I honestly do not remember the last time I put up a new video on YouTube
I am getting a little rusty
as always, we recommend that you watch all our videos at 1080 P resolution….because if you don’t, I just spent a kids’ college fund for apparently, no reason 🙂
[youtube]http://youtu.be/Cc8bCOOfFs4?hd=1[/youtube]
I’m mostly a weekend fisherman, but I have noticed less and less small bass for the past three years. And yes when the sand eels were thick two years ago I too only caught fluke, no bass.
↓Big bill for president! Tell it like it is mmmmffffaaaa!
↓Good video. sad but true..Thanks.
↓Scary. Like many of us vintage fishermen , we saw this happen before.All we got was BS untill there were hardly any before any thing was done.It’s not all caused by the commercial guys, we need to think twice before we keep that fish.
↓Sad but true. Thanks for sharing.
↓Zeno,
When you go to share a video from youtube; First click “share” under the video, under the hyper link there is a small “options” drop down bar, click that, then check off “HD link”. Now the link you copy and paste will automatically open in HD.
Hope this helps
↓sink there f,in boats ,,
↓I have seen some of the thickest bait in the last 3-4 years…and time and time again it is like the Stripers didn’t get an invitation or something. I blaimed the lack of bait in years past but you can’t say that any more. In fact I think some bait is growing in numbers due to the fact in my area, other then some gorilla blues slicing and dicing bass have been very scarce.
↓When Knie, Musso, Orlando and Wetzel are on record saying that we are going to have a big problem with bass stocks, i think you can take it to the bank. There was bait big and small everywhere on eastern LI this year and they were generally unmolested except by a few blues and birds. The charter boats were killing the big fish in the rips off the point for months but nothing small. I guess its easy to ignore the obvious when there were a few nice days in october this year the big sand eel bite in NJ and the YoY index last year.
↓Z… thanks for your time and effort highlighting these observations and into what I believe is potentially becoming (and i think many feel that i should be using the past tense, ie, has already become) a comedy of mismanagement and regulatory apathy in a clear, concise video. Great job.
My sampling set, while smaller but geographically broader compared to Bill Wetzel and Don Musso, suggest a size variation shift in the bass stock. In the past 2-3 years I have landed a much broader range of bass. My log shows bass 30 pound plus to 2 pound Twinkie in same areas around the same timeframes. Before that period my log shows mostly cookie cutter 26-32 inch bass. While a lot of fun there was little size diversity available to the surf rat. My kids had a blast this year catching 1-3 pound bass on the Susquehanna flats and off Sandy Hook while my buddies and I hammered solid bass in Massachusetts this summer. It is great to see small bass back in the salt ponds and surf! It makes me optimistic for the future of the sport. That being said everyone can be more environmentally aware while on the water and practice catch and release. We can also push for tighter regulations for charter and commercial fishing vessels. I just don’t think we are at the same place as we were in the 1970s when everything began to crash and I hope I’m right for my kids sake.
↓Everyone up and down the coast knows the bass are in trouble, well, except for the clowns in shorts and flip flops that get their intel via cell phone.
Yet, guys who should know better are out there day after day beating the piss out of the dinks- the very future of the fishery.
Until all the he-man bloggers, newspaper and magazine writers, tackle shop owners and employees, equipment manufacturers, pro team staffers, high hooks, sharpies, bass masters, and experienced, knowledgeable fishermen wake the eff up to the fact that tearing up microbass with trebles, dragging them up the rocks, bouncing them back down the rocks, coating them in dry sand, and then heaving them back into the wash is killing our fishery just as much as the commercials, poachers, limit cheaters, pogie boats, herring seiners and VA/NC/MD EEZ fishing charter boats THERE IS NO HOPE FOR THE FISHERY.
Everyone who kills bass, intentionally or not, has blood on their hands…
↓Thanks for sharing that video Zeno. I could listen to Bill talk for hours about stripers
↓Scary. What the hell am I going to do? Take up golf? I don’t think so. These guys are making knowledgeable observations. I know my numbers are definitely down. This summer was a struggle in the surf – very few resident fish. Guys like Jim White in RI have been warning us of the danger for a few years now. Not that that matters much to charters/commercial/rec guys who are killing loads of big breeders on the ledges around Block Island and elsewhere.
