowing how to get in, cutting through yards. Now maybe 1 in 5 were making noise, leaving trash and disrespecting the local, but how many does it really take? How many does it take before the residents go before the local town council (who likely don't care much for the night surf angler) and close the parking? Then a general area is lost, That serves nobody. It's a good short term strategy but it dies in the long term....

Now I want to say one other thing. There are a lot of people jumping personally on Steve on this. That's wrong. He has done nothing any different than another who knows how many people have done over the years. So don't make Steve out to be the bad guy. This might not be one of his brightest moves but he's not a bad guy.

You want to fix the problem? Maybe work on the culture of "spots", how they are handled and reported.

Ok - done for now ...

You could be REAL adventurous parking in one place and biking to another.

[JoeP]

Originally Posted by JohnR

Hmmm, how to keep this short ????

Ok - done for now ...

John-

I was just kidding about the length of the posts -- keep 'em coming.

[Nebe]

Originally Posted by JohnR

Now I want to say one other thing. There are a lot of people jumping personally on Steve on this. That's wrong. He has done nothing any different than another who knows how many people have done over the years. So don't make Steve out to be the bad guy. This might not be one of his brightest moves but he's not a bad guy.

are you kidding?? Sorry but Steve should be held acountable for his actions. Yes he is a nice guy, yes he has helped alot of guys out including me, but this article of his is just about the worst thing you could do as a surfcaster.. As a local narragansett surfcaster, i feel like he just slapped me right in the face. Steve is the bad guy here John.. the pen is mightier than the sword and there was quite a bit of blood spilled this month. I just lost alot of respect for him and i will tell him that the next time i see him...

The key to a good surfcasting article is to write up a puzzle.. give clues, give suggestions give just enough to get the reader jazzed and most importantly steer the reader to come to his own conclusions on how to fish an area......

What he did is more like handing out a treasure map with the keys to the castle, plus the secret handshake....

poor form imo..

[Slipknot]

Eben, the poor form is the 180 you did on this subject
you started out not pissed at all and now you lost respect for him.


What's done is done. Get over it and move on people, maybe we all learned something from this subject. No sense flaming a guy who doesn't even have a computer to defend his actions. Take it up in person.

[choggieman]

Wrong river, bud. You know where I am talking about.
If someone were to find out about a public spot through research and not hot posts, I would applaud them. Learn from trial and error, not someones big mouth.
Luckily I do have spots I can fish without worry of bumping into people who are there because they read about it on the internet, but the list dwindles with each post and every article.
If I burn a relationship with a great fisherman its because I do so in choice. It is my morals that make me beleive in something and if my best friend and I do not agree on something, then I will stand up for what I beleive.
I have always had respect for Steve Mckenna, to me he is one of the best. But I do not beleive what he wrote was proper for publication. And apparently I am not the only one.