“While the overall tone was civil, arguments broke out between
charter captains who pursue redfish in very different ways. That often meant fly-fishing guides, who in
many cases catch redfish and then release them, were urging stricter
regulations, while other charter boat captains who aim to send their clients
home with supper pleaded for a slower approach.
“The two groups even tended to sit on opposite sides of the
room, as if members of a different tribe.
“’We’re on the water every day. We can tell you what’s going on,’ said Venice
charter captain Ron Price, 54 and a guide since 1996.”
“He argued that the proposal was too drastic, using a couple
of expletives to help punctuate his point.
“’I don’t need some college kid with a seine net, throwing it
in the wrong spot, to tell me we’re in dire straits,’ he said of the research.
“Ty Hibbs, 29 and a fishing guide for about a dozen years,
called it a ‘decision for the future,’ as he spoke in favor of the proposal.
“’Why should my generation or the generations that follow me
have to deal with a subpar fishery in Louisiana just because there’s people who
don’t care about the future?’ he said.”
Change the names, and a few of the details, and the description
of that Louisiana hearing could have applied described a striped bass hearing
here in New York or maybe New Jersey, a weakfish hearing on the mid-Atlantic
coast, a bluefish hearing in southern New England.
Because in so many of those cases, as in Louisiana, the core
conflict isn’t between two different opinions about whether a specific set of
regulations ought to be adopted to manage a particular species, but between two
outlooks of how—and why and even whether—fish stocks ought to be managed, and
whether the benefits of current exploitation outweigh the long-term benefits of
a healthy and sustainable stock.
Most often, the people on each side of such debates are very
different, which those pushing for larger harvests in the short term generally
older folks who began to fish decades ago, when many species of fish were far
more abundant, and anglers far less abundant, than is the case today. They came to the sport when size and bag
limits were liberal, if they existed at all, and seasons commonly ran from New
Year’s Day to the very last day of December.
A few younger anglers, conditioned by their elders’ sensibilities, also
maintain a short-term outlook, but their numbers are relatively low.
Those urging caution are usually young, who grew up in an
age when size limits, bag limits, and seasons were always a part of the scene,
when some fish, at least, could be hard to come by. They may have grown up with their elders’
stories about catching fish that now, hardly anyone catches at all. But if you look closely, you’ll not a few
greybeards scattered around the younger anglers’ ranks, folks who remember the
fisheries that we once had, and grieve, decades later, for what we have lost.
But the debate typically breaks down along generational
lines, not only among anglers but, as in Louisiana, also among the for-hire
fleet. The old captains still focus on
killing fish; full coolers are used as the gauge of a good day. While they might not quite see themselves as
selling fish to their clients, they certainly see customers’ opportunity to
catch and keep fish as their business’ primary appeal; piling dead fish on the
dock is nearly as important to them as it is to the captain of a longliner or trawler. And like such commercial captains, they see
themselves as part of the fishing industry.
Many young captains see things differently. They often run smaller boats—perhaps out of
preference, or perhaps out of financial necessity—and carry fewer passengers on
each trip. Their focus is less on dead
fish, and more on recreation. While
catching fish still matters, they sell the overall recreational experience, often
fishing with lighter tackle that emphasizes the challenge of the hookup and
fight. While that often means that their
clients take fewer fish home, it also allows them to actively target fish such
as false albacore that are fun to catch but aren’t valued as food, providing angling
opportunities that are closed to the harvest-oriented boats. They understand that they are mostly selling
entertainment, rather than food.
And because they’re young, they also understand that if they
plan to stay in the business for all of their lives, they need healthy fish
stocks not only today, but for another thirty, forty, or even fifty years.
The two outlooks aren’t easy to reconcile. That came through loud and clear in the
recent debate over the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Addendum
II to Amendment 7 to the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic
Striped Bass, which saw the latter group of for-hires submit comments similar
to those provided by Maryland’s Capt. Greg Shute, who noted,
“I also recommend that whatever action the board chooses in
ensuring abundance that they accept dead discards while reducing harvest as a
means of lowering overall mortality. The
slot options presented [for the Chesapeake Bay recreational fishery] reduce
harvest significantly and only increase release mortality minimally while
allowing participation. Participation
is what drives the socio-economic benefit to sport fishing. [emphasis added]”
On the other hand, the older, more traditional for-hires
echoed the sentiments expressed in a form letter used by a group of charter
boat captains, which argued that customers on for-hire boats should be governed
by a wider slot size limit than that imposed on all other anglers, because
“This option is beneficial to charter boats who may be
struggling to find striped bass within the small 3” slot window for their
clients to bring home fish for food. Fish
for food is a very important aspect of the striped bass fishery. [emphasis added]”
The two views seem irreconcilable, and it might seem
impossible for both to be true at the same time. Yet, I can easily argue that both positions
are equally valid, as they reflect the views not only of different factions
within the for-hire fleet, but also different factions within the larger
angling community.
