Fishing Megathread: Looking For Big Girls Who swallow

[conVINCEd 21469]

19 minutes ago, fattyflattie said:

My understanding is that's pretty much what did it.  Maybe some of the older more well aged posters has a better recollection. 

That wouldn’t surprise me at all.

[Brisketexan 105037]

My understanding is that's pretty much what did it.  Maybe some of the older more well aged posters has a better recollection. 

That’s exactly what did it. And they were fished for them with gillnets. That was the basis for the creation of GCCA, now CCA - to ban gill netting of specks and reds.

[CHIEF 5075]

On 2/19/2021 at 8:16 PM, fattyflattie said:

Some good news.








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Fuck, I bet I could even wrangle a half limit of 15 and 1/16th inch trout out of that, but probably no reds. Or a 19" red. It's either one or the other, but never both.

CHIEF 

Edited February 23, 2021 by CHIEF

[Mac8111 2105]

I sent that pic to a buddy I fish with all the time and insisted that he couldn’t get a hook up in that pod of fish.

[DCA_HORN 725]

My understanding is that's pretty much what did it.  Maybe some of the older more well aged posters has a better recollection. 

Yep. Paul prudhomme made it popular in the 80s and suddenly a fish that nobody wanted to clean was in super high demand.

[fattyflattie 4639]

9 minutes ago, DCA_HORN said:

suddenly a fish that nobody wanted to clean was in super high demand.

Don't fear, I've carried on the tradition. Such a fun fish to fight, I have no problem letting them go though.  By the time you cut the blood lines out, not much there anyhow.  

[CHIEF 5075]

7 minutes ago, DCA_HORN said:

57 minutes ago, fattyflattie said:

My understanding is that's pretty much what did it.  Maybe some of the older more well aged posters has a better recollection. 

Yep. Paul prudhomme made it popular in the 80s and suddenly a fish that nobody wanted to clean was in super high demand.

Paul Prudhomme did to redfish what Ninfa's did to fajitas. I don't know exactly who did it to crawfish, but that motherfucker needs to be shot.

CHIEF

[DCA_HORN 725]

Don't fear, I've carried on the tradition. Such a fun fish to fight, I have no problem letting them go though.  By the time you cut the blood lines out, not much there anyhow.  

Nothing wrong with the bloodlines. You guys keep targeting trout. I'll keep a few of them as by catch and focus on the real fish.

[fattyflattie 4639]

5 minutes ago, DCA_HORN said:

12 minutes ago, fattyflattie said:

Don't fear, I've carried on the tradition. Such a fun fish to fight, I have no problem letting them go though.  By the time you cut the blood lines out, not much there anyhow.  

Nothing wrong with the bloodlines. You guys keep targeting trout. I'll keep a few of them as by catch and focus on the real fish.

Hey, nothing gets my blood going like one of those carp slamming my spook.  I just don't care to eat them.  More for you. 

[troph 24781]

30 minutes ago, CHIEF said:

Paul Prudhomme did to redfish what Ninfa's did to fajitas. I don't know exactly who did it to crawfish, but that motherfucker needs to be shot.

CHIEF

Ninfas, man I loved that place, loved it so much I waited tables there in college. I would demolish a fajitas a la chihuahua platter between a split double shift back in the day. Different life for sure.  

Edited February 23, 2021 by troph

[DCA_HORN 725]

Paul Prudhomme did to redfish what Ninfa's did to fajitas. I don't know exactly who did it to crawfish, but that motherfucker needs to be shot.
CHIEF

Shale boom and Katrina.

[conVINCEd 21469]

32 minutes ago, DCA_HORN said:

1 hour ago, CHIEF said:

Paul Prudhomme did to redfish what Ninfa's did to fajitas. I don't know exactly who did it to crawfish, but that motherfucker needs to be shot.
CHIEF

Shale boom and Katrina.

+ the internet.  People are more willing to try new things with instructional videos from quasi-experts.  I’ve never done a crawfish boil myself, because I know enough people who do them in normal times that I get my fill with no effort on my part,  but I would absolutely give it a shot today with all the info out there on how to do it.  Order the equipment from amazon, and it’s a done deal.  25 years ago, no fucking way. We had a hardcore coonass who lived in our condo complex one year in college, and we thought he was performing some sort of voodoo magic when he cooked up a couple hundred pounds of crawfish.  A keg+$10 a person and he probably made enough to pay his rent that month.

