These were posts by Bluewater that started the thread -


Quote:
Originally Posted by Bluewater sportfishing
Up and down the coast I see a huge lack of forage fish from Bunker, Herring, and Mackerel. We had the Bunker shortage in cape may this fall, and now as I finish up a dismal season in Morehead City one thing I can say for sure was a lack of bait in the area. Yes the temps and water were cold but there was very very little bunker in the area. This is what I see not made up theries. What are the rest of you seeing from Maine to N.C.? and what do you think is the cause of this?



Quote:
Originally Posted by Bluewater sportfishing
Thats interesting, I dont think there is a single species of fish that is "underutilized". I can say right now if we dont come up with something soon to protect the near shore bait supply were not gonna be catching anything. Take a look at the "food court" ( massys hambone hotdog etc etc) we have had insane fishing there for over a decade with Bluefin, Yellowfin and other pelegics, now its pretty much the fish move thru in a matter of days. Simple reason is lack of bait, why? maybe the bottom was soured by the draggers and the sand eels have no forage so they moved north, its no coincidence that in the lsat two years north jersey and long Island enjoyed spectacular Bluefin fishing when years past the fish were there but not in the numbers like they are seeing today.

Same can hold true for the near shore Herring in the gulf of maine. It took 8 years for the mid water trawl boats to wipe them out....8 years!!!
on the grand scheme of things thats horrendous. A fish that was once so plentifull is now gone from the waters. End result is the fish that ate the herring have moved offshore..way offshore. The science was wrong, the boats were told they could take this much and sustain the fishery, they were warned by Canada that taking that much will destroy the herring stocks, they (noaa) didnt listen and look at what we have now, a train wreck. Who is accountable for that?

One thing I would like to know is have they done any research on, not so much how many fish can be taken but how fast the fish are removed from the ocean, in other words if you take 20,000 metric tons of forage fish out of the ocean to quickly compared to taking it over a time line what would be better for the fishery. End result would be the same but maybe it would give the fish time to move on and a new school would replace the one they were working on? Tkae a little from each school instead of taking the whole school. I dunno just thinking out loud.