And I’ve lived long enough to understand why.
When I first started to fish in the late 1950s and early
1960s, fish of all kinds were very abundant and regulations were very few. There was only a 16-inch (fork length) size
limit for striped bass, and nothing else that a Connecticut angler need worry
about. Most adult anglers had lived
through the Great Depression and many were World War II vets who approached
fishing in a no-nonsense way, enjoying what they did while very much fishing
for food. Even though the economy was
booming in the post-war years and employment was high, a “keeper” fish was
meant to be kept, and few recreational fishermen ventured out intending to
return “free” protein to the sea.
In the northeast and mid-Atlantic, things really didn’t
change much until the late 1970s, when the striped bass stock collapsed,
shattering many fishermen’s belief that the ocean was a limitless resource
(except for “Russian” trawlers, of course, and our own commercial fishermen who
they viewed as threats to the resource, a view that they never thought to
extend to anglers like themselves).
Then, beginning with striped bass, the 1980s began to usher
in the modern era of regulation.
Amendment 3 to
the Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Striped Bass successfully rebuilt the striped bass stock by
severely restricting landings, imposing a 1-fish bag limit and an
ever-increasing size limit, intended to protect the relatively healthy 1982
year class, which eventually topped out at 36 inches.
Later in the decade, states began to require anglers who
sold all or part of their catch—back then, a not-uncommon practice among more
experienced and successful “recreational” fishermen—to buy licenses, something
that was never required before. And by
1988 or so, a decline in the numbers of winter flounder, once one of the most
common fish in the estuaries and bays, led to the first size and bag limits for
a species that was very
much taken for granted.
Throughout the 1990s, and
particularly after the Atlantic Coastal Fisheries Cooperative Management Act
became law in 1993, regulations began constraining the landings of
most other recreationally-important fish such as bluefish, summer
flounder, scup,
weakfish,
and tautog
(apologies for limiting the listing to New England/mid-Atlantic species, but
that’s just the timeline that I know; other species, in other regions, were
also seeing their landings limited during this period).
By the time the 21st century dawned, a few things
were true: Many fish stocks had declined
to levels that anglers fishing in the 1970s would not have believed. The saltwater recreational fishery was
regulated to an extent that such anglers could not have imagined. And because of such regulations, some
important recreational species, such as striped bass and summer flounder, were
recovering—or, in the case of bass, had recovered—from being very badly
overfished.
That pattern has continued to the present day.
As a result, we see different generations responding very
differently to fisheries management and fisheries regulations.
A large percentage of older anglers still pine for the Wild
West days of the ‘70s. Remembering how
they once brought home bushels of winter flounder, burlap bags filled with
tautog or cod, and garbage cans (the old-time predecessor to today’s Yeti
coolers) stuffed solid with bluefish, they rail against restrictions on
landings and, contrary to common sense, try to force time to run backwards to
an era when unregulated recreational fishermen could take what they wanted, any
time that they wanted, without any limits or laws.
For many, the striped bass’ collapse was a watershed that
forced them to confront their own attitudes toward fisheries regulation. Some became conservation advocates, many
became more mindful of how their actions impacted the bass fishery, if not
necessarily other species. Some quickly
forgot the collapse and returned to their own way of thinking as soon as the bass
stock began to rebuild, and retain their ‘70s mindset unto today.
On the other hand, anglers who just started saltwater
fishing in the last 20 years have never experienced an unregulated fishery, nor
have they ever experienced the diverse and abundant fish stocks of the 1960s
and ‘70s. They have seen the striped bass
decline, and have also seen the bluefish, summer flounder, and weakfish stocks
wane. Many have never caught, or even
seen, a winter flounder.
Abundance for them is defined by scup and black sea bass,
the only two species that, for the moment, still thrive. Regulation is a normal part of the angling scene.
And thus we have generational conflict, as older anglers
remember what was, and try to recreate the past, while their younger
counterparts, born into a more limited fishery, think of what may yet be, and
look to the future.
One cannot reverse the flow of time.
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