NJ DEP Gear Rules for Stripers and Sharks

[Gerry Zagorski]

This from the NJ DEP


New Recreational Fishing Gear Rules in Effect

Recreational Atlantic Striped Bass Gaff Prohibition
It is prohibited for any person to gaff striped bass when fishing recreationally. The new managment measure has been implemented to reduce release mortality and to comply with the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass. https://dep.nj.gov/wp-content/uploads/rules/adminchg/adminchg-20230403a.pdf?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery


Recreational Shark Circle Hook Requirement
The use of non-offset, corrodible, non-stainless steel circle hooks are required, except when fishing with flies or artificial lures, when fishing for sharks recreationally. The new management measure has been implemented to reduce release mortality and to comply with the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Coastal Sharks.
https://dep.nj.gov/wp-content/uploads/rules/adminchg/adminchg-20230320a.pdf?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery
2020 Fisheries Managment Plan Review

Please direct any questions to Marine Resources Administration at (609)748-2020 or njmarinefisheries@dep.nj.gov.

[hammer4reel]

This from the NJ DEP


New Recreational Fishing Gear Rules in Effect

Recreational Atlantic Striped Bass Gaff Prohibition
It is prohibited for any person to gaff striped bass when fishing recreationally. The new managment measure has been implemented to reduce release mortality and to comply with the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass. https://dep.nj.gov/wp-content/uploads/rules/adminchg/adminchg-20230403a.pdf?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery


Recreational Shark Circle Hook Requirement
The use of non-offset, corrodible, non-stainless steel circle hooks are required, except when fishing with flies or artificial lures, when fishing for sharks recreationally. The new management measure has been implemented to reduce release mortality and to comply with the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Coastal Sharks.
https://dep.nj.gov/wp-content/uploads/rules/adminchg/adminchg-20230320a.pdf?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery
2020 Fisheries Managment Plan Review

Please direct any questions to Marine Resources Administration at (609)748-2020 or njmarinefisheries@dep.nj.gov.

Good rules .
.
Seeing a few of the party boats gaffing bass the last few years made me want to puke .
.

[Jigman13]

Re: sharks, does anyone think they'll ever lift the zero retention rule on shortfin makos in 2024? Or have we lost them forever recreationally?

[bulletbob]

Good rules .
.
Seeing a few of the party boats gaffing bass the last few years made me want to puke .
.

Understood and I agree... The charters up here regularly net 30 and 40 pound salmon, so nets can certainly be used.. I would say it would certainly be slower and a bit more cumbersome with a couple mates and the captain swinging huge heavy duty nets on a packed boat in the middle of a blitz, but thats not an all day every day thing... Good modern nets would save a number of stripers every year that a poorly placed gaff might kill.... bob

[hammer4reel]

Understood and I agree... The charters up here regularly net 30 and 40 pound salmon, so nets can certainly be used.. I would say it would certainly be slower and a bit more cumbersome with a couple mates and the captain swinging huge heavy duty nets on a packed boat in the middle of a blitz, but thats not an all day every day thing... Good modern nets would save a number of stripers every year that a poorly placed gaff might kill.... bob


The better striper party boats have always netted their fish . And did so without issue .
Better handling of the fish absolutely increases their survival rate .

Be nice if all nets had built in scales too , much easier than hanging a fish by the jaw etc .
Some of the better brand nets are starting to do so .but doubt they are offered yet with the extended reach needed by a party boat .

[the directa]

Gaffing rule is long overdue

[Chumslick]

:mad:Good rules .
.
Seeing a few of the party boats gaffing bass the last few years made me want to puke .
.

Years back I saw mates gaffing short bass, WTF!

[bulletbob]

Handling Bass populations with kid gloves is an absolute must in this "modern age".. Thats it, nothing else out there to fish for in March and April... No Stripers? Not much else to fish for unless you want Blackfish in April, and the last thing they need is more pressure because the Bass populations have dropped. Sad its come to this but here we are.. As I have written here a few times,Stripers were totally MIA for decades, but there was such great year round fishing for so many other species, they were scarcely mentioned, and not really missed very much.. Now they are back strong, and EVERYTHING else is MIA.. If they go, not much else left to catch .

