Posted on March 2nd, 2022
It has definitely been one of the tougher winters that I can remember for fishing reports. The weather has sucked and the mainstay fish like tautog and striped bass that keep reports going just haven’t been biting very well. Even though that stupid groundhog predicted six more weeks of winter, there are some signs of life as white perch, yellow perch, crappie and other early spring fish are starting to be caught pretty regular. Spring is just around the corner and hopefully with that we’ll see better weather and more consistent fishing reports. Until then lets hope the tautog fleet can continue to get out like Captain Monty of the Morning Star did today.
Handful of long time clients—light rail, pretty day; already a fair piece off—watched Venus fade while the sun broke crisp. Mark gave today’s blocks a shove, a pyramid too. Little bit of a run; ehh, a bit more too, found us double anchored over doubles of sea bass.. What?I’d have thought they were deeper. Anyway, sea bass were voracious at first, then settled to a serious nuisance bite of nice fish. Lit up too – getting ready to run inshore & reclaim their spawning spots. Come a few tog, then a few more. Almost became an old timey bite for a while. Didn’t expect it. Don’t foresee it happening again soon. Nice trip though. Mark took everyone’s pool money. Must have been good luck from building reef. Tagged 17 – many decent keepers to jumbos. Working on MRIP’s recreational catch estimates of late. NOAA’s regional office pretends to know what’s best for management when they already have size limits along most of the coast far higher than should ever have been needed. Fifteen inches – what a scam. If something doesn’t happen in the way of reducing obvious spikes in the catch estimates, those insane size limits are likely to go higher still – and crush every aspect of sea bass in the party/charter trade like dominoes over the next couple years.NOAA’s current thinking has a small boat fishery – where even kayaks are fishing Buzzards Bay, MA – catching 1.6 million more pounds of sea bass than all the party and charter boats between Cape Cod & Cape Hatteras. Derned if that’s not a neat trick. Would take over 2000 boats with 3.5 anglers aboard fishing Buzzards Bay every single day to get that catch landed across the docks. On a computer? It’s a cinch. Just type it in and there it is – overfishing for all to see. And don’t you dare argue it. The Regional Administrator says estimates are peer reviewed. No fishers in the room for those peer reviews. What they knew about fish and fishing effort was statistically derived. Since statistics PhDs are pretty scarce on the water they didn’t need us. I’m going to keep writing about it. THIS is what’s the matter with marine management. THIS is what we need fixed. Will soon ask you to write letters. Cheers Monty
Check out this cool underwater flounder footage I came across from Spring 2021!!
