What's Going On With Our Fisheries?

[bulletbob]

Originally Posted by Fishguy1

How soon you forget. A lot of the people who post here are older guys. I know this bc they post ad nauseam about “back in the day” when there were no regulations…which led to regulations bc people are greedy and foolish and treated the resource as though it were unlimited. You know what else was true “back in the day”? There were no environmental regulations either. It got so bad that Richard Nixon created the EPA. (That’s right, guys! A republican created the EPA!) Why? Because of places like Raritan Bay and the Hudson River and NY Harbor which were industrial dumping grounds for corporations and sewers for the general public. Make no mistake, the striped bass fishery we enjoy is the direct result of actions by the federal government to reign in pollution. Like it or not it’s reality. There is a tremendous amount of historical scientific data to back this up and I invite any doubters to do some research. Yeah the government sucks a lot of the time but sometimes they do good. It’s the reason there isn’t lead in the paint on your kids toys. It’s the reason cars are the safest they’ve ever been. It’s the reason GE and Dutch Boy paint and Carborundom and United Lead don’t dump industrial wastes into our home waters anymore. It’s the reason Raritan Bay isn’t a festering , lifeless cesspool. My 2 cents.

You are omitting a few painful facts.. Yes, stripers are back, and swarm in the "clean waters" that were facilitated by the creation of the EPA.. yeah great.. However, when those same waters were a "festering lifeless cesspool" 50 years ago, they were choked thick year round, with flounder, weakfish, fluke by the millions,swarming schools of blues of all sizes, all sorts of bottom fish such as porgies, sea bass, blowfish, kingfish, spot, eels by the millions, and just outside the bay were blackfish everywhere,as well as Whiting , Ling Mackeral, Sea bass, etc, not to mention all the rough fish by the billions Dogfish, sea robins, skates etc etc etc...So did the EPA regs get rid of those fish, and
"bring back" stripers instead??... I dunno, if you wish to credit the EPA regulations for the restoration of striped bass, should you also credit them in the same breath with the disappearance of a half dozen other species???.. It would seem that it should work both ways -no??... bob

[Gerry Zagorski]

I think we can all agree that our local waters are much cleaner then they were back in the 70s and 80s. Manufactures dumped what ever they wanted in the rivers and bays and every town dumped their raw sewage and we have the EPA to thank for cleaning things up.

I wish we had the same results from the government agencies responsible for managing our marine fisheries. No passing grade there and it seems for most any species and this in spite of the environmental improvements.

[Fishguy1]

Originally Posted by bulletbob

You are omitting a few painful facts.. Yes, stripers are back, and swarm in the "clean waters" that were facilitated by the creation of the EPA.. yeah great.. However, when those same waters were a "festering lifeless cesspool" 50 years ago, they were choked thick year round, with flounder, weakfish, fluke by the millions,swarming schools of blues of all sizes, all sorts of bottom fish such as porgies, sea bass, blowfish, kingfish, spot, eels by the millions, and just outside the bay were blackfish everywhere,as well as Whiting , Ling Mackeral, Sea bass, etc, not to mention all the rough fish by the billions Dogfish, sea robins, skates etc etc etc...So did the EPA regs get rid of those fish, and
"bring back" stripers instead??... I dunno, if you wish to credit the EPA regulations for the restoration of striped bass, should you also credit them in the same breath with the disappearance of a half dozen other species???.. It would seem that it should work both ways -no??... bob

The answer is no. Pretty clear. EPA doesn’t regulate fisheries. Also, read what I wrote again. You seem to be misrepresenting what I said.

[Detour66]

Overfishing and the demand for fresh fish over the last 60 years. Also the oceans are warming up and any of the fish that we use to catch like whiting, atlantic mackerel and cod have moved north to colder waters. Winter flounder were just wiped out and never recovered.

[dales529]

Originally Posted by togzilla

"I could argue Freedoms and rights which you stated but seems either /both parties are restricting our democracy daily either outright through the supreme court or under the guise of states law. Pick your poison but sorry there isnt a clear choice going forward. Albeit the above has little to do again with recreational fishing."

Let me expand a bit because I do agree with some of your points but feel you are missing some of the bigger picture. Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush II, Obama, Trump and Biden have all helped to create the problems we have today, specifically a compounding Gov. problem that is not going to end well.
I am not going to go into economics because I have been studying economics for the last 33 years as it is a requirement of my job and the vast majority of people in this country are economically illiterate. That does not make then bad people at all as I am illiterate in the areas medicine, engineering, etc. But I am educated enough not to post on subjects that I am not extremely well versed in and can back up my findings.
How does the Chevron Deference affect recreational fishing if overturned? In the short term not one bit. But the only way to get some sanity back in this country is to reduce the power that the govt. has over individual states and their citizens. This country is a Constitution Republic and NOT a democracy and this is where most people have been deceived by the media. By overturning "Chevron Deference" this is going to start the long process of giving power back to the states and just as important to Congress and not un-elected bureaucrats. Make no mistake, if "Chevron Deference" is overturned this open up more lawsuits against govt. agencies that have created incredible burdens on many different industries. This will give power back to the states to make decisions that are in the best interest of those citizens that elect their Congressmen and Senators to represent them. Can this be done yes, but I am not optimistic as there is just too much corruption that has been embedded in our represented leaders including our education system. I don't worry for myself as retirement is not far off for me and I will be positioned financially to benefit from the inevitable but I worry a great deal for people that don't understand what is happening.
I have been at NMFS meetings and it is so blatantly obvious they do not have a care in the world for the recreational fisherman even when we challenge flawed science so maybe ask yourself, WHY? Power and govt. control, which makes you think which culture of people in this world have benefited from govt. power and control except those in control.
This is my last post as I should have known not to approach this subject but I guess I am just one person who refuses to be silent anymore.
Trolls go at it, but I will not waste anymore of my time debating with people who are blind to the obvious. Shame on me for even posting!

