FISHERMEN/Fridays Fishing Report.

[1captainron]

Please take a note for next season....The Real "SEA BASS OPENER" is in May when the fish are Big and abundant.

NOT in October when there are thousands of Pins and the Big Bass (with the exception of a Few) that have stayed behind can be caught!

Our first drop was the best this morning with plenty of action, those who could wait for the better bite were rewarded with a Nice Fish. When the current died, so did the bite so we took a ride offshore to fish some deeper water. Made two drops and got the hell out of there.

Ran back for the change were we at least had action only to find a strong outgoing current and just a half ass pick.

High hook had 7 keeper Sea bass and it was down hill from there. Should have stayed Porgy fishing but the customers had high hope's and we did not want to disappoint. Guess that went out the window today, especially when I see customer quit and put down the rods! Read plenty of life on the last couple of drops but the current was just too much to make it happen.

Looking forward to the next few days off!!! Back at it on Tuesday....I'm sure all the East wind the next few days isn't going to help us.

Praying for those North Westerlies and colder temps to come early this year and get the Bass moving!

I'd like to punch the guy in the face who ever started this Sea Bass opener shit in the Fall.....

Capt.Ron

[Togfather2530]

Fall/late season sea bass is more of an off shore fishery. At least that’s how I understand it. That being said I went porgy fishing lat Saturday and couldn’t find any porgys but the 2 of us probably threw back a 2 man limit of sea bass. If I try to go back for them I’ll probably be out of luck. I guess that’s a good thing bc we wouldn’t have any fish left if everyone “limited out and filled their coolers”. We all seen where that leads us from past experiences. (Sea trout)

[bulletbob]

"I'd like to punch the guy in the face who ever started this Sea Bass opener shit in the Fall"...


The "" fisheries experts"" in government are very well aware of where fish go offshore, and when they go... By this time every year, the sea bass are well on their way to their offshore grounds, leaving a lot of smaller ones behind, with enough keepers around to keep anglers quiet for a few weeks until blackfish start up. Even warm water doesn't keep them around. The fish go when they want, not when fishermen want..
The "experts" know that. They don't want too many caught-thats fairly evident.

Years ago, before bag and size limits and closed seasons, Sept was the best month for sea bass, shortly before the big ones moved off.. In those days, every bottom fishing boat advertised Blackfish/Sea Bass/Porgies with sea bass making up the bulk of the catch until Oct when the water started to cool and the blackfishing turned on... Not near as many Porgies around in those days, but a LOT more blackfish, and it made for some bottom fishing trips that are hard to come by these days.. All these regulations make it a lot tougher on party boat owners.. bob

[dakota560]

Capt. Ron,

Agree with your post. What I fail to understand in fisheries management is their willingness in certain stocks to protect the spawn and unwillingness in others to do the same. Black sea bass in terms of availability to harvest timing wise are close to summer flounder. With BSB the possession limits fluctuates and they're closed in September but the "inshore" fishing period is between May and late August with BSB and May 22nd through Sept 19th this year with summer flounder. Opening the summer flounder fishery on October 8th would result in the same fiasco as opening BSB on October 8th. Majority of harvestable fish are already offshore and for all practical purposes outside the range of most recreational anglers.

With striped bass, regulations were changed to protect younger age classes, harvest the middle age groups and protect the large breeders. Personally I agree with those changes, I know some don't but the regulations are intended to protect juvenile groups, promote and protect large breeders and harvest the middle age classes through a slot. Black fish have similar regulations with the primary spawn closed to fishing from May through July.

BSB spawn through July. Most larger fish caught early in the season are loaded with eggs. The amount of eggs killed is ridiculous, in the trillions. Why not close the season through June so these fish can drop their eggs and open it from July through the end of the year so fish can be harvested during the summer months before migrating back out east and south. It'd be healthier for the fishery and give recreational anglers an opportunity to harvest larger fish throughout the summer months while accessible to inshore anglers.

Look at the attached chart and the yellow line illustrating recruitment. Recruitment has dropped, per fisheries management's statistics, from over 140 million fish in 2012 to less than 20 million in 2018. The regulations mandate the harvest of the spawning stock before they drop their eggs and in my opinion any fishery with that ideology will ultimately cause the stocks decline and regulations to be tightened in later years. Makes no sense. Recruitment is a leading indicator of what the future holds in store for any stock. Any stock with poor recruitment won't survive with the pressure fisheries world wide have on them these days, especially ones harvested year round.

With BSB recruitment went up, spawning stock went up. Recruitment has since fallen off the cliff, why would anyone think the spawning stock won't follow suit. Maybe this is the definition under Magnuson of Maximum Sustainable Yield but it make zero sense imposing regulations with the effects of depleting the spawning stock and destroying recruitment levels. The same thing is happening, as I've repeatedly posted, with the summer founder stock and eventually those regulations will catch up with the fishery and lead to tighter regulations unless something is done to change them.

[tautog]

Black sea bass actually change sex from female to male as they age, so the keeper sized fish are almost all male. If anything we should be harvesting more at smaller size to stimulate spawning. Captain Monty Hawkins has done interesting work that indicates that a smaller size limit and larger bag limit maximizes sea bass spawning.

[dakota560]

You're correct. BSB are what's known as protogynous hermaphrodites, which means they start life as a female and then change sex to become males when they reach 2 - 5 years of age. All knuckleheads which are larger and older age class fish are dominant males.

If you fish for BSB in the spring early summer, check the fish you fillet. I have for some 30 or more years and a vast majority of them are egg laden females.

I'm familiar with some of Monty Hawkin's work and reputation and will look up his research on BSB and what you mentioned. But for now, my question would be based on the known that almost all younger age BSB are females, how would harvesting smaller fish at a higher rate maximize spawning? Wouldn't we in fact be killing more mature / immature females and killing more eggs?

[tautog]

Not enough fish are switching quickly enough. Females die of old age without making the necessary transition. The switch is primarily activated by population pressures. Until the size limits were raised, there were no such thing as 12 inch plus females. Virtually every fish over 10 inches was male and spawning started earlier.