To me, fishing above the bridge, for the most part, last year there seemed to be more people fishing throughout the early summer...As the summer moved closer to August/September it really seemed to taper off...October through December seemed just like us nuts out there looking for the last few big fish....:cool:

I was surprised Saturday that there were not many people out in the main bay on such a beautiful day....My oldest son said "most people are probably getting thier boats ready on a day like this"...Not sure but it was beautiful and I sure did enjoy getting out there....

Tom O'Connell confirmed last night at the SFAC that there was an increase in licenses sold in 2009 over 2008 :)

Despite a slower economy, sportfishing is a growing part of our economy.

I would not know if more people are fishing on the bay, I am waiting for Clean Fuels to pump my fuel tank and remove the water from an open gas cap. :eek:

I know from reports from friends there is way less fishing on the Honga river and that area of the eastern shore. During the week last year friends say they hardly saw any boats except crabbers, and not that many on the weekends. The few who did fish said they did well, especially in shallow water. It was also the best year for speckled Trout they had ever seen.

I absolutely think there are more people fishing. I have never seen so many boats this time of year...I've only been on the bay 4 or so years but saw a dip then it come back up last year, looking like it's gonna be more crowded this year...

I think one thing this PSC&R debate did was alert more people to what a good fishery we have that time of year...even saw some charters out the the other day...so it kind of back fired, they try to "cut the effort" well it brought to light a fishery many were not utilizing...

that coupled with the cheap boat prices, I have talked to a bunch of people who never would have bought a boat before that have now bought boats and are fishing because they are so cheap...

long winded answer for YES

I'm saving my opinion until after the fly-over :D, but I haven't seen many boats at all this pre-season. In fact, I've never seen many boats during the pre-season until a week or two before opening day. (I don't fish many days with high skies.) Most of the evenings I'm out, it's zero! My opinion, opening day will be a zoo again and the charters will have a tough time, they'll blame it on the pre-season and we'll be looking at more restrictions.

Skip I think there are more people fishing at certain times of the year. When the trophy season first opened you could go out late on opening day or Sunday and pretty much have the bay to yourself.

Now it appears to me that the number of people fishing the trophy season has gone way up on weekends to the point it is not even worth trying to fish it any more for me. Too much boat noise and too many boats.