No need to stop posting or giving your opinion. We most likely agree on more than you think.
Having said that the discussion over Democracy vs Constitutional Republic is clear that yes we are a "Constitutional Republic" but based on the definition of a Democracy. So semantics / chicken vs egg if you will. Writers of the constitution acknowledged it was flawed and accepted that amendments would always be required to keep "democracy" ( government elected by citizens) alive and well. Still the case today!

Yes we agree government overreach and ideology out of control but states are also complicit in restriction of freedom and rights. (EX: Florida) for One.

Again no "party" is exempt from over reach but like Gerry posted there is no longer a middle ground which should be the "clear" choice but no moderate leaders in the mix!!

Media deception is rampant again on both sides but would hardly call it corrupt unless people cant make informed decisions on their own rather than believing anything they hear over and over without facts ( or worse alternative facts) and zero evidence. Corrupt implies criminal intent, I would just call it entertainment.

Agree government agency control of our fisheries has prevented common sense regulations. Like soo many policies of good intent the Chevron was one as was catch shares when first instituted in the bearing sea, then greed took over.

The fact commercial fishermen are a united group and recreational fishermen are NOT exposes why we recs lose. USA sadly heading in the same direction with power overreach and no moderate choices.

[Broad Bill]

Originally Posted by Detour66

Overfishing and the demand for fresh fish over the last 60 years. Also the oceans are warming up and any of the fish that we use to catch like whiting, Atlantic mackerel and cod have moved north to colder waters. Winter flounder were just wiped out and never recovered.

Detour I agree with most of your post, would like to add the following. We're too quick to blame almost everything on climate change. Are warming trends causing some degree of spatial expansion of stocks northward, absolutely yes. Is it to the degree it explains or justifies the declines we've seen in so many stocks locally, I don't believe it is. I think climate change is used as a diversionary reason for everything that can't be explained otherwise or to deflect attention from the known reason, overfishing, because it's convenient to do so and masks the impacts of bad policy decisions.

Winter flounder were wiped out in a few short years when they were targeted by commercials year round in their offshore summering grounds. Targeted after the commercials killed the summer flounder fishery in the late 80's. Whiting, Cod and Atlantic Mackerel didn't move north, they were obliterated by international and domestic commercial fleets and never recovered. Southern New England and Gulf of Maine waters have seen the same declines we have over the decades. In the early 90's, Atlantic cod stocks fell to less than 5% of historic levels. Mackerel, a major source of bait in a $3 billion lobster fishery, plummeted due to fisheries mismanagement and overfishing by the commercial sector. Only 27% of today's stock actually reaches sexual maturity destroying recruitment. How is a fishery expected to recover when recruitment has been completely impaired? Whiting were literally annihilated within a few short years in our local waters when international processing ships and domestic small mesh trawlers killed the stock which everyone thought could never happen. It happened overnight and never rebounded.

I share the same concerns which have been posted recently on these threads. There's an answer for all these problems but it involves fundamental changes in how these stocks are managed and protected to insure long term viability. With the myopic management practices we've been living with for decades which get progressively worse, I don't see how these stock withstand the demand, technological commercial advancements and the price they have on their heads. It's the last known gold rush involving a natural resource and businesses, financial markets and government are all looking to cash in on their share and impacts to the recreational sector unfortunately aren't anywhere near the top of their list in the overall order of priorities.

