bumblebee grouper reef safe

[blackgrouper79]

commercial fisherman waste a lot of fish. Here in NY and NJ, commercial guys dump Striped Bass by the mile, filling tags on only the larger slot size fish. Draggers net tons of fish, but the by catch that also gets dumped back in is dead. Again, just a waste.
The grouper and lion fish explosion is or has taken over. Unfortunately, the people that make these decisions don't fish, or eat fish, and would never have a fish tank.
For years, old NYC subway cars have been given away to every state along the East coast, but not in NY.
After the WTC terrorist attack, most of the rubble was piled up on a few reefs on the south shore of Long Island. Everything on the reef died, life on the reef returned years later.

We are straight hook and line in FL. The waist from the slot limits that have been imposed is total BS. It's similar to us bringing up a grouper from 100 feet that's an inch short and having to throw it over even though it's belly is sticking 6" out of its mouth from the pressure change. Yeah we can poke a hole in their belly to let the air out but do these fish actually survive? Some do some don't and yes it is a problem. I'm sure they don't survive the swim past the 600 pound jewfish that they share the wreck with.
Another major problem are the bait shrimp boats that run Biscayne Bay. They absolutely destroy the baby fish population and the estuaries that the fish need to survive. I worked on one of those boats for a while and every single commercial fish species that you could possibly think of would end up in those nets and very hurt or dead when we threw them back. Everything from the bait fish that the food fish need to survive to sharks, skates, stingrays, seahorses and random shellfish. Our fisheries need some serious help and hopefully it comes from people that actually know what they're doing. Right now it's people that don't have a clue or just enough of a clue to be dangerous. Tax dollars at work.

 

[Tautog]

Yep! It's the same BS all over, look at the vets, and how their treated. " The Wounded Warrior " cash club. Corruption at its best. A friend that worked on a dragger off of Long Island, told me of times when the by-catch was 10-20 lb. Summer Flounder ( Fluke ) about 4 dozen at a time after each pick up. Some days more or less, but at this size fish, which are all females, that give birth to millions of eggs each year.
I'm so happy to have my aquarium.
In the future, if go fishing, and if I'm lucky to catch something, I'm sure some official will be waiting at the dock to collect per pound, whatever I caught!

 

[blackgrouper79]

Yep! It's the same BS all over, look at the vets, and how their treated. " The Wounded Warrior " cash club. Corruption at its best. A friend that worked on a dragger off of Long Island, told me of times when the by-catch was 10-20 lb. Summer Flounder ( Fluke ) about 4 dozen at a time after each pick up. Some days more or less, but at this size fish, which are all females, that give birth to millions of eggs each year.
I'm so happy to have my aquarium.
In the future, if go fishing, and if I'm lucky to catch something, I'm sure some official will be waiting at the dock to collect per pound, whatever I caught!

Owning a seafood market in Miami I've seen a lot. One good example was/is NOA closing grouper season down a month before or after the annual spawn. The fish that either my fishermen or I were bringing in to the store and gutting for storage or cutting for the days display case were slap full of eggs or sperm. This happens every few years where the all knowing government gets the spawn wrong and the fish come in by the boatload full of what should've been baby fish. During the spawn the fish are dumb and extra hungry so even the blind squirrel gets a nut-- meaning people that don't know how to fish and really shouldn't even be on the water end up catching trophy fish. So NOAs annual season closure happens a couple of weeks before or after all of these breeder fish have already blown their loads (or won't till after the closure) making the season closure a total screw job on the fish and fishermen the laws were ment to protect. If the Gov. would monitor things like real researchers they would catch the fact that the fish are early or late in any particular year and work the season closure appropriately. Sorry but gov. intervention that hurts a group of people (fishermen) that are easily pushed around due to lack of lobbyists (which shouldn't exist) should get more attention. It only makes a hard living harder to live.
More than just my .02