Do we as surfishermen feel an obligation to minimize when we have poor fishing?

[DarkSkies]

Sub-title:
"My penis doesn't work"


;) :embarassed: :don't know why:

[DarkSkies]

OK, it does work, except that I'm at that age where I gotta pee every half-hour. Other than that, no problems. :laugh:

The reason for this thread is to draw attention to a surfcaster issue that's come to the forefront of my attention lately..

Why do we as men feel it's OK to be less than honest about our surfcasting results?

Examples:

I went to this back bay location last week. A fly fisherman coming off the water told me it was "slow' when I asked him how he did. Further conversation revealed he was casting for hours without even a touch.
Was he embarassed to say he got blanked? :don't know why:

Sometimes on the internet we try to (hopefully) put our best foot forward when we put out a report. We don't catch a fish, or only one or 2 small fish, so we talk about what a great night it was, the beautiful sunrise, blah blah blah. We may want to say "Hey the fishing sucked, what's up with that??...
But we don't, we try to act like adults, and don't want to be perceived as whining wusses. :waaah:



We need to focus on the positive, you say?? :huh:

What if the positive reality is that our fishing success is gradually declining each year, and it 's something we don't want to look at or talk about in general conversation.

We want to sweep it under the rug by avoiding definitive talk and make up various excuses such as cycles, offshore migration, etc etc, just as some of us might make excuses if in fact our penises didn't work. http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/images/icons/icon3.gif

My Hypothesis: If a guy has difficulty catching fish when he has obviously caught fish before, and knows how to catch fish,
does it mean that guy is a whiner if he talks about it honestly?
does it mean he sucks and simply cannot catch fish all of a sudden?
does it mean that he is all of a sudden lazy and incompetent when he never had those issues before?


Or....
does it mean that as others have suggested -

...that we as surf fishermen are the canaries in the coal mine of an impending radical decline in the striped bass biomass, a fishery that is being targeted more and more by anglers all around becuase of the rerstrictions and closures on fishing for other species?

...that we as surf fishermen are seeing what amounts to a bowl full of tasty M&M's ravenously eaten by new anglers and others just starting out who may not have a long term of fishing experience with which to assess where the numbers really are? And that we will not see the declining results in this bowl of M&M's until right before the stocks crash as they did in the years right before the moratorium was enacted?

...that we as surf fishermen are afraid to talk honestly about any of our poor fishing experiences because it's tied in to our egos?

[DarkSkies]

I'm putting this up there so people have a clearer idea where I'm coming from. I know there are others out there because I get phone calls every day telling me that the fishing sucks, and how can I or others here say otherwise, why don't we address these issues honestly?

Again, I'm only sharing a small window of my experiences. I don't expect that everyone would have had the same ones, or that you will necessarily agree with me. All I ask of people is to consider them with an open mind, see if there is anything I say that you identify with, and feel free to share with us here any of your experiences that confirm or refute these opinions.

The motivation for this thread is the phone calls I have been getting complaining about the decline of fishing. Also the people I've been meeting out there who are old school fishermen, and never come onto the internet, but are mad as hell anyway.

I. Sandy Hook -
I remember about 15 years ago going to the "original" tip of the Hook (it's gone now). The old timers would be out there seining bait, putting it in their lumberyard white contractor aprons, and using that fresh bait to catch weakfish to 24", striped bass, smallish ones as well as ones that were up to 28", and medium sized fluke, all in the month of August, in the middle of the day!

I remember 3 years ago going to the false hook, dragging a diamond jig on the bottom, and being able to catch 2-4 schoolie striped bass every morning before 8am, from May to Nov, excluding parts of August.

It really was not that difficult to catch a few fish back then, and I'm wondering if anyone else had similar recollections.

[DarkSkies]

Let's hear some responses here. Do you feel you are as honest as possible when talking on the internet about fishing ?

Or do you feel you are being more honest when you are speaking privately with your friends?

[surfstix1963]

As honest as a fisherman can be:D You got to take the good with the bad.

[JakeF]

Honesty and integrity in all aspects of ones life is paramount. I find it difficult to understand how a guy might think he would get a free pass in the honesty department simply because he's talking about fishing. If I don't want to talk about how crappy the fishing was on a particular night, I just don't talk about it. I don't see any point in making up a story to cover my a$$ and make me look better. Once your credibility is shot, it's really tough to earn it back.

By the way. I've been skunked on my last 7 outings and haven't caught a fish in over 2 weeks,,,, in the middle of October, in Rhode Island and MA. :embarassed: :( :don't know why:

[DarkSkies]

If I don't want to talk about how crappy the fishing was on a particular night, I just don't talk about it.

