Winter Ling Fishery
 

What has happened to our winter ling fishery ????????

Used to do a bunch of trips through the winter on a few party boats that had good fishing once the water got cold.

seems the last few years that fishery is totally non existant.

was a good time getting out, filling the cooler pretty quick to fill the smoker wit some good eats

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

It’s like they have just disappeared. Ling used to be a winter staple. Pick a decent day in January or February, and all things being equal, you could put a decent number of fat fish in the cooler.
2 years ago, I noticed that the ling that I caught were smaller. Then last year and this, even the small ones have left.
One theory that I will float out there. Years ago ling was almost exclusively a winter fishery. Roughly 10 years ago, party boats started to target them year round. Could over fishing play a role? Possibly.
I’d love to see some numbers on the ling stock.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

Probably the same thing that happened to whiting, cod, winter flounder, mackerel, weakfish, black fish, stripers for the longest time until regulated and just about every fishery in our back yard. Check out Capt Joe's post about the porgies, 36 hours of fishing and 50,000 lbs of shad porgies. How long will that fishery sustain itself after all the years it took to rebuild.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

Over the last twenty years that I have been bottom fishing, winter ling was variable at best. Remember my earlier years on the J 2 12 hr trips often getting a dozen with my one or two keeper cod. Remember the Paramount and D not getting 20 fish total for most of the 2000s. We had that one warm winter about 5 years ago when you could catch a 100 in a day per man if you worked at it. Ling do not like ice cold water in general so you need a warm January to catch some. Size is generally down however even when the bite is good. They are one of the last things without closed seasons, so they get hammered. Open up sea bass again year round and they will get some breathing room.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

Rod and reel guys wiped them out.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

Start of the wipe out were the draggers. You would see mile long slicks of dead ling all summer in the 1990s. Back then we would anchor on one spot all day and catch. It has never been nearly as good since then other than one winter. Then the 15% of the biomass that was left from that has been knocked down by a mixture of recreational pressure and continued dragging and scalloping. If we had sensible sea bass limits, the recreational pressure would drop and the population would comeback a bit.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

what about the abundance of dog fish. seems like they're in our waters year round. i'm sure their presence don't help.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

I agree with the thought of the Greyhounds- has to take a toll. When you stop on a wreck and you look down the rail- and 10 rods are buckled instantly with them you know there just cleaning house.

Talked to a guy one time- he said when they stopped the New York dumping- the Mud Hole is not the Mud Hole any more? Kind of makes sense.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

Go ling fishing on the Paramount late summer. All the ling you want and some big flounder.

Re: Winter Ling Fishery
 

Everything about the where's and why's is theoretical. My theory can be summed up in a few words.........no sand eels! The stories of " frost fish" that were told by my family are a distant memory and most fishermen today would have to google the term "frost fish" to know what they are. The reason they were close to shore is because that's where the sand eels were. The MudHole yellowfin fishing in the 80's had everything to do with the sand eels. Recently, the bluefins at the Princess were hanging around feasting on sand eels. Do you see a pattern here?

The Long Branch Pier would thrive throughout the cold months with elbow-to- elbow fishermen catching ling and whiting. The twilight party boat fleet's lights would illuminate the sky over the Annex, Augies, the Klondike, and lots of other inshore high spots. It was great fishing. Again, my theory is .......the bait was there.

Find the food........find the fish. I'm convinced there's a connection.