The Assault Continues...

[ebroesicke]

My .02:

Maybe the 5.5% cited in the article is dead right. But how do we know its not a statistical outlier either? I'm as skeptical of the 80% as I am of the 5.5%. Not because they are bad studies, or are intentionally trying to prove a point. It happens.

I am a little surprised the key words in the article posted by the OP say "Myths about using bait for trout debunked". Really?

 

[vealboy]

A question,if bait fishing is so bad,how did 29 stream sections on 22 streams become Class A in spite being stocked for many years,hammered on opening day and be open to harvest opening day until the last day of extended season?I fish one of these streams a lot and had known for years it was already Class A,when the PFBC surveyed it years ago they called it Class B or better.Whats better than Class B?

 

[pete41]

Bait fishing in itself isn't bad --it's the attitude of some bait fishermen,fly fishermen and lure fishermen that can be a problem--they don't care about the fish--
I grew up on a racetrack [700 acres]. 3 ponds full of fish and at the time a clean creek with fallfish,sunnies and some trout that came down from where they were stocked above.I started fishing from the time I could walk---since my mother didn't want to bother with those fish, preferring salt water ones ,it was always catch and return .I was careful not to harm my little buddies. I used worms and hoppers and occasionally water worms[that's what my father called them].. the last thing I wanted to do was hurt the fish as I wanted to catch them again.even little boys who paid attention could catch them over and over.Catfish and carp got weeded..lol
Still rather keep the bait and lure guys off the streams so I could feel pristine and special as a fly fisherman but you need their support to keep streams open ..don't want to do an England bit.

 

[RyanR]

I'm certainly not judging anyone and have no wish to trash one group over another as there is plenty of trout stream for everyone to enjoy. Not a thing wrong with drifting bait to catch & creel a few trout (preferably stockies) for the grill. Nothing wrong with spinner anglers either. I just don't feel (and plenty of state fishery agencies & biologists across the country feel the same) that baitfishing has any place in special regulation areas. It's not a conservation-minded method and special regs are conservation-type regulations.

 

[FCP]

There are big differences in opinion and it is obvious that many have made up their minds about bait fishing on catch and release areas. But there is some history here. In 2004 the PFBC wanted to allow bait fishing on all DHALOs. It was rejected by a large number of fishermen. In 2014 the PFBC again wanted to allow bait fishing on all DHALOs along with other things. Again there was a massive rejection. Now the workaround is “going where science leads us” the PFBC is referring to a study or studies that claim bait fishing has a low mortality rate to support All Tackle Bait Fishing No Kill special regulations. This should lead to many questions. What is considered a low mortality rate and compared to what? Are the studies Peer-reviewed? What studies?
Also stop and think about how many miles of water we are taking about. The commission manages about 13,700 miles of water for trout . The special regulation trout areas are about 5% (around 220 miles) of the 4,400 miles the commission stocks with trout. Why the assault on these few miles?

 

[ROVERT]

Why is this an assault? The vast majority of these special reg sections are stocked fisheries. If we are going to get up in arms about something it should be the wild fisheries... the vast majority of which have no special protections.

Saying that Pennsylvania's special regulation waters are a conservation minded method is a bit of a stretch, at least for DHALO. DHALO's are typically stocked and typically don't support trout year round. What are we conserving? It's a put-and-take management but not really conservation. Some C&R waters probably should not be opened up to bait. For others there is probably no reason not to. There are several all tackle C&R sections that seem to do just fine... just as well as the adjacent FFO or ALO sections.

The way that DHALO's could be viewed as conservation minded is that it is pretty effective at getting more people to fish the designated sections rather than other areas. So, it probably does reduced pressure and C&R mortality in other, non designated areas. Following this line of thought, allowing the use of bait in stocked special reg sections could reduce the amount of pressure and mortality on wild fisheries.

Each water should be assessed on a case by case basis. I don't support automatically opening all special regs to bait. I certainly think that it would do little harm on a number of waters though. If we really care, we should be asking for hoot owl restrictions and stream closures on wild fisheries when necessary in the summer... and maybe an open season on herons. Just kidding on the heron part.

 

[RyanR]

Good points FCP.