By the way. I've been skunked on my last 7 outings and haven't caught a fish in over 2 weeks,,,, in the middle of October, in Rhode Island and MA. :embarassed: :( :don't know why:

That's one of the issues I'm trying to get us to discuss here, Jake, and the reason I used the off the wall title to the thread. ;) :kooky:

If the fishing is crappy, many of us will tend to minimize it in our reports, if we do report at all. I think the nature of ego and fishing is that many of us, myself included, don't want to admit fishing may not be what it used to be.

There is a change. I have noticed it and am not ashamed to say that I'm catching less fish than I used to. This is true even though now I am definitely putting more time, and fishing in the prime times and areas that for years historically held some resident fish through the season.

Many who call me on the phone angry about the increased effort they are putting in, with only one fish, or no fish, in an outing, are old school guys who grew up being taught that you don't talk about something when there seems to be a problem. You keep it to yourself. You man up. Nobody likes a whiner, so you shut your mouth and make the best of it. That's what we as men do, at least those are some of the things I learned as I grew up. :cool:

What I'm trying to throw out for discussion here is why do we do this? Are we afraid the NMFS and other reg agencies will shut fishing down, or this will give the environmentalists more ammunition for MPA's? Are we secretly afraid there might be another moratorium, and if we minimize how crappy things are sometimes, we minimize the chances of this happening?

I know for me, I will not have any agency tell me I can't fish. I need to do it for a psychological balance in my life. There is no gov't agency that will ever dictate whether I fish or not. :2flip:

I do feel we may be doing a disservice to ourselves by not addressing if fishing is gradually becoming worse. I have noticed it. I know I'm not alone because the old timers I have talked to have all noticed it. However they don't feel it's "manly" to talk about it. :don't know why:

Again, these are only my opinions. I know i'm not necessarily right or accurate in everything I say, although I do try my best.

I feel it deeply when a guy in his 60's mentions in a phone conversation that he's doubting his ability to catch a fish, because he is trying his best each time, and can't do much despite his years of fishing ability. And when I hear these sentiments echoed in dozens of similar conversations, it reinforces the opinions I have in my head.


So that's why I'm putting this out there, for the people too proud or too old school to feel we should talk about it...

Ignore it and it will go away.
Next season will be better.
We're just experiencing a slump in (fill in the blank_______)area right now). It will improve.
The fish are offshore, next year will be better.
The fish are all north of us right now, hang in a little more and they will be here (how does that argument account for the lack of resident fish when the water temps are perfect, bait is abundant, and they're still not around like they used to be?)

[And if you can move around and target them from a boat, your chances are better. That's why I put this in the surfcasting forum because I think of surfcasters as the canaries in the coal mine. The other night I know some guys fishing from a boat who caught and released about 100 fish, mostly bass, because they found a large concentration of peanuts. However I maintain that experience, though great, is an anomaly for most, and welcome opinions from any people who fish in this thread. ]

These are the things that have been thrown around in a lot of conversations. I feel a lot of the statements are excuses, or a denial of what is happening, because it is painful to address the truth sometimes. Yet we still do make these statements, myself included.

So I am wondering if we could get and keep a dialogue going here, and hoping that those who are always silent on this may weigh in.

You're entitled to your opinion, even if you vehemently disagree with the words I put out here. If you do disagree, please explain to me why I and others are wrong in our perceptions. Educate me, I'm listening. :D

[Pebbles]

My penis doesn't work ;) :embarassed: :don't know why:


Sorry to hear that!:eek:

[JakeF]

Sorry to hear that!:eek:

What,,, that's news to you?? :naughty:

[JakeF]

I hear what you're saying Rich. I can usually find some mistake on my part on which to blame my lack of success when it happens, and I try to learn from it. For example, "Well, I really shouldn't have been fishing that side anyway given the wind direction/tide. Next time I see those conditions I'll try something else." or "Well, turned out they must have been keyed in on the sand eels and all I brought were big honkin chunks of wood that got ignored."

I'm not saying that the condition of the fishery overall is not a factor. I'm sure it is to some degree. But I guess I tend to blame myself when I get skunked rather than to attribute it solely to things beyond my control, saying things like, "If I was out more, I'd have known better than to waste my time there last night. I didn't have a chance."

I don't think you can equate NOT posting a poor report to lying and making the trip sound better than it really was. If anyone asks me how I did last night, I'll tell them the truth, I got skunked, but I'm not going to feel obligated to tell thousands of people about it either. :huh:

[DarkSkies]

What,,, that's news to you?? :naughty:


I know you guys are gonna bust my balls over that title. That's why I picked it, to me it symbolized the reluctance some of us have to address what is now happening. If that's what it takes to get a dialogue going, feel free. :D


We have a bad few days or a bad few weeks, and we brush it off as "Hey that's fishin" The second we start getting into larger fish, we forget all about it, temporarily. Drunk on the possibility and catching larger fish, we soon forget how poor most of the days were prior to that. I got phone calls this morning which tells me that for some guys, today will be another epic day. :thumbsup: I'm not saying people should catch a fish every day. No one can do that, we all go through slumps.

