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Originally Posted by wonderfulfishing
There's a news that bunker are showing up, that brings to my mind the seiners who usually catch them all. But there is a hope this year with new quota limits. Wondering how it's going to impact bluefish/Stripers fishery in Raritan bay? I'm thinking out-of-state seiners won't be allowed to catch bunker without prior permission and have to comply to quota limits. What you think?
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@ Wonderful-
Hi. I am thinking the "out of state seiners" that are "grandfathered" into the system will most likely be fishing jersey waters until the bunker population increases in there own home waters.
The ultimate goal in implementing the annual catch limit is to have adult bunker from Maine to Florida thick as thieves.. and for it to be a self sustaining population. I see no reason whatsover for a trucker to have to haul bunker 400 miles north.
Here in Jersey we are definetely sitting right on the mother load of the population. Really sucks to have so many bunker with no predators under them so often though.
Now that there is a state based quota in place, I am wondering how long the true jersey based seiners are going to put up with out of state guys landing bunkers here in NJ, especially when the quota is close to being met.
Majority of these boats we see seining are feeding the New England Lobster bait market. The lobster guys all took a serious beatdown last year when lobster prices went into the dumps. This will be a big factor this year.
Anybody out there ever see any "out of state" boat inside Raritan or Sandy Hook bay? I only see the Belford based bunker boats fishing inside.
Paul