Pcray mentioned that Spring Creek was All Tackle C&R and my question now is there any kind of conservation rules regarding batifishing tackle in these All Tackle C&R areas? BY that I mean, is there any kind of regulation on the type of hook, size and do they have to be barbless or not? (Like we had for FFO and some of the other C&R areas where we had to use barbless hooks.) Or is it just the same as the non-special reg ATW where just about anything goes since the desire by the PFBC is for those stocked trout to be creeled? I mean I still don't think batifishing belongs in special reg areas but I could at least begin to accept it if there was at least some kind of conservation ethic to it.

 

[pcray1231]

Pcray mentioned that Spring Creek was All Tackle C&R and my question now is there any kind of conservation rules regarding batifishing tackle in these All Tackle C&R areas? BY that I mean, is there any kind of regulation on the type of hook, size and do they have to be barbless or not?

You can add the Youghiogheny River, significant portions of Penns Creek, Little Juniata River, upper Kettle Creek, portions of Pine Creek, Clarion River, and Valley Creek (outside the park) to this list.

No there is not additional restrictions. The restrictions are on harvest, not tackle.

The vast majority of these special reg sections are stocked fisheries. If we are going to get up in arms about something it should be the wild fisheries.

Of the all-tackle C&R or selected harvest list, only the Clarion, Yough, and Pine are stocked fisheries. The rest are wild in the parts that are under the regs. So 5 wild, 3 stocked.

Now, in the case of Spring Creek, and all of these really, I don't perceive that to be a problem. There isn't terribly high levels of mortality, most likely due to some degree of self selection among bait fishers (most bait guys who choose to fish under C&R regulations are already taking measures to reduce mortality, especially if it's wild or fingerling stocked trout). Spring Creek is is a dynamo for wild trout production so one or two occasional idiots who don't take their own measures aren't capable of doing much harm in the grand scheme. And most believe, if anything, it's overpopulated with trout rather than underpopulated. A little more mortality may actually be a good thing as the size distribution would likely improve.

Anyway, keeping with the concept that regulation should be as restrictive as necessary but not more than necessary, I do accept that there are lesser streams than Spring Creek where all-tackle C&R would not, on it's own merit, be sufficient due to incidental mortality, and more stringent regs are required. These streams are currently either lesser fisheries than they should be, or else full blown ALO. But some sort of "bait allowed with circle hooks" reg, or similar, would be a middle ground, and it'd be interesting to see how well it works.

 

[DGC]

If there is a fly fishing mecca in PA, it's State College generally and Spring Creek specifically. How many people fish bait on there in the first place? A fairly small percentage if my eyeballs over the years are any indication. Taken from what is already a small subset, it is no surprise there is little mortality from bait fishing on Spring Cr.

 

[Mike]

DGC,
Earlier in this thread there is info from the Spring Ck angler survey that was conducted. It is reported that thirty-eight percent of the anglers in the Benner Springs section were bait anglers. They accounted for 52 percent of the catch and 52 percent of the angling pressure.

 

[pcray1231]

By number? Quite a few. By percentage? Low.

i.e. a fair number of bait guys fish there. A WHOLE LOT of fly fishermen fish there.

Mike's 38% figure doesn't surprise me much. 38% of an extremely heavily pressured stream is still a lot of bait pressure.

Always interesting the difference in timing too. Bait guys aren't following hatches. In, say, March-June, you'll see them there from dawn till 10 a.m. or so, when they get out of there. Rarely during evenings. And come July when the fly guys switch to mornings for Trico's, the bait guys go the other way, lol. Always wondered if they realize they're avoiding hatches, or if they just tend to avoid the times when it appears to be crowded.

 

[The_Sasquatch]

Did someone actually try to argue FOR all tackle on the heritage sections of the CV streams? Come on.

 

[RyanR]

Thanks Pcray. Good post and I have to say I agree with your points. I do think it's a good idea to have some sort of hook regulation (either barbless or circle) for baitfishing in special reg areas because I think that is in keeping with not only the conservation ethic that special reg areas were enacted for but also with the Commission's "Resource First" supposed direction. And doing so would not exclude a single baitfisher. (I know that Spring Creek is likely the exception because of it's very high, arguably overpopulation but a barbless or circle hook restriction is still a good idea even there just for the fact it promotes that conservation ethic.)

And believe me guys, I'm not the "stereotypical" fly angler that is anti-harvest. Even going back to my own baitfishing days as a kid I've always been mostly a selective harvest guy. Take two for the grill and enjoy.

I actually grew up in a small town with a small group of friends where all of us were troutfishing fanatics. So except for baseball or football practices we were on our bikes almost everyday with rod in hand peddling to our two local streams or the trout pond up on the mountain. Recognizing that the more trout we creeled the less we'd have left to fish for later we actually developed our own little creel limit rules for ourselves. With the exception of opening day, we could only creel 3 trout at most a day. In the summer, we could only creel a trout if it was going belly up. We even went further on one favorite stretch of our favorite stocked stream and made that our trophy water as we called it: 1 trout a day and no fish under 15" or something like that.

 

[DGC]

Responding to Mike in post 110:

I just flat out don't beleive it is anything like 38%. I doubt it's even 20%. Someone made a mistake, not saying it is FTA. I don't wear blinders when I walk in and fish. I check out what others are doing, if they are fishing to risers or nymphing, working a streamer, etc. If there were THAT many guys fishing bait, it would be quite obvious, and it isn't. Full disclosure: I never fish Spring Creek on a weekend, so maybe that is the difference. I still doubt the accuracy.

 

[troutbert]

DGC wrote:
If there is a fly fishing mecca in PA, it's State College generally and Spring Creek specifically. How many people fish bait on there in the first place? A fairly small percentage if my eyeballs over the years are any indication. Taken from what is already a small subset, it is no surprise there is little mortality from bait fishing on Spring Cr.

Several people have said that there is little mortality from bait fishing on Spring Creek.

But, why do you think this is the case?

Is there a study that shows this?

If not, what is it based on?

 

[franklin]

ROVERT wrote:
Why is this an assault? The vast majority of these special reg sections are stocked fisheries. If we are going to get up in arms about something it should be the wild fisheries... the vast majority of which have no special protections.

Saying that Pennsylvania's special regulation waters are a conservation minded method is a bit of a stretch, at least for DHALO. DHALO's are typically stocked and typically don't support trout year round. What are we conserving? It's a put-and-take management but not really conservation. Some C&R waters probably should not be opened up to bait. For others there is probably no reason not to. There are several all tackle C&R sections that seem to do just fine... just as well as the adjacent FFO or ALO sections.

The way that DHALO's could be viewed as conservation minded is that it is pretty effective at getting more people to fish the designated sections rather than other areas. So, it probably does reduced pressure and C&R mortality in other, non designated areas. Following this line of thought, allowing the use of bait in stocked special reg sections could reduce the amount of pressure and mortality on wild fisheries.

Each water should be assessed on a case by case basis. I don't support automatically opening all special regs to bait. I certainly think that it would do little harm on a number of waters though. If we really care, we should be asking for hoot owl restrictions and stream closures on wild fisheries when necessary in the summer... and maybe an open season on herons. Just kidding on the heron part.

I don't think it's DHALO sections most people are worked up about. Most DHALO sections I fish have so much sign of bait fishing (discarded bait cups and power bait wrappers) they might as well be open to bait fishermen.

I think most of the push back being expressed here comes from the perception that bait fishing leads to higher fish mortality and that it seems to lead to a push for stocking.

My opinion based on my experiences is that bait fishing does lead to higher mortality. But as someone in a scientific field I recognize that sometimes perceptions may be wrong.

I think the way it should be managed is if the stream has sufficient capability to sustain wild trout numbers under a given set of mortality assumptions and angler pressure then that should drive the regulations for that stream. In general I trust the PFBC biologists to make that call. Where the PFBC starts to suffer a loss of trust is when they consider calls to stock streams like the Saucon special regs area. (Not blaming the biologists.)

 

[pcray1231]

I just flat out don't beleive it is anything like 38%. I doubt it's even 20%.

I believe it. That said, he specifically stated the Benner Spring stretch. And by that, I take it to mean alongside the hatchery, upstream from the access. There's a few big slow holes there and I virtually always see bait guys there. A few good ones and seemingly there was always one of the lawn chair and forked stick variety.

As for the stream as a whole. I doubt it's 38%, but it's probably more than you suspect it is. Again, timing doesn't match up. i.e. the bait guys fish at different times than we do.

Now I only get a few trips per year there, so I'm not a great resource anymore. When I was in grad school I fished it multiple times per week, and walked along it for exercise almost daily. I always remember an older fella and a lady friend, I assume his wife, who were to be found somewhere between the handicap ramp and Paradise EVERY SINGLE MORNING. I mean, I think they musta fished there 365 days per year, rain or shine. Looked like they mainly worked live minnies. I don't know when they got there because in summertime I'd show up at dawn for the tricos and they'd always beat me there and I'd see them by car on the way down. But they usually were gone by 10 a.m. or so. The rest of the year I mostly fished afternoons or evenings but when I'd walk in the morning, they were there year round.

In the grand scheme, based on the number of hours they put on, they probably represented a fair amount of the total angling hours in that stretch all by their lonesome, lol. But to be fair, I rarely saw any other baitfishermen in that stretch below paradise.

Down between Bellefonte and Milesburg was another place I did often see baiters, though. When the dam was still there, a bunch fished the spillway and areas down from there, on down to the mouth. Bellefonte had a bait friendly fishing shop in town, they sold a nice variety of minnies and even live crayfish and the like. And of course Bald Eagle drew a lot of bait fishermen. The lower end of Spring Creek is a natural extension of that scene.

 

[pcray1231]

I do think it's a good idea to have some sort of hook regulation (either barbless or circle) for baitfishing in special reg areas because I think that is in keeping with not only the conservation ethic that special reg areas were enacted for but also with the Commission's "Resource First" supposed direction.

I never perceived "conservation ethic" as the reason for special regulation areas. In some cases, it iss based on perceived need to "conserve the resource", i.e. provide more angling opportunities over a greater period of time, but not to "promote the idea of conservation" among anglers.

In the case of DHALO, these are mostly heavily pressured stocked streams that stay relatively cool late into the spring. With the regs, you then reduce over harvest and incidental mortality, allowing you to sustain a fishery beyond the first few weeks of the season and provide opportunities later in the spring.

For wild trout streams, C&R regs or ALO are for highly pressured areas, to help prevent angler impact from causing undue harm to the fishery. Again, for conservation, but not specifically to "spread the conservation ethic".

In some cases, like the Letort and the Paradise section of Spring Creek, Breeches at Allenberry, etc. FFO was intended not due to a need for it, but as a historical nod to the importance of these places to the FF community.

And for some, like Spring Creek, Valley Creek, and the LJR, the all-tackle C&R regs originated not because there was a perceived management need to reduce mortality, but rather to protect human health interests. The streams were polluted and eating fish from there could be dangerous to your health. They stopped stocking them for the same reason, why have a put and take fishery if you can't take without poisoning yourself? And ironically, the ending of stocking and the implementation of all-tackle C&R regs resulted in all 3 becoming massively successful as wild trout fisheries, and they are kind of the examples we use to pressure the PFBC into ending stocking or implementing special regs on other streams.

 

[troutbert]

DGC wrote:
Responding to Mike in post 110:

I just flat out don't beleive it is anything like 38%. I doubt it's even 20%. Someone made a mistake, not saying it is FTA. I don't wear blinders when I walk in and fish. I check out what others are doing, if they are fishing to risers or nymphing, working a streamer, etc. If there were THAT many guys fishing bait, it would be quite obvious, and it isn't. Full disclosure: I never fish Spring Creek on a weekend, so maybe that is the difference. I still doubt the accuracy.

There is quite a lot of bait fishing done on Spring Creek. You see a lot more of it during the times of the year when the water levels are medium or high rather than when it is low and clear. And a lot more in the early spring and in the fall than in the summer.

 

[salvelinusfontinalis]

Did someone actually try to argue FOR all tackle on the heritage sections of the CV streams? Come on. Posted on: Today 10:47

Yes, because we can't have any water at all.
In total special reg areas make up less than 2% of all total water in pa and fly only areas make up less than 1%. Yet lets cave to the entitlement anglers the PFBC has so willing caved in for before so many times. I'm sorry Frank but but some places SHOULD remain C&R FFO. CV is one of them. Heaven forbid we allow a fraction of a fraction of a percent of fly areas to celebrate heritage. Modern day American Fly-Fishing boomed because of CV. I'm all for more C&R all tackle streams but seriously....