Questions About Making Striper A Gamefish?

[spence]

Originally posted by flatts1
Spence, Stripers Forever wants to keep the EEZ closed even though there is no science to support its continued closure (stripers fully recovered since 1995 and now very abundant). They claim that they want to keep it closed so that commercial fishermen won't have more waters available to them to fish.

What Stripers Forever doesn't tell you is that a closed EEZ is closed to both commercial and recreational fishermen.

Keeping something closed that has proven successful isn't a new restriction in my book.

For all the numbers that show the stock is fully recoverd, there is also a lot of evidence that shows looming problems. We won't have a genuine healthy stock until we address forage, pollution and spawning ground issues as well.

Originally posted by flatts1
Further more even if striped bass were the target fish of these netters then these fish would still go against the commercial quota whne they were sold at shore. In other words, this would only affect other commercial fishermen by forcing the price down for stripers and closing the season earlier than expected.

How many fishermen try to sell poached fish legally? Chances are they don't, and they don't come off the comm quota. We just had a boat down the road get busted this summer for selling 30,000 pounds. How many times didn't they get caught? How many other boats are doing this?

I fully understand that recs take more fish than the comms, but that's not the real issue. The potential impact to individual state's revenue is much larger than a limited comm take could ever produce. The notion by Flaptail above that gamefish status is a tool so fishing guides can make out is ridiculous. Will they do better, most likely...but the benefits to all related recreational fishing markets are much broader.

It doesn't seem like the commercial fleet is eager to change, but change is just what is needed to balance a traditional industry with today's necessary environmental and management standards.

-spence

[MakoMike]

Spence
Re:"It doesn't seem like the commercial fleet is eager to change, but change is just what is needed to balance a traditional industry with today's necessary environmental and management standards"

Spunds like just another anti-commercial fisherman to me. Blame them for all the problems and while we squabble amount ourselve Pew will get the whole ocean closed for all of us.

[spence]

Originally posted by MakoMike
Spunds like just another anti-commercial fisherman to me. Blame them for all the problems and while we squabble amount ourselve Pew will get the whole ocean closed for all of us. [/B]

Standard response. Because I'm critical I must be anti-commercial right?

What's Pew?

-spence

[JohnR]

Ohhhh so many posts so little time - Ol PJ's, I am a RECREATIONAL angler that has never sold a bass and unless something drastically were to change with the fishery and we had ten times as many as today, I have no intention of doing so either. I have never sold a fish that I caught and I keep less than a dozen fish per year.

What I have done is participated in fisheries meetings for the past 7 or 8 years. I look at the data and try to make an unemotional response that is reasonably good for the sport AND the fish.

I also believe in being not an exclusionist. Many of the issues we have today is that one group tries to exclude another. When the Sierra Club tries to remove all offroading at say CCNS instead of a balance management plan and balanced regs, they are attempting to EXCLUDE guys like you and me and some bird watchers from getting an OSV permit and taking our vehicles on the beach. When someone like the Ocean Conservancy excludes anglers from fishing in the Cali Channel Islands (or eventually here - and it is coming folks - don't kid yourselves) that is a case of one group EXCLUDING another. When any one user group attempts to remove another user group, I have a problem with it. In my opinion it becomes self serving to try to remove one group for access to a fish when it will likely benefit another.

As for whether the bass have truly recovered? That's debatable. It can surely be considered recovered when it has filled out its year classes in addition to just biomass et all.

I fought against two fish for recs AND increasing the quota for comms in mass. I fight for reduction of netting of menhaden and herring and forage fish. I voice my opinion for effective management of a resource, not excluding one group out of it. Yes, I would like to see a decrease in the TAC for commercials and I'd also like to see a reduction for recs.

To me, I'd like to see striper bycatch go against the commercial quota and be sold, not thrown overboard. I think that is fair and equitable. Sucks, but I'm not bycatching bass. If I do catch and release a bass, I try very hard to release it safely, some will still die no matter what. Anyone that says they release every fish they catch and every single one lives is still full of crap or delusional - some will still die. Sad but true... But I digress.

So maybe you can say I have an axe to grind - yeh maybe, but its not petty enough to be at the expense of another user group. It's about balance and fairness AND the fish.

Now without being accusatory, let the debate continue

[MakoMike]

Spence,
In thses parts about 60% of the commercial abss catch is on rod & reel and other 40% is gillnets, not what do you want to change that would make things any better? Being critical of the industry is easy and mostly a knee jerk reaction. How about some specifics?

[spence]

Originally posted by MakoMike
Spence,
In thses parts about 60% of the commercial abss catch is on rod & reel and other 40% is gillnets, not what do you want to change that would make things any better? Being critical of the industry is easy and mostly a knee jerk reaction. How about some specifics?

I don't think I've said anything without thinking about it first. I'm not very knee-jerk...

