Scup

It is bad enough that we have poachers, we do not need this sort of thing to be legally sanctioned. I remember a few years ago in the Stonington area, the state police nabbed some foreigners, of Asian extraction, with a load of illegal striped bass off interstate 95. They had seined up a load of bass and tried to sneak away with the entire catch, shorts and all. They were in such a rush to make their escape they never even bothered to remove any of the fish from the seine. They just dumped the fish and seine in the boat and tried to make their getaway. Their boat was so heavily loaded down that their boat trailer broke down on interstate 95. They were caught only because the state police stopped to see what the problem was. All of their equipment was to be impounded but the bastards manage to remove their outboard motor and stash it away before the police came on to the scene. The trailer was broken, and the boat did go up for auction but it was a piece of junk as well. Basically all they got was their wrists slapped and a small fine as they probably cried they did not know, in broken English, that they were breaking the law.

Lynch68

I'm gonna puke...

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Shine On!

Relentless

Please explain to me why we are not allowed to take our two fish in the EEZ?

Dave

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Capt Dave Waldrip
www.relentlesscharters.com

ERICSFISHIN

Just not right, It is hard to watch for sure....

Scup

Dave,

Cannot answer for Mass, but CT is a no commercial striped bass state. If checked in CT waters, the CT DEP does not care where you caught the fish, they automatically assume you caught them in CT waters. The only way CT fish stores can sell bass is if they have been tagged to identify them as being caught in waters other than CT (or farm raised.) If every State went the way CT did, it would be illegal to sell decent bass anywhere. I did bitch to the CT DEP about this, and the fact that the Alewife population is being destroyed here in CT because of the large bio-mass of bass that winter over in the Thames River. Our lobster men are not too happy with so many lobster eating bass around either. When I suggested that us pin fishermen should be allowed the same as recreational fishermen, the CT DEP replied they were thinking of it. However, that was years ago, and they are now under too much pressure by recreational organizations to act, and for some unexplained reason, I have been told the Alewife appears to be recovering. The lobster men are still hurting but that is a whole different sad issue. Therefore, it is never going to happen. A single 25 pound fish can bring $100 so it has everything to do with money. Probably if they let guys like me go after two 32 inch bass per day, I would definitely target them and it would not be catch and release. Stripers while great fun to catch, are not that hard to take with rod and reel even for a little guy that fishes close to shore. I think I will just have to settle for my lowly scup, until some day, fishermen discover that scup are not only safer to eat than bass but tastes better as well.

finsup21

This is the type of fishing Billy Joel supports and was "arrested" for a few years back. There was a picture of him in Newsday with a short in his hand he pulled out of one of the nets. When friends ask why I have none of the dwi dwarf's CD's in my collection of thousands or why I need to take a leak every time a bar band plays one of his songs I relate this story.

Too bad they got him to close Shea Stadium.

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"How I wish tomorrow I was fishin'"

SeaHunt82

This just pissed me off and ruined my day. Raping the sea.....

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He must become greater; I must become less.

Justmako

I dislike commercial people with the nets

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YOU CAN SEPARATE THE MEN FROM THE BOYS BY
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tunaless

A haul seine is actually more "green" then that net. That is a beach gillnet, I believe, since I did not see a cod end, and the fish were all "gilled" At least with the haul seine, the fish come in live, and they could flip the undersized fish . Judging from the fish flipping (alive), they set in front of a school working down the beach(quick set). The beach gillnets are still used in montauk, most commercial guys get about 200 tags, and set in the late fall when the north westerlies blow, as the ocean side is flat for the first 1/4 mile out and they can launch a dory. I'm more upset at the handling of the fish. Those are $3-$4 bass, they should be left in the water, bleed and dropped in ice as they get pulled from the net. Those fish get all beat up (red belly) and sandy. When you pack them out, you have to dump them into a big vat of fresh water, and desand them, then pack them in ice (at least that is how we did it when we haul seined as a kid). If commercial fishermen in some fisherys treated there catch like we all treat tuna, the price would go up and they would make more money.

As for billy, he was trying to be a good guy and support the baymen of the east end of long island. It was a blind, but noble cause, as these guys (and I was one of them) were the biggest rapist guarded by the local town officials and the quest to try to keep things as they were in 1896. I actually believe that the 2 times he ran his car into a tree and did not get a dwi, it was done out of guilt for supporting them, as he figured out they nearly wiped out the large weakfish stock of the atlantic seaboard (one day they had 11 truck loads of 10-17 pound weakfish, it was about 90 degrees, took hours to get off the beach and over to stuarts to pack out. I think they got 15 cents a pound minus shipping).

heres the ugly truth, a good charter boat kills way more then then that in a season, just in release mortality. Probably double or triple if he is a chunker.

Scup

Even many of the commercial guys do not like what happens sometimes when gill nets are employed. I was at the wholesalers selling my fifty pounds of scup, when two unknown fishermen came in with over 1300 pounds of tailor blues last summer. They set their net in hopes of nailing some menhaden but did not count on the small blues being around. There were pieces of gill netting all over the floor as the choppers probably destroyed the usability of the net after that massive haul. As required by federal law, they had to fill out a log sheet as to when the fish were caught, when did they die, when did cooling begin, and if ice or a slush/ice mixture was used. What a sham that federal log is. How in the world is any one going know when the fish died when you have hundreds in a gill net or for that matter when they were caught. I doubt that it would have even be possible for these guys to have provided cooling for so many fish. It must have taken hours just to get all the fish out of the net. Even worse, the next time I was at the wholesalers, I found out that the entire catch ended up as lobster pot bait. The wholesalers are required to measure the internal temperature of blues landed and these fish could not be sold to the public. Another problem about bleeding fish is the wholesalers will not accept them. It sounds totally stupid, especially for blues, but the Asians will not purchase a blue that has been bleed or gutted as they should be. I am really upset that I cannot catch weakfish anymore, and now you have probably explained the reason why. Eleven truckloads of weaks, unbelievable. I did not know NY still sanctions netting of bass off Long Island. If some commercial guy has 200 tags, what happens if the net comes in with 450 fish. Please do not tell me that 250 bass are wasted away.