Mike
Swain with a 40” and a 43” striped bass caught in the East Passage of
Narragansett Bay Tuesday.
Bay and ocean exploding with activity
A month ago fishing news was
dribbling in but this week the faucet was wide open as fishing (catching) reports
accelerated with anglers offshore, in the upper and lower bay, along the
coastal shore, at Block Island and in freshwater with a strong largemouth bass
bite.
Here is a thumbnail of what’s going
on:
Tuesday Mike Swain of Coventry and
his fishing partner boated a 40” and a 43” striped bass early morning using
pogies in the east passage.
Capt. Louis DeFusco of Hot Reels
and Capt. Jack Sprengel of East Coast charters landed a 290 pound thresher
shark with Larry Norin, Rick Sustello and four other anglers on board.
RI state striped bass record holder
(77.4 pounds) Peter Vican of East Greenwich landed is 33rd striped bass
over 50 pounds… a 52.45 pound fish he
caught off the south side of Block Island at 5:00 a.m. on Saturday using a live
eel.
Tuesday, Brian Dick from Connecticut
was fishing with Capt. Rene LeTourneau of On the Rock’s Charters and boated a
16 pound striped bass off Brenton Reef, Newport using a needlefish lure.
Michael Strashnick of
Warwick boated several keeper fluke right off Warwick Light this weekend.
Fluke fishing out in front of
southern coastal beaches has improved daily with 3 to 4 pound fish being caught
and 7 and 8 pound fish being weighed in too said Phil Matteson of Breachway
Bait & Tackle, Charlestown.
Fishing regulations receiving pressure
During the past several months
there have been a number of key proposed policy changes that if approved could
greatly impact our fisheries. Some say the proposed changes will weaken regulations
having a long term negative impact on fisheries, while others say the policy
changes will have a positive impact on fishing immediately providing much
needed relief for commercial fishermen and fishing communities in New England. Here are some highlights.
Magnuson-Stevens Reauthorization bill
Last month, in a highly partisan vote,
the U.S. House passed a bill that would weaken the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation
and Management Act. Matt Mullin, from the
Environmental Defense Fund said, “The bill, as passed by the House would
undercut proven environmental law including the Endangered Species Act and the
National Marine Sanctuaries Act; weaken rebuilding and quota provisions;
restrict data from the public; and limit options for fishermen.”
It is important for recreational
and commercial fishermen to weigh in on the Reauthorization bill; particularly
if/when a Senate version of the bill starts to go thought the legislative
process in the U.S. Senate.
NOAA National Standard 1 changes would weaken Magnuson-Stevens
On June 30 the National Oceanic
& Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) closed its comment period on policies
that would weaken key parts of the Magnuson-Stevens Act and provide regional managers
with more flexibility.
NOAA’s proposal would revise the
act’s National Standard 1 guidelines making them more flexible in response to
fishermen who have claimed fishing laws are too rigid.
A statement from the Pew Charitable
Trusts, the Conservation Law Authority and three other conservation groups said,
“The proposed new rules promote strategies that would increase the risk of
overfishing and would allow managers to leave populations at low levels rather
than rebuild them quickly and to forgo management of fish stocks in need of
conservation.”
The statement related the
proposal would allow managers to delay lowering catch limits in response to scientific
information, increasing the risk of overfishing; obscure information about overfishing
(by averaging several years of data); raise quotas by carrying over uncaught
fish from the previous year without determining whether the population is healthy;
and continue using deficient plans for
rebuilding overfished stocks to healthy levels, instead of revising the plans
to restore populations more quickly. The statement said, “The proposal
would allow managers to keep using rebuilding plans that did not meet their
goals and to extend timelines for rebuilding overfished stocks for years or
even decades beyond what would be allowed currently.
At press time, the public
comment period closed on these policy changes and the fishing community is
waiting to see if NOAA will enact all or some to these proposed National
Standard 1 guideline changes.
ASMFC summer meeting
The Atlantic States Marine
Fisheries Commission’s (ASMFC) 2015 Summer Meeting is scheduled for August 4-6,
2015 in Alexandria, Virginia. The ASMFC
makes coastal fishing regulations for many of the species we fish in Rhode
Island including striped bass, summer flounder, black sea bass, tautog and a host
of others.
The preliminary agenda includes
important Management Board meetings for tautog, striped bass and Atlantic
menhaden that will impact the 2016 Fishing Management Plans for these species.