Sharks I don't understand ... I wonder why the populations are still dropping?.. Are that many killed by sports??... Are weird countries still finning them at sea, mercilessly for their fins, so a few rich Chinese businessmen can serve them in a flavorless cartilage filled soup at their daughters weddings?.. I didn't think that was still a thing.. I thought sharks were being left alone these days for the most part....bob

[duranautic al]

Everything is MIA because the stripers are eating them all… winter flounder, ling numbers have all plummeted since the resurgence of the striped bass…time to start harvesting more of these behemoth killing machines

[duranautic al]

Dogfish as well

[bulletbob]

Everything is MIA because the stripers are eating them all… winter flounder, ling numbers have all plummeted since the resurgence of the striped bass…time to start harvesting more of these behemoth killing machines

Yeah, I don't buy that for a second.. Honestly, you think Stripers are the reason everything else is absent??.. For every Ling a Striper eats, I bet they eat 1,000 menhaden, herring, etc.. Predatory fish go for readily abundant, and easier to catch prey- always. They will grub and forage when they need to, not because they want to. Not to mention they are programmed by their Creator to have a preference for food thats more oily, fatty, denser in calories.

Most actively feeding Stripers will feed on abundant oily baitfish that are packed in dense schools before they will go rooting in the mud looking for flounder... Just my uneducated opinion for what little its worth...

[Capt Sal]

Everything is MIA because the stripers are eating them all… winter flounder, ling numbers have all plummeted since the resurgence of the striped bass…time to start harvesting more of these behemoth killing machines

You are ridiculous! Took decades to bring the stripers back and you think we should deplete the stock by over harvesting? GET REAL!!

[bulletbob]

I am certainly not an expert on salt water fisheries, and their cycles of abundance.. However, in the years when Stripers were scarce, Bluefish were incredibly abundant.. I mean everywhere, all day and all night from April until the last of them in late November or so... Massive schools of 8-12 pound Weaks as well, that were perfectly capable of eating Ling/Flounder/Porgies/Sea Bass/Whiting/ small Fluke/Whatever... When we cleaned those big predators that were ocean caught in those days, we didn't see target species for rec fishermen in their guts.. We found the same thing that are in Stripers for the most part, today.. Smaller speciemens might have a lot of Sand Eels.. Various Herring type fish, most what we call Bunkers... Bay and river caught fish were more likely to have things like Silversides, very small small Sea Robins, and various little things that looked similar to rainfish.. that sort of things.. I just never found too many "game fish" in the stomachs of predators.. In both salt water and fresh, they are more than likely to go for oily, soft rayed fish if available, and lets face facts, they usually are.. I doubt stripers are killing off desirable bottom fish.... I would blame cormorants and commercial draggers before I blamed stripers...

[seazu]

Good rules .
.
Seeing a few of the party boats gaffing bass the last few years made me want to puke .
.
Every day they do it , big 50 plus pounders to it digusting they should loose the capt license

[Ol Pedro]

The regulation change doesn't effect a lot of us as we have been lifting or netting Stripers for a long time. It's frustrating when the bite is on and you have multiple Bass hanging but you can't get the fish out of the net because the trebles are hung in the mesh. I have changed out the trebles on all the Striper, Bluefish, and Tuna jigs that I own.The idea is getting the fish back in the water in a timely manner in good shape. We can improve a Stripers chances of survival by just changing hooks.

[Broad Bill]

The regulation change doesn't effect a lot of us as we have been lifting or netting Stripers for a long time. It's frustrating when the bite is on and you have multiple Bass hanging but you can't get the fish out of the net because the trebles are hung in the mesh. I have changed out the trebles on all the Striper, Bluefish, and Tuna jigs that I own.The idea is getting the fish back in the water in a timely manner in good shape. We can improve a Stripers chances of survival by just changing hooks.

New regulations are a welcomed change. What's the point of changing the regulations to protect young and older age classes of bass if anglers are going to circumvent those measures, gaff bass which is insane and increase fishing related mortality. Short term practices to ignore conservation measures will accomplish two thing, provide impetus for greater restrictions down the road and circumvent the new regulations intended to promote conservation within the fishery. No need to use treble hooks on party boats when jigging, using swim shads, chunking or swimming live bunker and no reason to have gaffs on board.

[Broad Bill]

Re: sharks, does anyone think they'll ever lift the zero retention rule on shortfin makos in 2024? Or have we lost them forever recreationally?

I wouldn't be optimistic. Makos are slow growing sharks and since the restriction was just put in place in 2022, I'd be surprised if it were lifted in 2024 or anytime soon. Makos have the potential to live long and females amazingly don't become sexually mature until there about 20 years of age. In my opinion, until they change long liner regulations, mako sharks and shark of every species remain at risk. At minimum, length of main line and number of hooks per set should be greatly reduced as well as time of year to coincide with migrational patterns of species considered endangered we're looking to protect. Will that ever happen the way stocks are being managed, probably not. This technique of fishing and finning over the years has put an absolute beating on shark populations.

Found this in an article and based on what I've read, the ban is going to be fairly long to rebuild yet another stock primarily decimated by commercial overfishing.

