Thread: Hot Button Topic!

Time to stir the pot a bit...We need a real hot button topic to talk about to get our juices flowing and get ready for Fall fishing.. lets see... size limits? Creel limits? Spider Rigging vs Non-Spider Rigging?... Minnows vs. Jigs... Green lights.. vs White lights? Woah..
for me?
Spider rigging
minnows and jigs.. don't care what ever catches fish
I'd like to see a 12" limit but keep all you want - State Wide (just easier to keep track )
currently use green lights

For me....... Learn how to catch them however I can! haha

What I would like to see is a 20 fish limit with 10 being 12'' or more and the other 10 any size you want. That way when you gut hook an 8'' fish you don't have to waste it.

10" limit keep all you want

Well, since the theme is "Hot Button Topic" I'll ask two questions. What is the effectiveness of a size limit in lakes that are over populated and also lakes where competition is high for the same niche with white perch?

Third question, what if you have both?

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for growing larger fish and don't mind working a bit to do that. I'm just for accurate management of things of this nature. I've worked in the hunting industry for about 20 years and see the same with "Trophy" management of deer. If limiting the consumptive user group of a resource is the right thing to do I support it but when other variables have a primary influence I can't. At that point it just becomes "Feel good" management to appease the masses and in the end produces nothing.

I'd just like to see a game warden at the ramps actually checking livewells as people pull out, even with size and creel limits we all know there are a lot of fish leaving the lakes undersize, that would help as much as anything imho

Originally Posted by quikcarl61

I'd just like to see a game warden at the ramps actually checking livewells as people pull out, even with size and creel limits we all know there are a lot of fish leaving the lakes undersize, that would help as much as anything imho

l I have mentioned this many times on other threads. All I
get back is not enough in the budget or not enough officers etc etc. It's been like this for as long as I can remember and when the economy was still pretty
good. We definitely need enforcement!!

I am definately in favor of 12'' rule as my personal size limit is 12'' anyway. A 10'' fish tastes pretty good but there just aint much of him and 12'' fish are plentiful. Don't know if they have it or not but I would like to see 1 fishing license cover both freshwater and saltwater.

Ok here's my hot button
When I lived in Chesapeake Va I used to fish the Suffolk lakes a lot in the 90's for Shellcrackers. It wasn't unusual to catch 50 which was the limit and most of those fish were over 10" and a few would even come close to 2lbs. Word naturaly got out. The Virginian Pilot newspaper's sports writer would even post which lake was hot and how to catch those nice fish. Soon the lake was covered in fisherman all catching 50 fish limits. When questioned about the impact on the fishery with everybody catching 50 fish limits. The Virginia Department of Inland Game and Fishery even went on record as saying that Western Branch was so fertile that shellcrackers couldn't be over fished by just hook and line. And nothing was done to stop the slaughter. This went on for seven years and guess what ??? The fishery collapsed. By the end of 2003 you couldn't (at least me) catch a 50 fish limit of gills and crackers anymore.
However guess what did suddenly start taking all my baits?? Yep you got it, small white and yellow perch. Their numbers went through the roof. Now I know gills and crackers don't eat perch except maybe their fry, but with the cracker numbers down and a fertile lake they just went crazy. They took over the food supply and habitat that was left vacant by the depleted shell cracker population. It got so bad that I just quit fishing Western Branch in 2004 because all I caught was small perch.

Fast foreword to 2011. I went back to Western Branch this past April for the first time and I again caught big crackers but not in the numbers I once did. However the ones I did catch were very large. The biggest one being caught by my friend Mike Whittaker 2lbs 5 oz. ( go to VDGIF under archive fish of the month ) Now most people would say that the fishing in WB is back, but I disagree cause when all you catch are big fish in limited numbers your population is in trouble. You have to have sucessful class reproduction to maintain a healthy population. (Bye the way the small perch were still there.)

So how does this rant relate to crappie fishing ??? Simple, you have to have estabilshed fish limits size and numbers on all fish. These limits must vary according to conditions ie drought, over fishing etc. Fisherman MUST realize that once a fish is taken, particularly a trophy it can't pass on its genes, and when these fish are taken during the spawning season it's a double wammie. That's why I release all my crappie over 2.8 pounds until I finally catch that 4lber I'll probably never catch. This is the only area where bass fisherman and I share the same opinion. Release those big fish to spawn not to the frying pan.

Originally Posted by sterkat

That's why I release all my crappie over 2.8 pounds until I finally catch that 4lber I'll probably never catch.

Just curious, why is "2.8" lbs. your magic number? Or was this a typo? That 15-16 inch crappie has had the same genes from the moment he hatched. Being sexually mature at 1-2 years old, I'm sure he/she has spread their genetic line around somewhere in the lake a time or two. I'm all for releasing big fish (more so during the spawn) however, it's a mute point when it comes to genetics.

Some bodies of water just will not support nor grow the quality of fish that we all want. By imposing a 10 inch limit on fish I'd like to think that these fish get a chance to spawn a time or two in turn passing on their genes. There's no guarantee that the offspring of these 3lb crappie that are released would ever make it to that size in their lifetime regardless of whether they were released at 10 inches or not. One thing is for certain, if he ends up in the grease there's no doubt he's done growing, but as a fisherman and hunter I wouldn't want to see unrealistic restrictions put into place in attempt to grow trophy deer or trophy fish. If it's legal, do as you wish. Have fun and enjoy some fried fish every now and then if you choose to do so.

The secret to any trophy management program is age. You want to deplete your resources, keep on filling the coolers with barely minimum fish. In due time you wipe out an entire slot size of fish for several years to come. To top it all off, like you mentioned, toss in a curve ball from mother nature and you can have some SERIOUS issues with our fisheries.