The tautog board will review and
discuss a Draft Public Information Document for Amendment 1 to the tautog
Interstate Fishery Management Plan. The
most recent tautog assessment will likely bring more conservation tautog
relations for recreational and commercial fishermen in RI.
Key issues on striped bass include
a review of the Technical Committee’s Report on the likelihood of achieving
fishing mortality targets with the regulations that were finally implemented
(one fish at 28” minimum size for recreational fishermen and a 25% commercial
quota reduction), and progress on management level projections using the
Chesapeake Bay and Coastal Fleet reference points. The Board will also review
and possibly approve the 2015 FMP State Compliance Reports.
Important Atlantic menhaden
discussions will focus on an update from the Atlantic menhaden working group on
the progress of ecosystem-based management goals and objectives. This was a key component/concession with the
vote taken by the Commission at their last meeting when they increased quota by
10%.
Rhode Island ASMFC representatives
usually hold an input meeting for fishermen on agenda items prior to the ASMFC
meeting. Watch for this meeting notice. An
updated agenda and materials will be available on July 23, 2015 at http://www.asmfc.org/home/2015-summer-meeting.
Where’s the bite
“Freshwater trout fishing has slowed down substantially.” said John
Wunner of John’s Bait & Tackle, North Kingstown. However largemouth bass fishing is hot. Dave Henault of Ocean Sate Tackle, Providence
said, “Customers Anthony Marfeo (junior and senior) have been catching good
sized largemouth bass every day, four times a week, using medium heavy shiners.
They are fishing multiple lakes and ponds north and west of Providence.”
Striped bass. Angler John Rivera of Portsmouth (when visiting Fin
& Feather Outfitters, North Kingstown) said, “I fished all night Saturday
starting at the Narrows, then Black Point, Narragansett, followed by the Cliff
Walk in Newport. The fish were not
interested in the flies I had. Looked
like they might have been eating shrimp.
Switched to spinning gear and ended up at the Cape Cod Canal landing
four fish in the ten to fifteen pound range.
In general fishing in the lower Bay from Portsmouth to Newport Harbor
has been good at night. I often fish on
my kayak and heard that last week kayakers landed a 40 and a 50 pound fish at
the Newport Bridge, one on a live pogie and a second on a squid.” Phil Matteson
of Breachway Bait & Tackle said, “Fish in the 15 to 34 inch are being caught
in the salt ponds with anglers catching them with plugs and small Slug Gos.” The bass bite on Block Island is improving. Ken Landry of Ray’s Bait & Tackle said,
“It is a messed spring with the bass bite on and then off on any given
day. Some schools of menhaden have bass
feeding on them and others don’t. Some
guys are fishing at night on Block Island for one bite and that’s it. From shore anglers are doing OK. We have a
couple of customers that landed 32” fish at Beavertail this week. The old timers say when we have a cold winter
the fishing season will last longer, but what they forgot to tell us is that it
will start slower too.”
Fluke/black sea bass fishing had been good at Warwick Light and
south of Patience Island. Some guys are
landing them in 10’ of water and others in 70’ of water.” said Ken Landry. I fished the Warwick Light area Sunday with
angler Steve Brustein and we caught short flounder, we moved to north of the
Jamestown Bridge and landed multiple sea bass to 21”. Anglers are happy about the sea bass opening July
2 as they have been catching them while fluking. As of July 2, anglers are allowed to take one
sea bass/person/day. The limit increases in September to seven fish/person/day.
Frank Mello of Lucky Bait & Tackle, Warren said, “Customers are landing summer
flounder in the Rocky Point and Conimicut areas.” Both the Seven B’s and the
Frances Fleet party boats had a good fluke fishing week. Capt. Russ Benn of the
Seven B’s said “Several fish in the eight to ten pound range were caught this
week including a 9.25 pound fish caught by Sean Stanford.”
The scup bite continues to get stronger with anglers landing them
just about anywhere in the Bay. “Customers
are catching big scup at Colt State Park and at the bridges (in Barrington and
Warren)." said Frank Mello of Lucky Bait.
Atlantic bonito. Yes bonito!
Dave Henault of Ocean State Tackle said, “Bob Turcotte landed a small
bonito Saturday about ¼ mile off the beach at Little Compton. It was the only bonito caught on a crippled
herring. The bass, blues and the bonito
were feeding on sand eels."
.jpg)