[Togfather2530]

Originally Posted by bulletbob

You are omitting a few painful facts.. Yes, stripers are back, and swarm in the "clean waters" that were facilitated by the creation of the EPA.. yeah great.. However, when those same waters were a "festering lifeless cesspool" 50 years ago, they were choked thick year round, with flounder, weakfish, fluke by the millions,swarming schools of blues of all sizes, all sorts of bottom fish such as porgies, sea bass, blowfish, kingfish, spot, eels by the millions, and just outside the bay were blackfish everywhere,as well as Whiting , Ling Mackeral, Sea bass, etc, not to mention all the rough fish by the billions Dogfish, sea robins, skates etc etc etc...So did the EPA regs get rid of those fish, and
"bring back" stripers instead??... I dunno, if you wish to credit the EPA regulations for the restoration of striped bass, should you also credit them in the same breath with the disappearance of a half dozen other species???.. It would seem that it should work both ways -no??... bob

This was due to all the guys in your generation, Bob, stuffing the blues in burlap bags, and not even keeping them on ice on the party boats, and also many people I know, loading the whole bottom of their boat with weakfish that they clearly weren’t going to eat and then throwing them in the trash cans after they got home. A lot of the people back in the day were idiots. Overfishing that they thought the resource was always going to be there. Smoking cigarettes because they thought their lungs would never be harmed. Just saying it is what it is. Most of the salt water fishery’s have gone downhill and anyone that wants to disagree is an absolute idiot. Maybe one day you won’t be able to fish at all. All these recreational fisherman wanna bitch but all I hear is that they want more and more liberal regs. Thank God there’s not as many party boats or we would even have less fish most likely. If left totally in the recreational fisherman’s hands with no regs and no closed seasons, you better damn well believe they would destroy the fishery like they already did.

[Fishguy1]

Originally Posted by Togfather2530

This was due to all the guys in your generation, Bob, stuffing the blues in burlap bags, and not even keeping them on ice on the party boats, and also many people I know, loading the whole bottom of their boat with weakfish that they clearly weren’t going to eat and then throwing them in the trash cans after they got home. A lot of the people back in the day were idiots. Overfishing that they thought the resource was always going to be there. Smoking cigarettes because they thought their lungs would never be harmed. Just saying it is what it is. Most of the salt water fishery’s have gone downhill and anyone that wants to disagree is an absolute idiot. Maybe one day you won’t be able to fish at all. All these recreational fisherman wanna bitch but all I hear is that they want more and more liberal regs. Thank God there’s not as many party boats or we would even have less fish most likely. If left totally in the recreational fisherman’s hands with no regs and no closed seasons, you better damn well believe they would destroy the fishery like they already did.

Recreational fishing has never put any fish on the endangered species list.

[Gerry Zagorski]

Originally Posted by Togfather2530

This was due to all the guys in your generation, Bob, stuffing the blues in burlap bags, and not even keeping them on ice on the party boats, and also many people I know, loading the whole bottom of their boat with weakfish that they clearly weren’t going to eat and then throwing them in the trash cans after they got home. A lot of the people back in the day were idiots. Overfishing that they thought the resource was always going to be there. Smoking cigarettes because they thought their lungs would never be harmed. Just saying it is what it is. Most of the salt water fishery’s have gone downhill and anyone that wants to disagree is an absolute idiot. Maybe one day you won’t be able to fish at all. All these recreational fisherman wanna bitch but all I hear is that they want more and more liberal regs. Thank God there’s not as many party boats or we would even have less fish most likely. If left totally in the recreational fisherman’s hands with no regs and no closed seasons, you better damn well believe they would destroy the fishery like they already did.

Woah! Not denying that people kept and wasted a lot of fish back in the day and I was one of them.... However, those fish were still around in great numbers until recently... As far as party boats are concerned, don't you think the people who run those boats want to be able to sustain the fisheries to keep their businesses viable in the future? Even if you assume that wasn't the case and it was short term greed, shouldn't the agencies who were managing the fisheries tightened up the regs so overfishing didn't occur?

I believe most recreational fishermen and for hires might not like it but they'd suck it up if they had faith in the way these fisheries were managed and the so called "science" that goes into managing them... MRIP is a joke and even they admitted it. And, after sucking up the punitive declines in Seabass regs , even when fishery fully recovered, we never got anything back?

How about some critical thinking here? If you want to point fingers they should clearly be pointed back to the agencies managing the fisheries and setting and enforcing the regulations during the decline. Not the people who were following their regulations and trusting their "science".

[reason162]

Originally Posted by dales529

I have been an advocate with many fishing groups over my years on this site that included members from both sides of any / all aisles politically, running many fundraising trips for recreational fishing rights, veterans groups etc.

Since MSA was introduced in 1986 we have had Regan, Bush 1, Clinton , Bush 2. Obama , Trump and now Biden so exactly what party is at fault for fishing regulatory issues as each had a chance to adjust it or fix it.??

Left /right / trolls LOL has very little to do with recreational fishery management.

I could argue Freedoms and rights which you stated but seems either /both parties are restricting our democracy daily either outright through the supreme court or under the guise of states law. Pick your poison but sorry there isnt a clear choice going forward. Albeit the above has little to do again with recreational fishing.

Lastly if you believe for one second that overturning the Chevron Deference would have any positive effect on recreational fishing I hope but doubt that you may do more research albeit hard since all information is corrupt or subject to those massive "trolls" we all had as kids!

When it comes to politics people should just call balls and strikes - that's our duty as citizens. To embrace tribalism - for any issue we might care about, not just fisheries management - is to be part of the problem.

Fishery management does seem to bring out the best of people smashing square pegs into round holes, bending over backwards so they can still consider themselves good conservatives or liberals.