↓I never caught a striper at this time. I think they should stop the commercial guys for a while.They catch everything in there nets in season or not.They cannot throw back those fish that are not in season or restricted to catch.Hopefully I’d like to catch a striper at least if it’s short I can put it back unharmed,but if I dragged a net around for a few hours and suffocated it well I can’t return it back unharmed.
↓Per the Atlantic States marine Fisheries Commission – “State of Stock: Relative to the biological reference points accepted by the Striped Bass Management
Board, the striped bass stock complex in 2010 is not overfished and overfishing is not occurring (SSB
threshold = 36,881 mt; FMSY = 0.34)…”
Are there fewer fish than in 2000? yes
Do the longer term projections suggest further declines? potentially, yes
We can line up 100 surfcasters with thousands years of cumulative on the water experience. There is long long history of surfcasters calling for more restrictions, but those voices have been over-ruled, time and again, when the critical vote on harvest restrictions comes up by the organization in charge(ASMFC).
There is always a reason to defer action until the next stock assessment, the next YOY, or the next [fill in the blank] study.
If you live in NY, it would be interesting to have these guys interviewed
NY
PAT H. AUGUSTINE
25 STUART DR.
CORAM, NY 11727-1918
E-Mail: PAUGUSTINE3@VERIZON.NET
Tel: 631 – 928-1524
Fax: 631 – 928-3540
BRIAN CULHANE
98 CLEVELAND AVE
SAYVILLE, NY 11782-1325
E-Mail: CULHANE@NYSENATE.GOV
Tel: 631 – 563-7866
In NJ
TOM FOTE
↓22 CRUISER COURT
TOMS RIVER, NJ 08753-6246
E-Mail: TFOTE@JCAA.ORG
Tel: 732 – 270-9102
Fax: 732 – 506-6409
I agree that the bass numbers are way down and the lack of smaller bass is troubling. Action must be taken fast like no commercial harvesting and going back to one fish at 36 inches no exceptions. I think I have kept only 3 bass in my almost 50 years of fishing because I enjoy catching them more than keeping them to eat. I release over 99 percent of all the fish I catch. There is no reason to keep two bass just because you fished a charter and can keep one from 28 to 40 inches and one above 40.
↓YES I have seen smaller blitzes in MTK than 10 years ago, & I wonder if the 80s wil repeat.
I would look at the commercial fleet & address bycatch regulations. Then look at the head boats that kill too many breeders for a photo op.
Maybe they could keep fish in the 28 to 34″ range & release the breeders.
I won’t disagree with the video.
However the schoolies that Wentzl spoke about were all over the NOFO this summer.
They had no red spots on them either!
Don’t forget, Irene shut down Long Island last fall, all the mud & run off from up in Vt.,Conn, & NY ran down the rivers & our local waters were brown last fall.
Acres of bass were seen on the 3 mile line heading south by commercial boats.
↓Ask anyone in Seaside Park NJ, where those bass hit shore & sat for weeks on a sandeel bite.
It was there BEST season in 25 years!
So I believe there is Hope for this fishery if proactive measures are taken now!
Moratorium, moratorium …………MORATORIUM !!!!!! No possession …..PERIOD !! ….GET IT !!!
↓Gentlemen, believe me, the Bass Are In Trouble. There will always be Pods of fish somewhere. If you find them you will think that the numbers are up, but that is not so. If you lived on Block Island during the 80’s you would have thought that there was no end to the Bass. But, as we know, that was not the case. In 1984 I went The entire Season and caught 17 bass on Long Island. When I went to Block Island later that year I caught 132 bass in a week and thought I went to heaven. Don’t be fooled by a smattering of fish in your area.
The Bass Stocks Are In Trouble.
Vito
↓Until someone steps up and tells the companies like Omega Protien to quit clearing the seas of thousands of bass and the menhaden they feed on every day nothing will change. yes the sport fishermen take a good amount but we both need to come to a comprimise or there will be nothing for the all of us very shortly.
↓