Team B-Faithful MSSA Tournament
 

summary:

Friday and Sat out of PLO. Landed 16 fish Friday and 9 fish Saturday. Biggest on Sat went 36.4lbs and we broke our line 3x on with new 50lb power pro, 2 at the rubberband. :confused:

Sunday out SPSP we ran to Poplar Island trolled to BPL. Landed 7 fish. Son entered a 25.4lber in the kids division

Missed the top ten by 1.3lbs...

Nice work!

Tournaments may be suspended after this year. Make them count.

Congrats man. I'm sure Brennan had a blast fishing with dad............Mark

Brennan had a blast but was ready to skip fishing today.

Reds, as long as there are open seasons I will fight for tournaments. Tournament anglers are subject to the same regs as any other fishermen whether they are fishing a tournament or not. No special priviledges are given to those fishing a tournament. Some tournaments have tighter regulations than (MSSA tournament has a 36" min).

It didn't take much to move the tournaments back to May. A mandatory 50 percent reduction in catch will move them back to What? December.

I like to eat rockfish but would support a 50% reduction in the total catch. Lets hope they do it for all states and address the menhaden fleet as well. More C&R and non kill tournaments would be great for the long term health of this fishery.

The topic of tournaments was brought up at a fall SFAC meeting. Appeared that most said that the DNR shouldnt even monitoring tournments given that anglers are fishing within regulations. See page 79 here for transcripts: http://dnr.maryland.gov/fisheries/ma...Transcirpt.pdf

I will start now by saying that I believe DNR should strongly consider the no-take slot from 2007 to effectively achieve a reduction if necessary. It proved to be very effective as despite an increase in participation in 2007 over 2006 that the harvest was reduced by half even with a 33" min in 06. Tow hurdles to climb in Maryland though. 1. Charter boats capts claimed all those fish died, which I believe to be untrue unless they were not handled properly. 2. DNR complained about the number of recreational violations of the no-take slot. To me this was more of a problem due to a lack of consistancy in regulations from year to year. The first year level of violations would decrease with consistancy to the next year.

C&R will take a hit also. The stress on C&R fish is well known. Never mind the great handling act some do while picture taking. The user groups will be pointing fingers and nobody wins

Get a new hobby guys, by Chesapeake Bay user groups trying to screw each other, the northern boys will reign.

If that is the case then we need new representation at the ASMFC...

Any idea what caused your braid to break ?

Takes a lot to break it.

I am not sure. Rather than respool all my reels with new 30lb mono, I top shotted with 300' of 50lb power pro. 2 lines seemed to break around where the rubber bands where and the other was deep umbrella. (yes i lost $$$ on tackle). Due to how rough it was I moved to #64 bands and triple wrapped them. I am not sure why it happened. I doubt it was the rods as it was 3 different poles (one tandem, one from the solo chute side, one deep umbrella boat rod). I may have a spool of bad line as the drag of 330gti isnt tremendous

I am considering going to something thicker though as handling the 50lb is hard on the hands due to how thin it is (diameter of 12lb mono). My hands feel raw after 3 days of banding lines

Yeah. Maybe someone like Smith. He can change the regs around to suit himself. Like he did with the letter.

Greg - might be the way the braid was wrapped three times in the rubberband that it cut into itself.

I use 50 lb Suffix braid with #64 rubberbands and never had any trouble.

I loop the rubberband twice to form a sorta figure 8.

Have to show you next time I see you - impossible to descibe.

I use a 6" piece of 1" pvc with a notch cut into the end. Hook the rubber band in the notch and stretch enough to wrap the power pro around the pipe the number of times you want. Pull the rubber band thru itself. Release from the pipe.

It's a lot easier on your fingers.

I learned my lesson on wrapping the braid around my hand when I had a hookup while pulling the rubber band thru the braid. Cut my finger to the bone.

Thanks for the tip reds. I have gloves that I started using after my fingers were already sore. However, i like your idea. I used to just use mono for trolling as it is cheap and safer having kids on board. I used to only use braid for light tackle. I did like the braid for trolling in the wind though.

Greed
 

Reds is right on.

Funny how a tournament is deemed greed when the vast majority of people pay lots of money to participate, yet very few win. :confused:

One would think that greed would moreso be not wanting others to be able to participate in recreational fishing the way they want or not wanting high levels of participation in fishing so they can have more of the resource to themselves.

Tournaments are celebrations of recreational fishing season in a competitive setting. Anglers participating in tournaments are fishing under the same regulations and guidelines as every other angler on the bay whether they are tournament fishing or not. The state management creels and size limits are not liberalized for those participating in a tournament. The MSSA tournament even has a much larger min size and tighter creel than those not participating in the tournament. (Maybe the state regulations should match those of the tournament - 36" min and max 2 fish per boat per day).

Lets face it, most anglers are competitive whether they are in a tournament or not. The competitiveness can be the simple trash talking on a boat between anglers over who caught the larger fish, or even those over internet boards who want to be recognized as superior fishermen than others based on the way they enjoy to fish. Tournaments are merely organizing the competitiveness of anglers into a controlled event. No one is forced or even obligated to participate should they not enjoy the setting or the rules of a particular event.

To make others feel good, according to a conversation with the MSSA yesterday it was confirmed that less than one fish for every two boats entered was weighed-in in the name of the tournament despite the tournament being 3 days long. Yes, The number of fish weighed was less than half as many boats entered. My bet is that those not fishing the tournament this past weekend were more likely to keep a limit of fish than those who did participate. I know the most fish we kept in one day of the tournament was 2 despite a crew of 5 and one of the fish was only kept because we believed that it would not have survived the release (hook in the gills). We didnt want the fish to go to waste and it will be consumed.

Mind showing me the numbers on fish kept by tournament entrees vs not kept?

If you don't have any, then DNR's determination will have to stand.
When they bumped the Tournaments back to May 1 and after, it was done because of the mass number of fishermen that a tournament attracts. A large number of boats equals a larger then usual number of fish caught.

That is impossible to determine. I will say that any fish not weighed-in obviously was not kept in the name of the tournament but rather because the regulations set by DNR allowed anglers to do as such. Therefore, DNR needs to manage based on the season length, creel, & size limits. I do not believe it is of the DNR's concern/business to what motivates people to fish, rather than to deal with the levels of harvest based on levels of those that choose to participate in recreational fishing. If DNR is wanting to reduce participation through eliminating motivating factors in anglers wanting to take trips, the charterboat industry should be very concerned. It would certainly set a bad precedent.

MSSA made it easy to determine whether a fish should be kept in the name of the tournament this year. They issued text message updates to the leaders of the tournament, were very good about online updates on their site, popular forums and facebook. They also would respond via vhf to any any inquiries to what it would take to place in the tournament. Besides traditionally it takes at least 34lbs or so to get into the top ten or even win a divisional prize.