Is Something Wrong?

[NIB]

Originally Posted by Vogt

Last fall in Connecticut, the bunker was absolutely everywhere. The result was an explosive fall run for large fish. There were sooo many slammer blues around my spots and some really really nice bass. We would have action all day and all night just by moving from spot to spot.

Hey Buddy....

[luds]

Fishing has been pretty good North of the Cape as far as I can tell. It was just a little strange for me this year because July has been great after a dismal June. I also thought the fishing in May was pretty good.

[fishpoopoo]

too much gook poop in the water

[Back Beach]

Surf fishing is, was, and will always be cyclical with regard to its productivity. I believe there are plenty of fish in the ocean right now. The boat catches prove it.There are lots of small fish. From shore its always a crap shoot as to where the schools of large fish will stage on a given year. Many great seasons on the cape are being succeeded by what seems to be a prolonged dry spell. When the cape was hot, a lot of the spots that are productive now were dry. If you put in enough years at this game, you will see ups and downs. A lot of you guys here started fishing in recent years and really don't know what slow is. The fishing now is so far from "bad" it's ridiculous. Most guys can't appreciate it, especially if you started fishng after 1990 when the stocks began to boom. The fish may not be in your favorite spot every time out hitting your favorite lure with abandon, but that isn't an indicator of the fishing quality. Move.

[Pete_G]

Any other long term fisherman who have seen far more ups and downs then me want to add some thoughts?

This is a good topic and it could use some additional insight from those who have gone through lean times from shore in the past.

Are there any other factors that are currently in place, especially relating to baitfish that parallel slower stretches in years prior? I tend to agree there's a lot of fish out there, but clearly surf fisherman in many areas aren't or can't cast to them.

[Flaptail]

Easy.

1.Bounty on seals
2.Immediate end to menhaden fishery by both commercial and bait for sport shops suppliers
3. End commercial fishing for bass except for real, year round commercial fishermen. (ie: no plumbers allowed)
4. 36 inches for everyone at one per day
5. Keep the river herring protected for ten years not three
6. Ban mid water trawling for herring
7. enforce stricter rules for groundwater discharge in coastal embayments, marshes and adjoining wetlands.
8. Open the backbeaches on CC from Eastham to Long Point to orv access.
9.Allow orv night fishing access only to South Beach in Chatham.
10. Buy a boat and learn how to access closed or unaccesible by land areas by the same to fish from shore.
11. Realize that striper fishing has more secrets than 7 volumes of Harry Potter adventures and that there are hundreds of ways to catch bass when they are "not" there. Experimentation is the key.
12. Positive attitude in the face of sure failure.

Some of the above will never come to pass, like #'s 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 and 9. But hey you can dream can't you?

[JohnR]

I think the overall amount of bass is probably in fair to OK shape and not the reasons we are doing "poorly".

Let's look at what we know:

• Bass fishing has been fantastic where there are bunker; 'Gansett Bay, large areas of Jersey, LI, parts of LI Sound/CT, and Boston Harbor had a nice run.
• Some people are having great years, some people are having miserable years but this is usually the case. The fish move around a lot.
• Because we stay (or are supposed to) in the close waters near shore, lots of offshore migrations of bass are go way underreported. In the fall, think about the Great South Channel Bass Slaughter that gets more reported every year.
• Weak inshore bait populations - with the exception of the bunker - not bringin fish back as often.
  
  Here is some guessing:
  
• I've heard some interesting opinions from people that have seen some good tagging survey data. What happens if your NJ fish and your Cape Cod summer fish are from the Chesapeake and since they are spending so much quality time on bunker in NJ that a sizeable percentage never gets to the Cape? If you look over the past few years at the progressively improved NJ fishing, does it coincide with the falling Cape Cod fishing????
• Are the RI inshore fish Hudson fish and less influenced by the NJ bunker?

This is very cyclical and varies from year to year, the past few years the Cape has had it pretty hard but the Jersey guys have been doing very well. Is there a connection? What about the other failing forage stocks in New England? Like the herring??

[ThrowingTimber]

I'm sick of catching all these 20lb to 25lb fish from shore

[Back Beach]

Originally Posted by Pete_G

Any other long term fisherman who have seen far more ups and downs then me want to add some thoughts?

Surf fishing is like a pedulum. When it swings in your favor you rationalize why. When it swings out of your favor its the same way. I've been at it since 1982 and have seen real bad,good, great, and ridiculous. In that time frame I can readily admit that the slow nights in the surf outnumber the good 5 to 1, perhaps more. Anyone who has a lot of years at it and claims differently is full of crap IMO. In the last five years I would say the fishing(surf) has been good to great when compared to the long term average.

[Flaptail]

Originally Posted by Back Beach

Surf fishing is like a pedulum. When it swings in your favor you rationalize why. When it swings out of your favor its the same way. I've been at it since 1982 and have seen real bad,good, great, and ridiculous. In that time frame I can readily admit that the slow nights in the surf outnumber the good 5 to 1, perhaps more. Anyone who has a lot of years at it and claims differently is full of crap IMO. In the last five years I would say the fishing(surf) has been good to great when compared to the long term average.