As for what would I change...I'd start managing the ocean as an ecosystem rather than this absurd idea you can just pick a single species out and increase/decrease the load based on some prediction model.

Stripers are somewhat unique as they are one of the few large fish that can be caught from, or close to shore in the northeast. They seem to have a much larger value to the recreational industry than to a limited commercial catch and it's clear they can barely sustain limited recreational and commercial quotas. Given this I'd make them a gamefish and go for healthy stocks and good revenue for the states from recreational fishing.

I'm not anti-commercial by the way. I appreciate the fact that people are willing to do a dangerous job so I can buy my stick sword for the grill.

But I also believe that if left unchecked commercial fleets will wipe the oceans clean. For sure there are good comms that follow the rules, and management has had a big impact in the US. But the rules the comms have to follow seem to be based more on negotiated tactical settlements with no strategic endgame. Each group is pushed more to the extreme because they are afraid of loosing everything.

That's why I think we need big change in how we fish. Just my opinion of course...I grew up in Iowa and have little saltwater heritage. My view is that of the outsider.

-spence

[MakoMike]

Originally posted by spence


They seem to have a much larger value to the recreational industry than to a limited commercial catch and it's clear they can barely sustain limited recreational and commercial quotas. Given this I'd make them a gamefish and go for healthy stocks and good revenue for the states from recreational fishing.

Those are two mighty big assumptions that the scientists that study this stuff wouldn't agree with. Plus, the folks that are pushing for gamefish status don't want the catch reduced, they just want recreational fishermen to do all the killing.

[JohnR]

Spence is absolutely correct about the recreational striped bass fishing economic impact -v- the economic impact of commercial fishing for stripers - its not even close. From a purely economic generation standpoint.

As for making it a gamefish, it wouldn't be bad but it would still - IMO - be a case of user reallocation. You can achieve the same biomass and yield goals with effective management (it ain't too bad right now) AND, probably more importantly, a recovery of the forage fish.

Then there would be room for both comms & recs and you'd have healthier stocks than just bass...

But just my opinion

[spence]

Originally posted by MakoMike
Those are two mighty big assumptions that the scientists that study this stuff wouldn't agree with.

That's part of the problem. Scientists really can't agree on the health of the species. I've read many articles that state both sides well, though there is enough room for doubt that I'm not convinced.

As for the economic impact, it's a non argument. I'd go dig up the numbers if I didn't have dinner to make

-spence

[OX]

Originally posted by 'ol pajamas
I am a rec and completely behind Stripers Forever. If you know how much pocket lining is done my the comms, you will understand why SF must be hard nosed. Politics and comms are in bed together. The majority is the recs and yet we must obey them. On the issue of stripers, Atlantic menhaden and american eels as well some other marine life I think conservation must come down hard on commercial fishing.

It was recs who brought the last moratorium. It isn't recs who are over fishing bunker. It was recs who virtually eliminated Atlantic Salmon. It was recs who over fished scallops on the south shore of long island. This is their track record. I don't cull stripers, recs do. Recs don't look out for me and so I'm not interested in them. I write the politicos and do what I can to keep the environment in check and in the process I keep small business owners in buisiness with my business and that is far more profitable than the over killing of stripers.

This sounds alot like a voice from yesteryear!

['ol pajamas]

Sorry about my sloppy earlier post. I stated rec in in certain instances where comm should have been used.

I would like to add cod and pollock to the Hall of Shame of government and comm fishing success stories.

[MakoMike]

Ol PJ,
So you put scallopers, draggers, gillnetters and pinhookers, trap fishermen etc. all inthe same basket? No commercial is a good commercial and all recs are saints?
Spence & John,
Yes, recreational fishing for stiped bass generates more economic activity than commercial fishing. OTOH the recreational catch of stripers is more than double the commercial catch. If we are going to analyze it in strictly economic terms we have to measure economic acitivty per pound of fish, or something similar. Now how small would the rec. catch have to be before people would stop fishing for them? On the other side of the coin, will increasing the recreational catch result in more economic activity or is it maxed out already? It would take a major economic study to answer those questions and no ones really knows the answers right now. No one knows what the marginal econonomic aciticty will be for an additonal pound of stripes caught by either sector. So any speculating that increasing the recreational catch would be economically more beneficial than leaving the current catch with the commercials is just pure B.S.

['ol pajamas]

It doesn't matter if recs aren't saints. I want the POWER. I don't want the coms and government to have it. What is so difficult about that concept. Why is there such a difference between NJ and NY recommended intake of Hudson River stripers? Because NY is commercial and NJ isn't. It's the same river. NY chooses to possibly poison their citizens in order to support the comms.

It's not about who is right or who is wrong it is about power.

[MakoMike]

OPJ,
I have a hot flash for you, there is no commercial striper fishing in the Hudson river. So its only your bias showing through.