[Lat22 4010]

7 hours ago, fattyflattie said:

Don't fear, I've carried on the tradition. Such a fun fish to fight, I have no problem letting them go though.  By the time you cut the blood lines out, not much there anyhow.  

Me too.  I can fillet 10 trout in the same amount of time it takes me to do justice to one redfish. I throw those carp back.

[fattyflattie 4639]

10 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

That was the basis for the creation of GCCA, now CCA

I still have a handful of GCCA stickers.  GCCA > CCA imo.  

[Pescado_Rojo 19411]

19 minutes ago, fattyflattie said:

I still have a handful of GCCA stickers.  GCCA > CCA imo.  

You don't like their new business model of collecting a bunch of money, taking politicians fishing, then signing off on whatever bullshit industry pushes and trying to sell it as a "win"? 

[Ollie Slatt 289]

1 hour ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

You don't like their new business model of collecting a bunch of money, taking politicians fishing, then signing off on whatever bullshit industry pushes and trying to sell it as a "win"? 

You forgot running a tournament that encourages killing breeder trout . . . as a "conservation" organization.  

[Ollie Slatt 289]

Question for those of you more knowledgeable about the recent fish kill than I am:   Is this going to impact the trout population more than reds and drum?  I would suspect so since many of the mature reds should be out in the gulf this time of year, but I don't really know.   

Relatedly, I know there will be some areas more impacted than others depending on factors like proximity to deep water where the fish could escape the cold.  But are there also going to be some areas more heavily impacted than others because the mature fish in those areas are less likely to move to the gulf in winter?  I am specifically thinking of parts of the LM where there is not a cut/pass to the gulf for many miles.  

[fattyflattie 4639]

1 hour ago, Ollie Slatt said:

You forgot running a tournament that encourages killing breeder trout . . . as a "conservation" organization.  

One?  Poco was run by the Fondrens forever. Babes on Baffin, Babes on the Bay both have ties. All huge tournaments. At least the Star raises big money. 

[crash_davis 23094]

5 hours ago, Ollie Slatt said:

Question for those of you more knowledgeable about the recent fish kill than I am:   Is this going to impact the trout population more than reds and drum?  I would suspect so since many of the mature reds should be out in the gulf this time of year, but I don't really know.   

Relatedly, I know there will be some areas more impacted than others depending on factors like proximity to deep water where the fish could escape the cold.  But are there also going to be some areas more heavily impacted than others because the mature fish in those areas are less likely to move to the gulf in winter?  I am specifically thinking of parts of the LM where there is not a cut/pass to the gulf for many miles.  

Redfish are much stronger fish than trout. They are built like tanks with thick scales.

Trout are fragile. Doesn't take much to kill them.

Anyone who wade fishes or fishes from kayaks with stringers know that redfish can survive on a stringer all day except in late July - Sep when it's just too fucking hot. Trout will die within a couple of hours on the stringer.

From my experience with freeze kills, it's always a lot more trout than reds.

[Mac8111 2105]

I told my dad about a movement to ban croaker fishing this year (just fucking with him) and he launched into a “ban all tournaments “ speech. Made me laugh. He loves his croaker in the summer.

[fattyflattie 4639]

7 minutes ago, Mac8111 said:

he launched into a “ban all tournaments “ speech.

I enjoy it, but they are not a net positive.  Even the small church/friend tourneys take ALOT of fish out.  And starting in April, there’s more than 1 per weekend in most mid-coast bays.  It’s not hard to fish one weekly, spring thru fall, if you really wanted to. 

[BearSchlong 8082]

That’s exactly what did it. And they were fished for them with gillnets. That was the basis for the creation of GCCA, now CCA - to ban gill netting of specks and reds.

I remember when I was a very little kid my dad and 10 buddies would run 300ft seines in the surf in front of our Beach house at Crystal Beach and catch an ungodly huge amount of fish. Nowadays that would be sickening. IIRC they burned the nets in a bonfire the day they were outlawed. Then I was content to catch finger mullets and shrimp in a 25 foot bait seine. I kept my own live bait aquarium too.

