Why can’t we have the last 3 weeks weather for the next 3 weeks? The water in Nantucket Sound is like 48 degrees already, 2 more and that’s squid water……but, if it stays cold, we are gonna play hurry up and wait.

Fluke petition update- apparently, I didn’t submit my petition soon enough (FEB), so….no more fluke for us this year, but it is supposedly going to public hearing this summer. I don’t know, I think having submitted the petition in Feb. was plenty of time for them to do it. Just more excuses to keep the hook guys down……

I have requested a meeting with Diodati this summer to discuss the inequities in our landing limits, lets see if he pounds the table with his fist’s this time………

5-day crab closures each new and full moon in May and June

Got plenty of jigs? How about a night time set up, lights and a heater and such?

Will there be any squid this year? Let’s hope so, the last two years have been dismal and so has the weather, which in my opinion is a big part of why the squid haven’t been spending much time near shore. There have been plenty of squid, but not close to the beach, last year the Atlantic Pride, operating out of Hyannis, did very well into June, but the handline guys and rec boats hardly got any. Seems as if the blues arrive earlier and earlier each year now too, adding to the reasons why the squirty fishes are scarce inshore lately, IMO.

My friend Chrisa and I have been working on making some new jigs, which I think are going to out fish any I’ve used before, but we’ll need some squid to figure it out, so keep your fingers crossed for a warm end of April and first week of May. I think that when we have a lot of sun, the bottom gets warmed and the squid like it, making them more likely to hang around longer, it seems that the best years I can remember were always sunny and warm, like t shirts in the afternoon weather, those years the squidding at night was good and I would average over 500 pounds a trip alone. The last couple years I don’t think I’ve gotten 500 pounds
the whole season……

What about Woods Hole? I’ve never tried it, but, I have been hearing form more and more folks that there have been good numbers of big tubes there the whole month of May for the last 2 years. The reports I am getting are all accounts of shoreside efforts, but I’d be very curious to see what could be done from a boat by experienced squidders? Just might have to give it a look this year.

Sometime in the next 2 weeks they’ll start setting up the weirs or traps, along the S side, then it’s hurry up and wait for the fish, if there are any?

May 1’st is coming fast, only 37 days away, will catch shares happen on schedule or not?
Protests, meetings. hearings and complaints abound, all aimed at diverting this runaway wreck bound train.
Even Senator John Kerry seems to be getting it, although I’d say pandering is his middle name and he is beginning to see a Massachusetts political future in which he’s not our senator if he doesn’t at least appear to be interested in the fishermen’s plight.

Unfortunately, I think that catch shares will be implemented May 1, as scheduled, regardless of our united stands against it, this administration is intent on doing what it thinks is in our best interest, regardless of whether we want it or not, just look at what just happened with health care reform…..

The only folks I see winning anything in amendment 16 are the handgear A guys, who unless I am mistaken will be getting bumped up to 750 pounds (cod) a day and not in the common pool either, for these lucky guys this could potentially be a huge windfall, at 750 they can make some real money.

37 days, then we will see if any of our efforts to change the governments mind has helped or if we were just wasting our time?

Good AM. I spent the better part of yesterday in Gloucester at the Marine Fisheries Commission meeting.
I arrived a little late, there was a lot of traffic on the expressway through Boston and the of all things, a State Trooper was on 128 all the way to the Anisquam, keeping traffic slow.

Horseshoe crabs were the biggest topic at the meeting, the discussion on them lasted nearly 2 hours, though I would have to say that from the sound of things, the crabs are in need of some conservative management measures to insure their future here in Massachusetts. Management changes for this year are going to include; spawning closures around the full and new moons in May and early June, a 7″ min. size limit also was approved. The Bio-medical harvest in Pleasant Bay is going to be exempted from the spring closures. Another change to management fo r the crabs this year, will be an increase in what the draggers can take, up to 600 a day – the limit was 400 for all gears, but the DMF recommended the draggers increase as a way for the bait and medical markets to still get enough of the crabs, without taking them during the spawn.