Pro Wildlife

“While we welcome that in the new proposal an alternative version proposes a temporary retention ban for North Atlantic mako for 2022 and 2023, this still does not meet the precautionary approach and the recommended high probability of 70% for rebuilding the stock by 2070. Pro Wildlife therefore strongly urges ICCAT Parties to support an immediate and long-term retention ban, in line with the advice from the SCRS. They therefore recommend the implementation of a temporary retention ban at least until 2035, or even better until 2045 (the earliest point in time a recovery of this population is at all possible).”

[Exit135]

Remember when the Barnegat Bay lagoons were packed with spearing and killies and you can spend a day catching snapper blues on a bobber and hook? It's the micro ecosystems that feed the macro ecosystems and both are extremely, extremely fragile.

[Broad Bill]

Everything is MIA because the stripers are eating them all… winter flounder, ling numbers have all plummeted since the resurgence of the striped bass…time to start harvesting more of these behemoth killing machines

Completely disagree with this post. For those fishing in the 70's and 80's, winter flounder, ling, whiting, cod, mackerel, blackfish, weakfish, stripers, bluefish etc. were all extremely healthy stocks and there were more bass back then than there are today. Domestic trawlers killed the winter flounder fishery period, domestic and foreign trawlers and our own federal government killed ling, whiting, cod and mackerel stocks trading our ocean's resources with Russia and other European countries. Bluefish were overfished and bass were absolutely pulverized during their migration south and by southern states during their spawn. Stocks were depleted with complete disregard of the economic, recreational and environmental impacts and impact on the overall food chain. Weakfish were destroyed by purse seiners in the fall during their southerly migration as well and by the recreational sector targeting tide runner breeders in the spring in Delaware Bay. Blackfish were destroyed by the increased demand in live market sales, commercial potting and too much pressure from the recreational sector along with no protection to all these species during their spawn.

The theory bass have been the cause of these declines is simply untrue and not supportable. Striper's primary forage is bunker and the bunker populations as we all know has exploded over the last decade as measures have been put in place to better manage the stock and restrict Cooke Inc. and Omega Protein from pillaging that resource.

Nature will always find a balance as long as humans don't interfere and @$%! it up which we have for years.

[Broad Bill]

Remember when the Barnegat Bay lagoons were packed with spearing and killies and you can spend a day catching snapper blues on a bobber and hook? It's the micro ecosystems that feed the macro ecosystems and both are extremely, extremely fragile.

As I've said, disrupt the natural order of things and any part of the food chain and you disrupt the entire food chain. The more the lower end of the food chain is disrupted, the more severe impacts on the entire food chain. Simply stated, when the forage base is impacted, predator species will be impacted as well. Case in point, NJ used to have a robust mid range giant bluefin tuna run every fall in the 70's and 80's when whiting and ling populations were abundant in the Mudhole. There were even a few years large yellowfins came that close due to water quality and the abundance of bait at the Oil Wreck, Ledge and Arundo and general area. After the ground fisheries were destroyed by domestic small mesh netters and huge foreign floating processing operations, the giants left and changed their fall migration patterns to points further offshore. No bait, no predators. Anyone remember the year giants took up residence at the Manasquan Ridge?

[Ol Pedro]

New regulations are a welcomed change. What's the point of changing the regulations to protect young and older age classes of bass if anglers are going to circumvent those measures, gaff bass which is insane and increase fishing related mortality. Short term practices to ignore conservation measures will accomplish two thing, provide impetus for greater restrictions down the road and circumvent the new regulations intended to promote conservation within the fishery. No need to use treble hooks on party boats when jigging, using swim shads, chunking or swimming live bunker and no reason to have gaffs on board.

BB, there are still uses for gaffs that don't involve gaffing Stripers. Bluefish are still gaffed as they eat the nets. (Not so many lately) You never know when you need to retrieve something from the water/stern lines.(right tool for the job)Saying that they shouldn't be on the boat is a bit of a stretch. Lifting fish whenever possible, netting, and using single hooks are things that a lot of us have been doing without having regs to force us to comply.

[Broad Bill]

Pedro agreed. I could have worded it better but you know what I mean. In my opinion, there's no need to gaff bass period and now it's a moot point because it's illegal.

[NoLimit]

Everything is MIA because the stripers are eating them all… winter flounder, ling numbers have all plummeted since the resurgence of the striped bass…time to start harvesting more of these behemoth killing machines Interesting theory but 25 years ago when there was lots of flounder, there was also lots of bluefish and they are bigger killing machines

[dfish28]

Dogfish as well

HELL YES!!!

[dfish28]

C’mon … not one mention of clubbing seals,shooting cormorants,or trapping otters… we used to have good discussions on here… lol!