Then Dad and his buddies all joined GCCA, he was the SE TX chapter president for years. As a kid, I attended some really heated TP&W public hearings in the early 80s. Conservationists on one side, commercial fisherman on the other, all loudly motherfucking each other.

I'm pretty most early GCCA statewide business was held in Houston strip clubs.

[troph 24781]

That’s a cool story. 

[BearSchlong 8082]

That’s a cool story. 

I was brought up in an environment where commercial fisherpeople were demonized for obliterating the fishery. Lots of latent racism too, because many of them were from southeast Asia.

They were just trying to eke out an honest living.

Conservation has come a long way in 40 years, even factoring in exponentially increased fishing pressure.

[troph 24781]

1 hour ago, BearSchlong said:

I was brought up in an environment where commercial fisherpeople were demonized for obliterating the fishery. Lots of latent racism too, because many of them were from southeast Asia.

They were just trying to eke out an honest living.

Conservation has come a long way in 40 years, even factoring in exponentially increased fishing pressure.

well, we have to eat, they have to make a living, and I have to have my hobby. we have to sustain the planet.  I've always thought the intersection of lefties and sportsmen (not a complete overlap but a lot) is interesting and I think there's an overlap for capitalists and conservationists too - the economy and the food industry needs to have its place, but they can't destroy the fish population that feeds them.  the better we leave the planet today, the better it will be tomorrow.  there really is so much capitalists, environmentalists, sportsmen and commercial fishermen can agree on when it comes to fisheries.  It's kind of shocking (not really) how we get in our own way on this stuff.

 

Edited February 24, 2021 by troph

[CHIEF 5075]

14 hours ago, Lat22 said:

Me too.  I can fillet 10 trout in the same amount of time it takes me to do justice to one redfish. I throw those carp back.

Gotta have a good electric filet knife. The one below was the best one made in about 2016. It's a Rapala with an exaggerated serrated blade. It runs at 2800 rpms, about twice as fast as most. I get a new Mr. Twister brand every year (sigh)for Christmas from my MIL. We cast net tilapia on Squaw Creek, and you might end up with 600 fish. You will go through three Mr. Twisters at the cleaning table. One thing, this is not a knife to learn with, it is a nice gift for the guy with 4-5000 fish under his/her belt. I can halfshell a red in about 15 seconds, and filet them in about 25. I usually clean all the reds, and leave the trout to the Mr. Twisters. You can see how much bigger the motor is.

CHIEF

[fattyflattie 4639]

2 hours ago, troph said:

there really is so much capitalists, environmentalists, sportsmen and commercial fishermen can agree on when it comes to fisheries.

It literally took MANY (thousands?) rec snapper fisherman openly defying the law to get a tiny bit of leeway tossed their way over the last several years.  Gulf coast states (AL and LA iirc) publicly stating they wouldn’t require their rec fisherman to follow the federal seasons.    Many many years of 14 day rec snapper seasons while the commercial guys get 150.  95% of season catch allotment allocated to the comms.  14 days in June when you might get 3 days of good Wx gtfo.   If you’ve ever had a comm boat pull up near you and watch them longline thousands of snapper in an afternoon, sickening.   Don’t get me started on bay shrimpers.  Raping the bay for fucking bait ffs. 

[troph 24781]

Doesn’t have to be that way. They are killing their own resource. It’s so effing short sighted.  

[davidg 4035]

On 2/22/2021 at 10:09 PM, Brisketexan said:

That’s exactly what did it. And they were fished for them with gillnets. That was the basis for the creation of GCCA, now CCA - to ban gill netting of specks and reds.

Purse seiners.  I believe they used some of the pogy fleet to chase schools of reds off the beach even using scouter planes to local large schools.

https://gulfseafoodnews.com/2016/02/28/missing-redfish-documents-blackened-history-of-gulf-icon/

[davidg 4035]

9 hours ago, fattyflattie said:

It literally took MANY (thousands?) rec snapper fisherman openly defying the law to get a tiny bit of leeway tossed their way over the last several years.  Gulf coast states (AL and LA iirc) publicly stating they wouldn’t require their rec fisherman to follow the federal seasons.    Many many years of 14 day rec snapper seasons while the commercial guys get 150.  95% of season catch allotment allocated to the comms.  14 days in June when you might get 3 days of good Wx gtfo.   If you’ve ever had a comm boat pull up near you and watch them longline thousands of snapper in an afternoon, sickening.   Don’t get me started on bay shrimpers.  Raping the bay for fucking bait ffs. 