The sector for summer flounder that Warren Doty is trying to get set up for Menemsha seems to be going nowhere with the commission, DMF director Diodati wants to go through the exploratory process, but commissioners Vito Calomo and Ed Nasser seem dead set against this idea, Nasser scoffed at the notion and offered that 2 of the fishermen in the would be sector from Menemsha are 70 and 80 years old (not a quote). Ed Nasser told director Diodati, sarcastically, “you are starting to sound like Jane Lubchenco” when they were discussing the proposed Vineyard fluke sector. The talks of the Vineyard sector for fluke are going to continue, to what end I don’t know, but I don’t see this happening anytime soon.

Recreational sea Bass, scup and fluke – Scup season is going to be the same as last year, with the exception of a “bonus season” in the fall for the for hire boats, I’m a little shaky on the details. Sea bass is going to open on May 22 and fluke is going to open June 1. All this is tentative, it still has to go to public hearing/s which will be announced by DMF soon and I am sure better details will be provided.

Commercial fluke fishermen using hook gear may see some relief this year, a petition submitted by yours truly and CIIFA, to raise the landing limit for fluke by hooks to 300 pounds will aslo be going to public hearing/s and the DMF is supporting it, keep your fingers crossed guys…….

The US support of a CITES listing for bluefin tuna was discussed, overall the commission was critical of this action by US Fish and Wildlife. Ma. DMF was also critical and told the commission that the deputy Commissioner was actually taking their vacation time to travel to the meeting where the big CITEs vote will take place, in Qatar? I’m not sure I spelled that right? I tried to listen as best I could but the commission will often talk over each other and it is difficult to hear everything, sorry.

DMF is putting a temporary moratorium on the transfer of conch permits. They say there is a lot of new effort in the conch fishery and there is some concern for the stocks, dealers are reporting seeing a lot of small conch in the landings recently.

Dogfish are going to open May 1’st with a trip limit of 2,000 pounds. The DMF sent out an advisory seeking public comments.

Catch shares for groundfish was discussed at the end of the meeting, not any formal talk, but Vito and Ed both spoke of dark days ahead for a lot of folks.

That’s all for now.

Obama moving to limit fishing access – ESPN

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And – what the hell am I talking about?

Who’s side is Massachusetts DMF on anyway? All the fishermen or just a select few? I’m gonna have to go with the latter, because the former don’t seem to be “in” on what’s looking to be the future of groundfish in Massachusetts……

Remember the CCZ and how it was created? If you don’t, l’ve explained it a few times, but for your sake, I’ll say it again- It was created as a reaction to gill netters throwing incredible amounts of fish away there. Nothing more, nothing less, period. DMF was quoted as saying so much in CFN. I don’t think the article is still online? DMF director Diodati told the Marine Fisheries Commission that DMF was getting a lot of criticism from NMFS about the greatly escalated cod landings in state waters, which were almost entirely affected by gill netters.

Now- with catch shares about to become the federal management system, DMF is looking at instituting a similar system for our states waters groundfishery and according to recent statements by Mr. Diodati, the state waters groundfishery, based on recent landings, is primarily 20+ gill net vessels, DUH!!!! Since the CCZ and the creation of the SWGE, pretty much all the landings are from gill netters and a few draggers. There hasn’t been much opportuinity for skiff fishermen to get to the fish because the places the fish are in in state waters are all closed while the fish are there.

This is just more of the same from MA DMF, starve the hook guys, let them have a permit, but no fishery, let them have a permit, but no value. Let them have a permit, but with less access and lower landing limits.
Maybe I am crazy? But I think they want us to go away, but can’t actually just eliminate us altogether, so they’ll just let us starve to death?

What do you think?

Lubchenco holds firm on May 1 ‘catch share’ launch – GloucesterTimes.com, Gloucester, MA

“I got nothing; I’ll be catching one third of the fish I caught previously,” said Capt. Joe Orlando. “Because of the reallocation, we got screwed.”

“I’m out of business,” said Corrado Buccheri, who owns two boats.

“I’m in the 2 percent who are supposed to make it, and I’m not going to make it,” said Richard Burgess, who owns 11 permits and four boats.