[Hotfish]

Great thread and posts. After reading everything it seems like we're all, rec's and comm, are missing the real problem, the root of it all. It seems like if you get right down to it, there'd be plenty of Stripers to go around for both sides if certain restrictions were enforced or better yet created on the striped bass' feed. To many times I've seen poachers pulling 5 gallon bucket after bucket at hidden herring runs and if I'm not mistaken didn't Mass last year or the year before allow some Russian fleet to come in and take some un-goddly amount of herring and menhaden from our waters?? Sorry for not being as up on the politics as you fellas, but I thought I'd throw this out there as my 2 cents, for what it's worth.
Also, look at the decline on the length to weight ratio with regard to the Striper. It used to be and inch equaled a pound, not anymore and why? Is it less baitfish in the waters? Stress levels, poaching of young fish that havent had time to reproduce????

['ol pajamas]

There's commericial fishing in NY smarty pants and I am biased. This is politics.

[BigFish]

I thought all of the Hudson River was catch and release????? Could be I am wrong, anyone know for sure?

['ol pajamas]

I striper a day over 18".

[BigFish]

No commercial though right???

[JohnR]

the economic impact of Recrational fishing for Striped Bass far exceeds that of Commercial fishing for Striped Bass. Bass for commercial fishing is not a staple bread winner but a time limited side game that few regular comms particpate in. Many of the "commercial" rod & reelers are in fact recs with the comm license for bass fishing. Also where it is rod & reel most often and not damaging to an ecosystem, I feel that it is not "bad" (comm striper fishing) as long as regulations are adhered to and that these regulations have built in triggers to protect the stocks should they decline. Again, the bigger issue is the forage fish... Also penaltys should be far stiffer for those that break the law - comm & rec.

Ol PJ - you want power? Did you get your meds in on time? You want power, so you want to be judge and jury and determine who gets allocation, right? WTH does that have to do with protecting the fish?

Both parties ruined the stocks the last time and both parties suffered thru moratoriums and regs til they came back. I remember being a kid on the Chesapeke filling buckets of "rock" because we didn't know any better and nobody else did either. Things should be alot different these days and the stock should not collapse due to over fishing - might due to health and lack of forage but not overfishing as the rules are in place already to protect that.

Hotfish - you're correct - forage fish are the red headed step child in this equation.

[macojoe]

Well here we go again!! Every one fighting over who gets the fishing rights!!

There is good and bad on both sides!!

And as far DMF goes, they did a good job of getting the fish back!!
But they have no idea on how to keep it good!! They don't want to say no to the commercials and they don't want to say no the recreactional !!
But they need to adress some concerns and take acation!! They can't be concerned for eaither!! They need to think about the fishery and what is good for it!! Not for us!

And we Comm. and Rec. should shut up and thank god for what we now have!! Come toghter and find a middle ground, and see what we all can do toghter to keep the fishery alive and well.

Till this happens we will NEVER have a Great Fishery!! This goes for all fish! Not Just Bass.

[spence]

Originally posted by MakoMike
Spence & John,
Yes, recreational fishing for stiped bass generates more economic activity than commercial fishing. OTOH the recreational catch of stripers is more than double the commercial catch. If we are going to analyze it in strictly economic terms we have to measure economic acitivty per pound of fish, or something similar.
...snip...
No one knows what the marginal econonomic aciticty will be for an additonal pound of stripes caught by either sector. So any speculating that increasing the recreational catch would be economically more beneficial than leaving the current catch with the commercials is just pure B.S. [/B]

I don't think anyone here ever speculated that there was a linear relationship between the rec quota and revenue generation. For sure there is a lower cut off where the rec industry would go entirely underground. There is also a high cut off where the rec market is maxed. The key here isn't increasing rec quotas, it's maintaining a healthy species to ensure the rec industry can be sustained. It's quite possible that max rec revenue would require lower rec quotas to be sustainable. I would have no issue with that.

If recs were near or at their max revenue capacity, and they were consuming a minority of the fish things may be different. But it's clear that the recs already consume the majority of the fish. So what's the economic impact of allowing a commercial harvest that must be tightly regulated to mitigate the potential risk?

To me it appears that the economic impact of commercial striper fishing is minimal and doesn't represent a significant value justification to warrant a commercial catch which has the potential to upset the recreational benefits.

-spence

[MakoMike]

Originally posted by spence
The key here isn't increasing rec quotas, it's maintaining a healthy species to ensure the rec industry can be sustained.
So what's the economic impact of allowing a commercial harvest that must be tightly regulated to mitigate the potential risk?

To me it appears that the economic impact of commercial striper fishing is minimal and doesn't represent a significant value justification to warrant a commercial catch which has the potential to upset the recreational benefits.

