So you're saying it's not possible for fish to be in limbo?:whoo::HappyWave:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efvzPNVl5Jk
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So you're saying it's not possible for fish to be in limbo?:whoo::HappyWave:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efvzPNVl5Jk
today Barnegat bay frozen and remember saltwater freezes at 28 degrees
My rule has always been 3 straight days never above 30s is bad bad bad, guys are on Facebook saying they will stay all winter too :) like Colonel troutman said to Rambo.............It's over johnny!!!
Wow a frozen Barnegat Bay! The ice boats will be out soon. Guess the fat lady is here to stay. Thanks for posting finchaser.
I agree sharkhart. thanks for the right on opinions finchaser. ds thanks for the effort getting out there. Fishing the salt in 13 degree temps is a little off the charts for me. I think I am done till the Spring.
5 year Timeline for becoming a successful Facebook or Internet fisherman:
Year 5 - sit on bucket, catch bass on clams. Only go where the fish are thickest in spring and fall. Base all your fishing on fishing reports and following them.
Year 4 - sit on bucket, catch bass on clams, find bunker pods in spring, catch a few 30 lb fish in spring blitzes with your pencil popping skills or snag and drop.
Year 3 - after 2 years of sitting on bucket, become curious about throwing plugs and artificials other than a bunker blitz. Learn how to throw diamond jig at fall Island Beach Blitz. Catch 200 fish doing that. Start reporting on the internet and facebook about how you have been killing them for years at Island Beach in the fall blitzes. Make one trip to Montauk in October. Catch 25 fish. Start reporting on your epic fishing at Montauk. All of a sudden, having been up to montauk one time during a blitz, you become an expert on montauk and fishing in general.
Year 2 - the striped bass become harder to catch on artificials because there are less. You go back to catching fish on clams because you don't want to fish at night and it could be dangerous. You have fair success with clams when the water is cold or fish are hungry. Clams are the way to go you tell everyone.
Year 1 - Start your own Facebook page, claiming you have been fishing for almost 10 years :kooky: and have fished all over (Doesn't going to Montauk once or twice count?) Start making fun of other fishermen who you claim are less than you. Read everything you can about fishing on the internet, rather than putting in time on the water to learn different skills. Tell everyone you are crushing all the bass everytime you fish. You never get skunked. You are too good to get skunked.
You have finally arrived - you have become a facebook fishing expert.:rolleyes:
:clapping::clapping: Wow buckethead that was harsh! Loved it! Wonder how many guys ears are ringing today? You would not believe how specific they are on facebook. Every detail about the report. GPS coordinates, even. Dark and some of you others who are against spot burning would blow a gasket if you saw some of these and their posts. Unbelievable.
Dark you are crazy for being out in that cold be careful! Finchaser thanks for the iced up bay photos.
I don't know if any of you are interested but they are still catching stripers in delaware. Last week the water temperatures down there were 46 degrees and there were a lot of spearing around. I caught 3 stripers. One of them was a keeper at 31". Nice healthy fish on storm shads. Some were caught on avas with green tail too.
I just checked the raritan bay temperature on the USGS site. 28 degrees.
Took a ride to the ocean this morning because I was bored. Not a soul out there. The ocean temperature was 34 degrees. Fat lady in full effect. Even whiting are a little slow to hit at those temps. Does anyone remember frostfish and picking up whiting on the long branch beaches in the winter?
seamonkey thanks for the heads up I might take a ride down there. Congrats on your fish.
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Sure do we were talking about that this morning in the shop even the part about bushell baskets before spackle buckets . Most people can only read about it at least we got to live it.
Sea monkey water down there this week in in the upper 30's
^^^I don't think we will ever see whiting in any kind of numbers. They are mostly an accidental catch with ling now. Some better catches out of Ma and RI. If you are on any kind of groundfish trip the whiting might account for 5% of the catch, rest is ling, cod and other species. I think the draggers continue to hammer the whiting numbers. Even the smaller fish that they throw back and end up floating dead on the water. Maybe finchaser could shed some light on that.
I remember when I was a kid and my Grandpa and I would go pick them up off the beach in Long Branch. A lot of folks would do that back then. The fact that not many remember actually doing it shows you how quickly they forget. Folks can't even remember what the fishing was like 10 years ago let alone 40. I hope that answers your question vpass, those were good times for me. gone forever.
what he^^^said it sure is sad my son is 40 and barely remembers it
Sad Thing about the Whitting. I do love eating them they make great tasting soup. If we don't watchout the Stripers will be in the same boat as the whiting for next generation of fisherman.:soapbox::burn::waaah:
Absolutely vpass......thanks for making that point..:thumbsup:...I know you have been fishing for them your whole life, since you were a kid.....
The educatlon of the younger anglers out there is a critical part of the process......
There are some of the newer guys in their 20's starting to understand...and seeing the benefit of C&R...but the thing about C&R fishing is you can't push it on anyone...nor should you try...
...the best way to reach people is through education.
We try our best to do that here....
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...release-thread
There are a core group of fishermen who refuse to believe there is anything wrong with the bass stocks.....
Such as the ones that point to the Hudson YOY 2011 # as proof of a strong biomass....
What folks need to understand is that the most important stats are not a single YOY tally....but the trendiing upward or downward of stats as taken over a broad time frame, like a 5-10 year period.
And when you look at it as an aggregate of YOY stats in combination of what it harvested, over a minimum period of a decade or more....
It's hard to argue that the bass stocks are as healthy as they were...because overall, there has been a decline.....