Some overstatement here ^^^ but my biggest beef is guides fishing from the rec allotment vs commercial, especially when they push for catch allotment on the recreational side.

[fattyflattie 4639]

9 minutes ago, davidg said:

Some overstatement here ^^^ but my biggest beef is guides fishing from the rec allotment vs commercial, especially when they push for catch allotment on the recreational side.

How’s that?  I couldn’t find the actual dates on phone last night but ~5 years ago recs had 14-21 day season.  Comms have always had all summer.   Recs are now ~60 days depending on year? 

[hookemATL 11700]

Are there any TPWD-led efforts at stocking for saltwater species?  I always see their posts on stocking trout/bass/etc. all over the state but not sure if there are any similar efforts for saltwater fishys.  Is it even possible to do so?  

[Pescado_Rojo 19411]

10 minutes ago, hookemATL said:

Are there any TPWD-led efforts at stocking for saltwater species?  I always see their posts on stocking trout/bass/etc. all over the state but not sure if there are any similar efforts for saltwater fishys.  Is it even possible to do so?  

Yes, they've been very successful with Redfish and started stocking Flounder and trout more recently. I'm not as up to speed on the Flounder and Trout efforts. 

[davidg 4035]

1 minute ago, fattyflattie said:

How’s that?  I couldn’t find the actual dates on phone last night but ~5 years ago recs had 14-21 day season.  Comms have always had all summer.   Recs are now ~60 days depending on year? 

 

TAC allotment for RS has been 51/49 comm/rec forever. Who cares how many days it takes for each sector to catch their allotment?

Texas gets the short stick vs eastern gulf due to the way they have count fished on structure, reported catch and shitty fishing weather when the season typically starts.   We only get 6% out of the rec catch allotment  vs Florida with 45% of the rec allotment.  

My main beef is guides fishing out of the rec allotment and getting the extra days to do it.  That sucked.  The 2019 plan is better regarding allowing the states to manage but the path to get to that point sucked over the last 10 years.

[fattyflattie 4639]

Appreciate the clarification.  

9 minutes ago, davidg said:

My main beef is guides fishing out of the rec allotment and getting the extra days to do it.

This loophole used to be available to me, and was the only way we got to fish many of the shitty Wx years.  It no longer is, but now we have a large enough Wx window to get a few trips in, even in the terrible Wx years.

I'd still rather the people pay $15 more at the restaurant the 3x a year they eat snapper and have a healthier population offshore.   

 

*Full Disclosure* - I am hypocritical and shouldn't preach on the issue, and would like to see the snapper population rebound for EVERYONE.  In a past life, I removed more of their gulf habitat than I care to admit.  Maybe if they rebound I'll forgive myself for blowing up 10's of thousands of them (literally) and removing the home of who knows how many more.  So basically, over about 10 years, I did the damage one of those comm boats does in a season.   I'll slink back to my bay hole, where you'll never be able to convince me bay shrimpers are a net positive. 

[fattyflattie 4639]

35 minutes ago, hookemATL said:

Are there any TPWD-led efforts at stocking for saltwater species?  I always see their posts on stocking trout/bass/etc. all over the state but not sure if there are any similar efforts for saltwater fishys.  Is it even possible to do so?  

Sea Center Texas in Lake Jackson used to (still does I'm sure) farm a ton of redfish and were flirting with trout for awhile iirc.  

[davidg 4035]

3 minutes ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

Yes, they've been very successful with Redfish and started stocking Flounder and trout more recently. I'm not as up to speed on the Flounder and Trout efforts. 

https://tpwd.texas.gov/fishing/sea-center-texas/

 

[Born to Run 6569]

It literally took MANY (thousands?) rec snapper fisherman openly defying the law to get a tiny bit of leeway tossed their way over the last several years.  Gulf coast states (AL and LA iirc) publicly stating they wouldn’t require their rec fisherman to follow the federal seasons.    Many many years of 14 day rec snapper seasons while the commercial guys get 150.  95% of season catch allotment allocated to the comms.  14 days in June when you might get 3 days of good Wx gtfo.   If you’ve ever had a comm boat pull up near you and watch them longline thousands of snapper in an afternoon, sickening.   Don’t get me started on bay shrimpers.  Raping the bay for fucking bait ffs. 