I am saying that we are in a serious slump in all states when it comes to resident fish. They are the M&M's at the edge of the candy dish, and maybe it's time to start thinking about why.

[DarkSkies]

I hear what you're saying Rich. I can usually find some mistake on my part on which to blame my lack of success when it happens, and I try to learn from it. ...

I'm not saying that the condition of the fishery overall is not a factor. I'm sure it is to some degree. But I guess I tend to blame myself when I get skunked rather than to attribute it solely to things beyond my control, saying things like, "If I was out more, I'd have known better than to waste my time there last night. I didn't have a chance."

If anyone asks me how I did last night, I'll tell them the truth, I got skunked, but I'm not going to feel obligated to tell thousands of people about it either. :huh:


All good points you're making here, Jake. I'm very hard on myself as well. If I don't catch fish, the first thing I do that night or the next morning is ask myself why or what could I have done better.

I'm fortunate enough to have a few trusted friends where we talk over these things the next morning, so we get to analyze and critique the actions of each other. We all want to be the best we can be, so we push each other to look at our mistakes. Good friends are not afraid to admit they mid-judged fishing conditions, and we all learn from it. Also, one of us may be doing something slightly diffferent that enabled him to bail fish when others didn't, so we learn from that too. :learn:

To some extent, there are always fish around in certain areas, even in the coldest months. The job we have as fishermen is to find the ones that are feeding and figure out how to best present to them so we will be successful. If we are not successful because we gave them the wrong presentation, we should bear some of the blame. :beatin:

What if you're the guy who does everything right, knows how to read the water, and have been catching fish for 50 years?

You know what the patterns are and what does and doesn't work. You see you are catching less fish and you say, what is happening here? Do I just suck it up, hope for better days? Why is this happening that this year is different from what I remember in the near past? What is happening around me that even the bluefish are not showing up in numbers like they used to?

(I have an answer for that too, offshore sandeels, but even offshore sandeels should not be enough to keep the masses of voracious bluefish away from our shores...so what else is there, are there any other patterns here?)

[clamchucker]

The overall numbers are down dark if that's what you are alluding to. I also remember catching enough schoolies to make your arms tired. That was chiefly from the boat, while now most of my fishing is from the surf, so I don't think it would be fair to compare. My numbers are down though.

[nitestrikes]

:eek: Funny thread title, I didn't know what to expect when I clicked on this. You are definitely spot on with this Dark. Here is a fishing report from another site. This guy says he has been fishing for 50 years, so that should tell you something. He was talking about Montauk.

'.....I've never seen them so devoid of life this time of year. I've fished these beaches regularly for 50 years and this has so far been one of the worst bass seasons I can remember. I scanned the horizon from Montauk to Amagansett with binoc's and saw empty skies. The water is crystal clear, waves 1-2 ft and offshore winds: couldn't ask for anything nicer. I haven't even seen many bass carcasses(maybe 8) in the past 2 weeks along this stretch. I've been looking for the usual brown and red stains in the water showing schools of bait fish and haven't spotted any yet. Maybe the end times are coming! At least for the fish anyway. Tomorrow's another day lets see what happens. "
.

[voyager35]

By the way. I've been skunked on my last 7 outings and haven't caught a fish in over 2 weeks,,,, in the middle of October, in Rhode Island and MA. :embarassed: :( :don't know why:

As for reporting the skunks Dark, I usually am not happy when we don't get at least one fish, so I don't always report.
Jake, I've read your reports, are you getting skunked skishing? If that is true, just like when we're on a boat, your chances are slightly better, except we have fishfinders and electronics.:D Moving along that point, if you are skishing and bouncing eels and jigs on the bottom where the bass are sitting, wouldn't it be reasonable to get a few hits more regularly if there was a good amount of fish there? (you'll have to pardon my ignorance, I heard through some friends that the fishing in MA and Rhode Island is exceptional right now.)
I ask this because my numbers are down in the past 5 years. I have to work harder to pull in the big ones. Even when there are pods of bunker all over the place and we are livelining, this year has been one of the poorest in recent memory for that. We did catch a good amount of smaller fish, but as for quality fish, we hit them on an average of once every 4 trips. I know you are a big catch and release guy, and we C&R most big breeders, keeping one when it is bleeding badly or we decide we need some bass for company on a holiday. Just wondering how your catches have measured up in the last 10 or 15 years?

[JakeF]

...if you are skishing and bouncing eels and jigs on the bottom where the bass are sitting, wouldn't it be reasonable to get a few hits more regularly if there was a good amount of fish there? ...

...Just wondering how your catches have measured up in the last 10 or 15 years?