Most importantly, as the old timers here keep stating over and over....
We are harvesting at a greater rate, than the bass are being replaced......
This is the critical trend that we need to help the folks out there understand...before it really is too late......:learn:
Because of the trends I was seeing, 2 years ago I decided to document Coastwide what was happening with the bass stocks...broken down by regional observations, with a bi-annual assessment period.
Admittedly it's a crude attempt....as there are no scientific data points that would allow scientists to accept it as valid........
but folks reading it should know that somehow, over the years, I've managed to meet and befriend hundreds of fishermen who fish regularly......
This thread, which attempts to qualify this decline on an annual basis.......is the result of hundreds of conversations every year, with fishermen who fish regularly, and have been fishing for decades.
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...***+assessment
From our thread, "Striped Bass have never been healthier"
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...Been-Healthier
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Cc8bCOOfFs4
This is just a paraphrase of what Bill Wetzel is saying........
**I agree with it all, as I have seen it, and every year have to try to explain to guys who are new to the sport, why the fishing they are saying is "Epic" at Montauk is but a mere shadow of what it was, just 7 short years ago
Bill Wetzel.....
"There are thousands of sandeels at Montauk in the Spring, thousands of them......
Fluke blitzing on them, all over, but not one bass.....
This is a common occurrence......
A smorgasbord of fluke, sandeels, bait...but no bass........
This summer, there was tons of bait on the North and South shore, no small bass on them....
Some blame the water temps....F*** that! I take the water temps every time I go out, and it was not the temperature...
I'm out there all the time, 40 hours a week, and I know what I see....If striped bass are so healthy how come they haven't expanded their range?
Guides in Maine are quitting there are so few bass there they can't make a living from them...
Last year fishing at Montauk was terrible...this year we got some nice fish, true, but where were all the smaller bass? ..7 years ago it was a no brainer to catch numbers at Montauk"
Additionally, the other threads you see listed below, are some of many here that try to educate folks who may not know, understand, or may only have been fishing a few seasons and may not have this perspective....
1. Candid conversations:
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...t-striped-bass
2. Striped Bass have never been healthier?
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...Been-Healthier
3. Back Bay and Bait Fishing and Migration Patterns
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...shing-patterns
4. Where are the Striped Bass?
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...e+are+the+bass
5. Honey the Striped Bass are Shrinking!
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...e+are+the+bass
6. www.StripersAndAnglers.com Coastwide Bass Assessment
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...***+assessment
What's important is these are not random opinions by me on a soapbox, but a compilation of hundreds of critically honest observations by Captains and Anglers...all along the East Coast, who I have been fortunate enough to meet and remain in contact with. I'm very grateful for their opinions as these are the folks who fish more than most.....:thumbsup:
And absent quantitative data, or data that is sometimes flawed or skewed (look at the recent dispute in the Seabass assessments and biomass calcs)
I would submit that this Qualitative method of gathering and presenting assessments of hundreds of anglers...is as accurate a picture as you wll get at this time....and can been seen as a compelling indicator of
1. Trends
2. Concerns
3. Rationales
4. Critical Field Observations
DS 615 to 618 IMO should be in the conservation corner thread
^ thanks for the feedback, OGB...but folks are more likely to read it here....copied the posts to the CC thread as well.....:HappyWave:
*********
Late report....
Fished 2 hours Sat night....
There have been some very brief windows to catch the small fish that are left. The larger fish that some of us were catching are gone from all the legal areas.
I wanted to get out earlier, but Sat was a 14 hour work day to catch up on a lot of things I had put aside to go hunt after the fish when they were there.....some who are jealous of that often don't realize the hours we put in, or the other prices we pay, to go after the fish when the bite is hot......:learn:
The dark side of fishing thread here is an illustrative example of that.......
Sometimes, even though you know it will be a waste of time, it's good to get out there anyway.....
The solitude to me is a big part of that package of what it means to me to get out there for a few hours.....
It was damn cold, but not as cold as the brutal temps the last time I fished a week ago, 12-15 degrees.
Comparatively speaking, it was mild, "only" 27-25 degrees out. :kooky: :ROFLMAO
The great thing is there was no wind at all. This made it manageable. Not a soul fishing either along 10 miles of beachfront.
Water was crystal clear. 1" of snow everywhere.
I knew I didn't have a shot in hell at catching, but just going through the motions, casting and retrieve, was enough for me.
The beauty, and the solitude, under the waning moon, was all I needed to get my fix.....:cool:
Fished 2 locations, didn't have the energy to fish any more....there was no activity for me whatsoever.
Did not take the water temp till I was ready to leave, as I already knew it was too cold for the fish.....
Final water temp - 38degrees, crystal clear water.....
**Death comes to the surf zone at those temps and below.....
(Actually, below 42 you really don't have a shot of catching bass on artificials, and below 40 your chances even of catching on bait or worms are less than winning the lottery.....):)
http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/...-the-Surf-Zone
The forecast weather for the next 10 days isn't promising.....even friends who have fished clams in the last week have not really had any action.....
Ocean temps are pretty stable this time of year and take a very long time to increase or decrease, absent a storm system.
As previously mentioned, the limited windows are at the end of a very sunny day or 2, when the shallower water can warm up to the 42 degree range. Although possible, that's not likely going forward in the next 2 weeks...
I'll probably give it a rest for a week or so, get the work done that I put off for so long.....:( and maybe give it a shot during the last weeks of Feb.