How about July 2004? 4 and a half weeks,three nights a week minimum on the backside. Three two pound bluefish and one 47 inch bass caught in the glare of headlights on a needlefish. I kept thinking why do I do this to myself?

[piemma]

Originally Posted by Pete_G

Any other long term fisherman who have seen far more ups and downs then me want to add some thoughts?

This is a good topic and it could use some additional insight from those who have gone through lean times from shore in the past.

Are there any other factors that are currently in place, especially relating to baitfish that parallel slower stretches in years prior? I tend to agree there's a lot of fish out there, but clearly surf fisherman in many areas aren't or can't cast to them.

Yeah Pete. Mike is right. Even at it's worse it doesn't compare to how bad it was in the mid to late 80s. I remember in 85 when I caught 3 schoolies at Deep Hole one morning and I told the guy who ran the old bait shop on Monahans in Narragansett. He told me I was lying. he hadn't seen any Bass for 3 weeks and this was in June.
When the moratorium was on and we went from 34" to 36". We would fish RI 5 out of 7 nights a week and get maybe 1 fish that was a "keeper". There were no peanut bunker and sand eels and silver sides were the bait to be found. We'd pray for the Mullet run around Sept 15th around Weakapaug because you had a shot at a decent fish...maybe one in a week worth of nights. And I'm talking fishing from 10 or 11 till dawn.
So around 87 or 88 we started to run back up to the Cape. We would run the Back all night and maybe find fish at the Mission Bell or laurias for an hour. If we found fish we'd drive home in the morning. Sleep maybe 3 hours, do stuff with the kids and head back up at 6 or 7. I put in tons of 600 mile weekends when the fish were on the upswing in the early 90s.

During this period of time RI surf sucked big time. Everyone would drive from Narrow River to the Sheep's pen to Poind Jude, Deep Hole, Green Hill, Charlestown, Quonnie, Weakapaug, and watch Hill in one night looking, looking and maybe you got a couple of schoolies.

I am firmly convinced that the huge amount of Bunker up in Narr Bay is having an effect on the fishing everywhere. I have never seen so many big fish concentrated in the Bay. I saw fish from the mid teens to the low 20s all morning yesterday in 74 degree water. You NEVER could find fish in water that warm before but there is so much adult Menhaden in the bay the bass are staying on them. The reason? They are easy pickings. I worked a school that was about 2 or 3 acres yesterday. There were probably several thousand bunker in that school all on top with bass and blues under them. High protein diet for the fish without expending a lot of energy.

Just my humble opinion.

Paul

[Pete_G]

Originally Posted by piemma

Yeah Pete. Mike is right. Even at it's worse it doesn't compare to how bad it was in the mid to late 80s. I remember in 85 when I caught 3 schoolies at Deep Hole one morning and I told the guy who ran the old bait shop on Monahans in Narragansett. He told me I was lying. he hadn't seen any Bass for 3 weeks and this was in June.
When the moratorium was on and we went from 34" to 36". We would fish RI 5 out of 7 nights a week and get maybe 1 fish that was a "keeper". There were no peanut bunker and sand eels and silver sides were the bait to be found. We'd pray for the Mullet run around Sept 15th around Weakapaug because you had a shot at a decent fish...maybe one in a week worth of nights. And I'm talking fishing from 10 or 11 till dawn.
So around 87 or 88 we started to run back up to the Cape. We would run the Back all night and maybe find fish at the Mission Bell or laurias for an hour. If we found fish we'd drive home in the morning. Sleep maybe 3 hours, do stuff with the kids and head back up at 6 or 7. I put in tons of 600 mile weekends when the fish were on the upswing in the early 90s.

During this period of time RI surf sucked big time. Everyone would drive from Narrow River to the Sheep's pen to Poind Jude, Deep Hole, Green Hill, Charlestown, Quonnie, Weakapaug, and watch Hill in one night looking, looking and maybe you got a couple of schoolies.

I am firmly convinced that the huge amount of Bunker up in Narr Bay is having an effect on the fishing everywhere. I have never seen so many big fish concentrated in the Bay. I saw fish from the mid teens to the low 20s all morning yesterday in 74 degree water. You NEVER could find fish in water that warm before but there is so much adult Menhaden in the bay the bass are staying on them. The reason? They are easy pickings. I worked a school that was about 2 or 3 acres yesterday. There were probably several thousand bunker in that school all on top with bass and blues under them. High protein diet for the fish without expending a lot of energy.

Just my humble opinion.

Paul

Good stuff, thanks Paul.

I've only been at it in the salt since the early 90's, and only VERY seriously since the mid 90's. A little over a decade or so just doesn't give you that much perspective, overall.

[Mike P]

Eddy, I think the cycle is a 3 year one, which is why they went with a 3 year moratorium--give the whole biomass from any single run a chance to spawn, and then re-assess the stocks.

I think Bournedale is in big trouble, and should stay closed until they hit the 250,000 fish count.

Of course, since the counter is broken, and the state seems unwilling to give Bourne DNR the money to repair/replace it, no one will really know how many went up this year

[NIB]

I am pretty sure it is three yrs also...
It doesn't matter between the seals an the trawlers they could give em 100 yrs..
I have seen a show on tv how seals have basically decimated herring stocks up north...