On Wed, 12 Nov 2008 02:53:54 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:


wrote in message
...
On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 18:40:39 -0500, Eisboch wrote:


32 miles straight out from Scituate in 260 feet of water is a verrry
productive cod fishing day. Two or three trips will supply several
families fresh and frozen fish for the summer and following winter.

Is that still the case? I thought cod stocks were about done in. Are
they coming back?


I haven't done it for a few years now, but I heard from the regular charter
boys that the cod has dropped off quite a bit over the last couple of years.
It apparently goes in cycles.

What is strange though is the number of tuna being landed. When we had the
Egg (2003-2005 seasons) it was a rare occasion for anyone, including the
charter boats, to return to the dock with a tuna. The tuna would arrive
around mid-August, but the hits and landings were infrequent. We got a
reputation of being the "lucky" fishing boat because we always came back
with a full well of cod and, in our first tuna outing, hooked up and landed
one by 8 am. However, by 2007 and this past season, tuna began showing up
in Cape Cod Bay in early June and charter boats were returning to the dock
early with their limit. Again, from talking to the "experts", all of this
goes in cycles.

Some of it is certainly the EEZ restrictions on pelagic fish which
were put in place a couple of years ago. Another factor is that the
tuna seem to be chasing more types of bait fish rather than
concentrating on menhaden. I heard reports of tuna at The Race this
year although you coulnd't prove it by me. That would seem to
indicate that they are hitting different size and type bait.

The current striper fishery is quite good, but that is due to direct
intervention - it was at one point almost a collapsed fishery. When
they placed the striper restrictions, it gave the stocks time to
recover and now, instead of the Chesepeake Bay being the main
replacement school stock, there are three - the Bay, Hudson River and
Thames River in CT.

So part of it is management - which, as you say, seems to run in
crisis cycles. Pretty soon cod will be put on the list, yada, yada,
yada.

On Nov 11, 6:02*pm, Boater wrote:
Tom Francis - SWSports wrote:





On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 10:32:59 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

wrote in message
. ..
On Tue, 11 Nov 2008 07:08:08 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Meanwhile, I am spending a few days at my son's beachhouse on Cape Cod
Bay.
It's amazing the number of die-hard fishing nuts out on the cold, cold bay
in open CC's at 5 in the morning, looking for the last of the Striper and
Bluefish stragglers. *Fishing is an addictive disease for some, I guess.
Not for me.
My Niece (Buzz's Marina Ridge Md) says it is still very busy down
there in spite of ball chilling cold. I guess as long as the fishing
is good, they will come.
Once dawn broke and I could see, I watched them for a while using
binnoculars from inside the warm house (the temp outside was 36 degrees).
My observations:

1. *None of them were catching anything.
2. *All of them looked miserable.

Not miserable - just disappointed.

Now you want to see miserable, try the morons fishing for winter
flounder in late January/early Feburary.

My wife's second-best fishing outing was a sunny, cold day (low 40s) in
St. Augustine, Florida, when we pulled into a marina to find out what
might be under the piers and docks. She caught a half dozen doormat
flounder on live shrimp.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Yeah, sure.......liar.