Every spring, the squid come to Nantucket Sound, for a few weeks they hug the beaches from Falmouth to Chatham. For a week at the end of April, the draggers are allowed to fish inside the three mile line between Mashpee and Hyannis, after that they have to stay outside the three mile line, if they are east of Succonesset Shoal. The draggers have been allowed this one week inside since 1990, when the DMF began to allow them to fish using squid mesh inside the line, because a few boats had already been doing it in previous years and DMF wasn’t able to enforce the rule prohibiting from doing so, as strange as that sounds. You can read where it says precisely this, it’s in a report from the DMF - The Loligo squid fishery in Nantucket and Vineyard Sound Page 15.

The trawlers tow an area about 5 1/2 miles x 2 miles over and over for a week. See the chart inserted -

Inside Squid Tow

Some years there are only a few boats and some years there as many as 40 trawlers. How many depends on how early the squid arrive and how thick they are, word of a good run spreads quick. In the last few years the squid that show up inside have been scarce and the number of boats dragging has been limited, mainly to the few local boats from Hyannis and Falmouth and Menemsha.

As you’d likely imagine, jigging for squid in this is popular, but not very productive until after May 1’st when the draggers have left, usually it takes a day or two for things to settle down from all the disturbance of the draggers towing back and forth between Colliers Ledge and Succonesset Shoal all day for a week, it’s a small area and the week of dragging activity keeps the squid from settling in 1 spot for very long. Once the draggers have left though, squid are able to be jigged and the area becomes an eclectic mixture of sport boats, party boats, six pack charters, commercial jiggers and sea bass potters who also must wait until the trawlers are out of the area before they put their gear in, or risk losing it.

The draggers continue to catch squid after May 1’st, further out in the sound, most years well into June and most boats do well, getting thousands of pounds a day for several weeks, perhaps a month. The inshore area, this little area between Osterville and Mashpee, only sees any good numbers for a week or ten days and again, not until the draggers have left. There are a lot more fishermen who fish this area who aren’t draggers, than there are, but we have to give up this week because they are there. For twenty years the draggers have had this week open to them in this area, but to a certain degree, at the expense of all the others who would also access this area and not just the other fishermen, but the squid themselves, which never really get a chance to settle in until they leave and sometimes don’t until after other fish arrive like scup, seabass, stripers, blues and fluke, all go there to eat squid, which also keep the squid from having very long to themselves in this very small place.

I think it’s time we looked at re-closing this area year round to squid trawlers. The area had been closed for 70 years, basically since we’ve been dragging with powered vessels until 1990. Considering how many more local fishermen, both recreational and commercial would benefit with an enhanced squid presence inshore and the lingering effects of the attraction of more bait to other fish, we should keep this area off limits to Mobile gear fishermen. During years of an abundance of squid in late April, many of the boats that show up to drag aren’t from the area, some are even from out of state. I think that keeping this area off limits to them will be of a greater benefit to more people, locally.

A few years ago the trawlermen attempted to get this area left open to them for the first two weeks of May, they were unsuccessful though. At the time, due to a procedurally improper motion made by the Marine Fisheries Commission, they almost got to fish inside for a week in May, but efforts by myself and others, convinced the Wildlife commissioner Tom French, to overturn the MFC decision and the area remained closed to squid trawlers in May. Now if we can just get that last week in April re-closed, we’d be all set. It’s not as if the draggers wouldn’t still catch any squid, which they do all during May and into early June, it’s just that the rest of us, which is a lot more than the few draggers who would be excluded, need this area and the availability of squid in it far outweighs the quick buck the draggers get there at our expense.

Mind you I said FISHING and not FISH…..
I’m sitting here listening to “talk radio” on our local “news” station WKTK. The lead news story this AM? The story about the great white sharks that were tagged off Monomoy last year. There’s a lot going on with fisheries management that is newsworthy, like – Senior NOAA enforcement agent Jones shredding documents and NOAA chief Lubchenco’s visit to Gloucester and the US supporting CITES listing for tuna. Nothing about any of these from our local “news” station…..This is Cape Cod and we do have a lot of fishermen here, so I would think WXTK would think news about fishing would be something they’d feature more often and prominently.

This seems to be a reflection of the public’s apparent apathy towards fishing and fishermen as opposed to how they feel about fish.

I wrote the station a note just now asking why they thought the sharks were more newsworthy? I’m betting I won’t get a response. I’ll be sure to let you know if I do.