Yes, typically you are right, IF there are a good amount of fish there. One thing I've noticed about positive reports heard the last few weeks is that the best bite and the blitzes have been occuring during daylight hours (when I'm either at work or home spending time with my family).

To keep peace with the wifey, I fish at night when the family is sleeping, and try to be home before they awake. I try not to let fishing take away from my family time, and this results in very few opportunities for daytime fishing. And as we all know, when the water is cool and the fish are on the move gorging themselves on baitfish that are most active in the day, sometimes they may not be as hungry or as active at night. So for me anyway, the night bite has not been on where I've been skishing, for whatever reason. That said, there have been times when others fishing 1 or 2 miles down from me have been on fish while I've gotten not so much as a hit, so maybe I just didn't have what they wanted that night :don't know why:

How have my catches measured up in the last 10-15 years? Well, 10-15 years ago I was a largemouth fisherman in the Midwest and had never seen a striped bass in person. It's only been in the last 5 years since I moved to the coast that I've had the opportunity to target stripers and my first couple years were spent putting in a LOT of time for very few fish, learning the ropes as I went and doing a lot of things wrong. However, I tend to be a very driven person and a combination of countless hours of reading and countless hours fishing by myself and with some good friends who have much more experience than I, have paid off in the last couple years and I've seen some nice fish as a result. I still have a lot to learn and by no means consider myself an expert in the field. :thumbsup:

[storminsteve]

I have only been fishing the surf hard for about 10 years. I saw the wealth of bigger bass taken on the jetties after they banned the bunker boats. I would say for the last 3 or 4 years it seems like there are less fish around, particularly the fall runs.

[jimbob]

I have been fishing the same areas for the last 35 years. I know where the structures are and how the bait relate to it and how the Bass and bluefish feed and what conditions dictate how I can catch them. My numbers overall have declined in the last 5 or 6 years. I don't reflect that in reports because I feel that it is a different issue. Reports are a brief summary of my last fishing trip and that is all. The discussion of fish management is that, a separate issue. All the fisheries are suffering. The Fluke regulations are not favorable for recreational fishing, but the commercials can keep 1000 pounds of Fluke a day 14" or larger all season long. as a result recreational fishermen turn to Bass. Recreationals can only keep 10 porgies, what do they do after 15 minutes when they reach thier limit? Fish for Bass. Where are the Flounder, Cod, Tommy Cod, Weakfish? Can't find them, lets fish for Bass. Close the Sea Bass fishing in federal waters, you can guess what we will fish for. I am sure I have left some things out but you get the idea. You can't put this much pressure on a healthy stock and expect it to stay healthy. All of the party boats go out and catch limits of two fish per fare. This is just in New York, there are different regulations in every state, for a fish that migrates through all the states that have Striped Bass. This is a long rant, but this is the basic problem as I see it.

[fishjay]

I've been fishing New Jersey for over 50 years and I definitely see a lack of fish both bluefish and bass. I've always thought that the opening of the bass to slot fish did a lot of damage to our smaller fish, but since the slot fish closure it has not gotten any better. What has happened to all the schoolie bass? Is it netting, poor spawning etc. I don't know the answer but it is getting harder and harder to catch a half dozen small bass today when in the past it was not a chore if you worked at it.

Where are the small 1-2 lb blues? there used to be a study flow in sept and Oct. but I see very few now. Also when was the last time you saw waves full of snappers. I guess if you have no small fish the future is bleak.

Only my views and opinion

[DarkSkies]

Great posts guys, thanks all for expressing your opinions. :thumbsup:

Here's something I found when searching for data for another thread. A charter boat captain talking about how his carefully documented catches are down....


Capt Skip Montello (http://www.northcoastangler.com/) October 13th, 2009 9:07 am (http://www.reel-time.com/lead-article/striped-bass-rollovers%E2%80%A6-another-bad-idea-2/#comment-210)I have kept striper catch log for more than 10 years now as part of my “catch and release” charter business. My “real” stats are alarming to say the least. My landings are down significantly, on the order of 52% over that time period. And not to mention how few sub 20 inch fish we landed this past season is surely telling me that the future of strped bass is in serious danger

http://www.reel-time.com/lead-article/striped-bass-rollovers%E2%80%A6-another-bad-idea-2/

[Monty]

Dark, maybe you may want to change the title of this thread now. You pretty much got all of our attention :laugh:.

[DarkSkies]

I don't think you guys busted my balls enough yet, maybe I'll leave it for another day or so. But you do have a point there. :laugh:

Just so y'all know, I'm continually thinking of creative ways to have discussions, and engage others in those discussions to get them to think. And by thinking I mean not to just listen to what I'm saying, but to take the time to learn for themselves, and maybe consider getting involved in something of their choice.

So If I have to embarass myself again to bring attention to something, it ain't no big deal. :don't know why:

Thanks for worrying about it for me. :D :thumbsup: