Strategies to limit preseason fishing for trophy rockfish spawn controversy

The first time I saw a trophy-size saltwater fish released alive was in the 1970s. You could have knocked me down with a feather. It was Cape Hatteras, N.C., in the fall. A crowd of surf anglers was at Cape Point around dusk. Many stopped to watch a good fight.

A red drum about 40 pounds broke the surface in the suds after a 15-minute battle. Someone volunteered to hold the angler's rod while he bent to slip the hook, then we gasped as he seized the drum by the tail, swished it back and forth to refresh its gills, and let go. Huh?

Back then catch-and-release fishing was in its infancy and almost exclusively practiced in fresh water. Tidewater anglers didn't throw big fish back. You took them home to show off to friends, snapped some photos, cleaned them and froze or gave away what you couldn't eat.

That angler was ahead of his time. The ground he helped break soon would be walked by saltwater anglers up and down the coast who took to catch-and-release fishing as a high-minded way to enjoy the sport with the least possible damage to a precious resource.

Who would guess that 30-odd years later saltwater catch-and-release would be challenged as a threat in its own right? In Maryland last week, natural resource officials pored over recommendations to limit preseason catch-and-release fishing for trophy striped bass, locally called rockfish.

The state's volunteer Sport Fish Advisory Commission recommended outlawing preseason fishing for rock with bait and banning trolling all but three days a week in the month and a half before trophy rockfish season opens the third Saturday of April. Resource managers are responding to a five-fold increase in effort in recent years, from an estimated 50,000 trips in March-April 2002 to about 250,000 last spring.

Preseason trolling for trophy rock is a relatively new phenomenon, fueled in part by the popularity of the Web site http://www.Tidalfish.com, where anglers post reports of their catches and photos of huge spawning females they catch on their way up the Chesapeake to spawning grounds.

Charter captains and others who wait for the regular trophy season to open have expressed concern some spawners may die from the stress and others may abandon the effort to spawn. Brandon White, founder of Tidalfish.com and a member of the Sport Fish Advisory Commission, posed the question this way: "Would you put your pregnant wife on a roller coaster just before she was due?"

Figures are not plentiful on the effects of catch-and-release fishing for spawning rock, but Tom O'Connell, head of Maryland Fisheries, said estimates are that about 1.4 million pounds of rockfish are caught and released in early spring, of which an estimated 86 percent are females. "If you assume every one of those fish doesn't spawn," he said, "that's still just 1 percent of the spawning biomass. So we don't think the fishery is having a significant impact. At current levels, we don't think it's a problem."

But O'Connell says increasing effort is a worry. "We want to get some controls on it, to stabilize the effort" while studies are conducted to determine impact. Because a huge majority of coastal striped bass return to the Chesapeake to spawn, he said the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which oversees coastal stocks, is particularly concerned.

"If this fishery continues to grow," O'Connell said, "it's going to attract concern from the ASMFC about our management strategy, particularly for the spring fishery, which is Maryland's hallmark striped bass fishery." He said ASMFC could clamp tighter limits on the regular rockfish season if it decided catch-and-release is negatively affecting the stocks.

Strategies for containing the preseason effort have spawned their own heated controversy. O'Connell's agency offered a proposal that included limiting preseason trollers to six rods per boat (some now run as many as 20); banning "stinger" hooks from trolling lures; banning bait (widely used on the Susquehanna Flats); and requiring barbless hooks.

The Sport Fish Advisory Commission's proposal to limit preseason trolling to Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays raised hackles in at least two anglers' organizations, the Coastal Conservation Association and Maryland Saltwater Sportfishermen's Association. "We'd rather see limits on the number of rods," CCA Maryland President Andy Hughes said.

My view?

First, I've yet to see a fishery that isn't improved by a shift to catch-and-release (trout, largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, tarpon, snook, bluefish, etc.), so you have to wonder why anyone is antsy about a trend that seems so positive.

Second, I don't see bait fishing as appropriate for catch-and-release. Maryland now requires bait fishermen to use circle hooks when fishing the Susquehanna Flats for rock, and studies show they're less likely to be lethal. Nonetheless, bait fishing and catch-and-release don't compute. Why kill worms to annoy fish you're going to throw back, anyway?

Third, limiting the number of rods for trolling is a good idea not just in the preseason but in the regular season as well. Boats trolling 18 to 20 rods, using planer boards to carry outlying lines 100 feet to either side of the vessel, are a hazard to navigation and an insult to sportsmanship. Why not just drag a net?

Finally, I think Maryland, Virginia and the ASMFC should focus on tightening controls on commercial and recreational catch-and-kill seasons rather than fretting about catch-and-release, which is not where the problems lie.