Act Now to save the 2007 fluke season

[Swimmer]

I fluke fish both rec. and commercially. I am not going to read the whole two part post although i do appreciate the time it took Mike to do that. My buddyon whose boat I fish, the boat captian/owner still gets his 200 #'s when he goes out. He is older though and doesn't push it as many days as he usually does. A couple of weeks ago after bass fishing quota (rec day) was reached we did three drifts and caught our 14 fish limit. Thats all fish 17 1/2 inches or better. I don't think we caught one under 24 on those three drifts. Very deep water though. But like everything else thats done in regard to the fishery thier doesn't seem to be a steady stream of common sense used instituting rules or catch quotas. When all of this means so much to all of us it can be very disconcerting one season to the next worrying about what we can or cannot fish for, or even if there will be any fish to go after next year.

[MakoMike]

O.K. Maybe the explanation was a little two long, here is the crib notes version. NMFS inplemented a ten rebuilding plan for fluke about 8 years ago. The plan was required by the magness act to be complete in ten years. NMFs set, what most people think, was an unreasonably high target for the total biomass of fluke in their plan. Now we are eight years into the plan, and the total biomass of fluke is higher than it has ever been, since NMFS began tracking it, but because of 1. the original target biomass and 2. the ten year requirement, they are going to have to just about shut down the fishery, for both commercial and recreation fishermen, NEXT YEAR. This has nothing to do with MRFSS or any other catch data, this is entirely due to the NMFS estimates of Biomass via trawl surveys. At this point the only option to save the 2007 and later seasons is to get some flexibility built into the Magnesson Reauthorization act, so NMFS can extend the rebuilding period. Again, there has never been a higher biomass of fluke and overfishing is not occuring, yet becauseof the ten year requirement they are about to, effectively, shut down all fluke fishing!

[Mr. Sandman]

I think when push comes to shove they will not shut it down. I almost would be willing to give it up for a year just to see the heat come down on them hard. How can you shut down a fishery that is at record levels? This is the same boneheads counting dogfish.

Exactly what should one do to help keep it open? letters?