Terrible fluke season

[Jigman13]

Originally Posted by Brewlugger

Been the same for us down south, alot of 19 to 22 inch fish in 3 to 7 foot in the back.

I dropped one last week that was an easy 24" in about 4-5' of water. Spit the hook and just slowly sunk back down to the bottom. I was fine with it as I already had my 18"+, but woulda been a nice picture and release--an a PB from from shore...

[Tombro]

This fluke season has been absolutely abysmal. I’m a retiree and private boater who is out a lot. From SRI. I see the rental fleet catching fish constantly. Same for a friend who fishes the Navesink in his boat.
Ocean fluking is stinko! I think maybe I’m going to go old school, and drift live killies along the beach instead of fishing rocky bottom in 60 foot. Hmmm…

[Brewlugger]

Its been different for us this year, even in the back areas that always produced have been very slow and we have been finding isolated pockets of fish in areas where they have been more spread out in the past. Not sure whats going on this year?

[Rocky]

I am posting this for a friend and I totally agree with him100%!


This fishery has been declining for more than a decade. Reason is obvious, recruitment is down. And recruitment is down for two reasons, regulations have the commercial sector today harvesting the breeding stock during the spawn impacting the efficiency of the spawn. Number of surviving recruits compared to the spawning stock biomass , a relative measurement, has declined over the last two decades by 80%. For example, if the spawning stock was 2,000 metric tons and recruitment when we were harvesting immature age groups was 2,000 new fish added to the stock, today it's 400 new fish. Add to that the spawning stock over the last decade, both males and females, has declined by over 60 million fish because the regulations have both sectors targeting larger mature age groups. And in the pursuit of larger age groups by the commercial sector and required harvest of larger age groups by the recreational sector, waste through discard mortality has reached epic levels. Now add to that the fishery is said to lose 25% from natural mortality on top of all that. Now someone please explain to me how this fishery survives.

We lost the southern Chesapeake stock some time ago and are now witnessing the loss of the Mid-Atlantic "MA" biomass which is where almost 80% of the commercial quota comes from, right in our backyard. Commercial operators are saying the stock is moving further north and northeast. My opinion is as the regulations continue to destroy the local "MA" biomass in our backyard, commercial operators are being forced to steam further to fill quotas and fishing a different biomass which is the Southern New England / Gulf of Maine biomass. Last biomass for fluke. Expansion, in my opinion no. Just a body of fish until now which has had less commercial pressure because of the biomass locally. As that biomass becomes the focus of commercial harvest, it will officially mark the beginning of the end of this fishery.

Are there fish in the bays and shallows due to water temperatures colder in the ocean? Absolutely. If they were there in the numbers they should be, every party, charter and private boat would be fishing the bays and reporting limit catches every day. Look at the reports, they're dismal at best.

One thing and one thing only at this stage because of complete inaction and unwillingness to read the data correctly by NMFS saves this fishery. Close the fishery to commercial harvest during the spawn to maximize recruitment which the data suggests would increase by 200% - 400%. So instead of 30 million new recruits a year, maybe we're looking at closer to 80 - 100 million.

Anything short of that, we're all looking at another dying fishery due to complete incompetence by management.

[hammer4reel]

[QUOTE=NoLimit;570625]

Originally Posted by hammer4reel

No way - just look at the Atlantic Highlands fleet. Its the largest in the state and you mean to tell me that they are taking even 2000 or 1000 lbs of fluke a week? That is utterly impossible. And I was out last week. From Sandy Hook Bay to Breezy Point, there were perhaps 10 private boats fluking. So dont even go there with "Its the recreational fault"

I did not say it’s the recreational guys fault .
But UFS you think we don’t gave an impact you must fish around a lot of unsuccessful fisherman .
Numbers are numbers . With. A quarter million Nj based salt water anglers it doesn’t take each angler keeping one fish each to get incredible numbers .

If each angler only caught one keeper all season that’s a half a million pounds .
Sure some guys might only catch a few keepers a season , but then there are guys who will catch 75 keepers or more for the season .

.


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[Tackle guy]

Party boats are not catching this year .daily pictures show 10 to 20 keepers per day.most customers catch no keepers.some of us still enjoy a day on the water but hard to justify money spent for others.hope August is better.

[Togfather2530]

Well as the starter of this thread, I finally have a chance to get on the Internet and catch up with it. Thanks for all your opinions and replies. My opinion is that recreational people certainly do have a drastic impact on the fish harvest as well as commercials. A lot of recreational fisherman are in the dark when they say that a guy with a rod and reel will never have an impact on the fishery. That’s bullshit. I know a lot of the party boats and for higher boats want looser regulations and want to keep more fish. That’s not always the answer just to keep everyone in business. The only thing I know is in my opinion we can’t keep all these breeders. Recreational and commercial fisheries both have a drastic impact as far as I’m concerned the fishery has gone down every year in the last 10 years 👎👎👎

[FishingSinceIWasThree]

I have not fished this year because the economy is so terrible I can't get away from working but I have visited the docks and the fluke fishing looks pretty good from what I saw. Maybe they are not at the spots you are fishing.

And I worked on the party boats for many, many years - 10 to 20 keepers is a pretty decent day for the past 50 years or so. Not saying it can't be better but I've worked on MANY MANY days with less keepers.

By the way, the regulations were put in place to steal the waterfront property from the old fishing stations and others who didn't have the fake money that the elitists do. Don't tell me that those huge, sickenly ostentatious, mega-fake bucks homes on the water don't destroy the environment with all of the garbage they dump straight into the bays. They are responsible for fish nursery destruction. These people should be regulated. They should give their homes back to the environment. I guess those gas guzzling yachts they got from China payola help the environment? All the Clorox being dumped into the bay to keep their boats spotless in a show of arrogance and ill will to their neighbors and environment.

[Capt Sal]

Originally Posted by Togfather2530

Well as the starter of this thread, I finally have a chance to get on the Internet and catch up with it. Thanks for all your opinions and replies. My opinion is that recreational people certainly do have a drastic impact on the fish harvest as well as commercials. A lot of recreational fisherman are in the dark when they say that a guy with a rod and reel will never have an impact on the fishery. That’s bullshit. I know a lot of the party boats and for higher boats want looser regulations and want to keep more fish. That’s not always the answer just to keep everyone in business. The only thing I know is in my opinion we can’t keep all these breeders. Recreational and commercial fisheries both have a drastic impact as far as I’m concerned the fishery has gone down every year in the last 10 years 👎👎👎

So PB and Charter Boats are the bad guys? Of course they want to stay in business doesn't everyone? I suggest you do more home work. Another thing is if you can't catch fish maybe you need to learn from some of the guys that can.

[Capt. Debbie]

I agree.

This year has been BETTER than the last five for me and what I have seen in the Sandy Hook area. Not sure about elsewhere.

But spots do move