-spence

Spence several points. First stipers forever, the organization behind the push to make stripers a game fish is entirely about increasing rec quotas. Their agenda is to eliminate commercial fishing so that the recs can kill more.
Secondly, whatever the economic impact of the commercial fishing, its incremental to the economic impact of the recreational fishery, and I seriously doubt that its minimal. If it truly were minimal why would recreational fishermen care about the few measley fish the commercials catch?
Third, although uncontrolled commercial catch might affect the recreational fishery, no one is advocating that. What we have now is a tightly controlled commercial fishery which is not affecting, and under the rules of the ASMFC can't affect the recreational fishery.
To me it doesn't make any sense and is unfair to make stripers a gamefish.

[spence]

Originally posted by MakoMike
Spence several points. First stipers forever, the organization behind the push to make stripers a game fish is entirely about increasing rec quotas. Their agenda is to eliminate commercial fishing so that the recs can kill more.

That certainly is a biased and spun opinion. Gamefish status would increase rec quotas as a % of the entire quota, but doesn't necessarily have any impact on the total number of fish killed.

Secondly, whatever the economic impact of the commercial fishing, its incremental to the economic impact of the recreational fishery, and I seriously doubt that its minimal. If it truly were minimal why would recreational fishermen care about the few measley fish the commercials catch?

The economic impact of both fisheries are only connected in that one could make the other unviable. Rec fisherman care about the commercial take because it has the potential to harm the entire rec industry. As we have discussed, this has a much greater economic impact.

Third, although uncontrolled commercial catch might affect the recreational fishery, no one is advocating that. What we have now is a tightly controlled commercial fishery which is not affecting, and under the rules of the ASMFC can't affect the recreational fishery.
To me it doesn't make any sense and is unfair to make stripers a gamefish.

It's not affecting the rec industry today because of extreme measures that have been required due to commercial excess. Granted we have learned a lot and manage much better than in the past, but until issues such as bycatch, poaching, upgrading, forage, pollution etc...are addressed, it's not as simple as a yearly take.

I do believe many of the current rules limit a commercial fisherman's ability to best fish the ocean. That's why I think we need more comprehensive eco minded management, which is a bit beyond the whole gamefish thing...but that's another story.

Oh, and as a footnote. I agree Stripers Forever does mislead people as a tactic. This is evident in the Capt. James White article in this months RISAA newsletter. I plan to write a response to the editor...

-spence

[fishinmedic]

That could not be more false. Are you trying to say they want 3 fish a day in Mass at 28 inches. for the recreational angler. The limit is currently 2 aday I wish it was one. I love these conspiracy theories. You have to look at other states and look at the big picture. We all want better fishing for stripers. The big issue is not the numbers the comercials take I think its the political influence they have. The recreational angler has no voice in most of these discussions. For example I am completely against having a saltwater fishing liscence but most other states have them and the money can be used to benefit the recreat. I am an outsider not from the North East originally. I think the fishing here is the best in the world better than Alaska. I am totally amazed at how many people think a striper should not have gamefish status. I think alot of people take the striped bass for granted.

[MakoMike]

Spence,

Re;"It's not affecting the rec industry today because of extreme measures that have been required due to commercial excess. Granted we have learned a lot and manage much better than in the past, but until issues such as bycatch, poaching, upgrading, forage, pollution etc...are addressed, it's not as simple as a yearly take."

Just to point out he obvious, makeing them a game fish will have zero effect on bycatch, poaching, forage, pollution etc.

Care to elaborate on what these "extreme measures" are?

[spence]

Originally posted by MakoMike
Just to point out he obvious, makeing them a game fish will have zero effect on bycatch, poaching, forage, pollution etc.

Care to elaborate on what these "extreme measures" are? [/B]

I agree, that's why I've repeated several times we need a more encompassing management strategy. But even with strict enforcement, all the above have a large impact.

By extreme measures I'm referring to the fishing restrictions put in place in the 80's. Like taking the commercial harvest down to nearly zero.

-spence

[MakoMike]

Spence,
Just to make sure I have this straight. You agree that all of the problems you listed wouldn't be affected by making sptripers a gamefish. You also agree that, though extreme measures were required in the 80s they are not required today. Have I got that right?

Then why the hell do want to make them a gamefish?

[spence]

To protect from commercial encroachment. I don't believe the comms will be happy with a minimal quota if the stocks appear healthy. It would be too easy for the balance to be upset and for the recreational industry to be hurt.

On second thought I don't agree with what you had said above. Chances are game-fish status would help deter poaching, up grading as well are making protection measures easier to pass.

-spence

[rwilhelm]

I am all for gamefish status 2 fish a day at 28" and no sale of bass. Just last year in Rhody a boat got caught with I forget how many lbs of illegally stripers. If it became a gamefish maybe things like this would not happen as often. I don't think there is a big demand on the open market for stripers anyways so why not end the selling of bass. It's not like you can buy it at the supermarket or your average restaurant.