Do you miss fishing herring?

[moogie]

I totally enjoyed fishing with herring. To me, the best times were at the slack tide when the herring would be swimming on the surface, and a cow bass would slap it 3 feet into the air, while I'm standing there, freaking out, waiting for the cow to take it.

I'm glad to have had the memory of fishing with them. I'm not planning on being able to use them again. I think those days are gone.

My uncles took me fishing in Boston Harbor for the first time in 1955. We were using sea worms, fishing for Stripers. The worms were the size of snakes. If you lifted them up without any body support, they would snap in two.
We called them "Striper Worms", and if one of them bit you, you'd surely know it!

There were tons of them, and they were dirt cheap. You could buy a flat of them for a few bucks.
Eels were only a nickel a piece, or you catch your own. All you wanted. There were tons of those too.

Herring were everywhere. . . .by the millions. Families used to go to the various runs, and make a day of it. The kids would have much fun trying to catch them with their hands. Good eating afterwards too.

Needless to say, bait fishing was very popular in those days, although the surfcasters were die hard plug and eel skin guys.

Yeah, those were the days when they used to bring in bus loads of anglers from New York and New Jersey to fish for flounder at Houghs Neck. Each guy could fill a 30 gallon trash barrel in 5-6 hours catching 2 at a time.

All that is gone. I saw it go away. I saw Boston Harbor turn into a cesspool. I saw the remaining schools of flounder vanish, and whatever ones were left, their bodies were laden with sores and lesions. I saw the Stripers disappear.

I also saw our beloved Striper fishery and Boston Harbor return to their respective glories. We even have healthy flounder too.

Now, everything is a matter of politics and the all mighty dollar. It's just that simple.

North carolina has the Gamefish Bill on the political table. It's an interesting bill to say the least.
Take a look at it.
Personally, I've seen some crazy videos of trucks hooked up to nets, pulling hundreds of Stripers out of the water onto the Carolina beaches.
Maybe they need a bill. . .

As for us,I don't know what's gonna' be. I read things, I hear things, and I listen to the scientists.
Many of them say that the fish stocks are declining.

I always wondered how you count fish. I can understand how you can count produce, count cows, count chickens, and count trees etc. I can even understand count Dracula, count Chocula, and even the count of Monte Cristo, but how do you count fish?

I read an article a while back, claiming that the Stripers are underweight for their size. It said that they don't have enough food to sustain their proper weight.
Somebody's taking their food away.

I hear that there is a big demand for fish oil these days.
Maybe there's even a moratorium on pogies and sea worms in our future.

Anyway, I don't claim to know the answers. I have no idea as to what the future holds for all of us anglers.
I'm a member of the Baby Boomer generation, and there's one thing that we learned. . . . It takes an awful lot of noise to change political minds.

I only know that no matter how much they may take away, and how much they may restrict me, they will never be able to beat me.
I'll always find a way to go fishin'.
Moog.