I worked a bayshrimp boat one summer as a kid. The amount of bycatch is staggering. Maybe 1 basket of shrimp per 8 of bycatch. You can imagine the survival rates on a hot deck in July. Lots of random weird fish like pufferfish, sea Robin's, tons of small flounder and reds. Just shocking. The liscence buy back program was a great use of funds.
We need to do buy backs on oysters.

[Born to Run 6569]

Appreciate the clarification.  
This loophole used to be available to me, and was the only way we got to fish many of the shitty Wx years.  It no longer is, but now we have a large enough Wx window to get a few trips in, even in the terrible Wx years.
I'd still rather the people pay $15 more at the restaurant the 3x a year they eat snapper and have a healthier population offshore.   
 
*Full Disclosure* - I am hypocritical and shouldn't preach on the issue, and would like to see the snapper population rebound for EVERYONE.  In a past life, I removed more of their gulf habitat than I care to admit.  Maybe if they rebound I'll forgive myself for blowing up 10's of thousands of them (literally) and removing the home of who knows how many more.  So basically, over about 10 years, I did the damage one of those comm boats does in a season.   I'll slink back to my bay hole, where you'll never be able to convince me bay shrimpers are a net positive. 

Platform demolition?

We rolled up to my favorite snapper right after it had been loaded on a barge. The amount of dead snapper was astounding.

I wish they at least coordinated with a commercial boat to fish them heavily prior but that's obviously impossible to coordinate and oversee.

[crash_davis 23094]

 

Redfish are tough sons of bitches.

[fattyflattie 4639]

27 minutes ago, Born to Run said:

The liscence buy back program was a great use of funds.
We need to do buy backs on oysters.

I agree. And I love oysters.  But I’m not above paying either a whole lot more for them, or tonging and schucking them myself. 

[Dry Elbows 142]

3 hours ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

Yes, they've been very successful with Redfish and started stocking Flounder and trout more recently. I'm not as up to speed on the Flounder and Trout efforts. 

The flounder hatchery at Sea Center Texas just recently got up and running.  They are still working on getting the process down.  A good friend of mine started that project when he was at TPWD.  They've been stocking trout for years.

 

[Cajun 11705]

Marlin off the beach in Australia.  Just nuts --

 

[Lat22 4010]

Joey Farah posted a picture of a 30.5 in 10lber he found.  Also some video of dead trout on the bottom.  He really blames barge traffic for a lot of the devastation.  I've also seen lots of pictures of dead tarpon and snook.  It's just stomach turning.

[Cajun 11705]

I just can't look.  

Heartbreaking stuff.

 

[Pescado_Rojo 19411]

Friend of mine that lives in Corpus just posted a picture of what looks like a 50' mat of floating mullet stacked up in the back of a canal on the island. 

[fattyflattie 4639]

1 hour ago, Lat22 said:

He really blames barge traffic for a lot of the devastation. 

I’m with him on that, big factor. But good luck getting it stopped.  Thru work in a past life I’ve had to shut down the ICW for 4-12 hours stretches - completely block it. Technically, all you have to have is USCG buy off, and the guys I was working with were great.  But when Kirby called them and told them to jump, it was how high, sir.

3 hours ago, Born to Run said:

Platform demolition?

We rolled up to my favorite snapper right after it had been loaded on a barge. The amount of dead snapper was astounding.

I wish they at least coordinated with a commercial boat to fish them heavily prior but that's obviously impossible to coordinate and oversee.

 Yes.  And some installations...but when I tallied it up for a CV once, it was roughly 15:1.  My barge did roughly 25-30 a year, unless we had some intl work that year.    And explosives are sooooo much cheaper, faster, and as effective as abrasives, especially after the rearranged the permits to 200# without any real hassle.  Derrick barge market is tighter than a dolphins ass so...

The NMFS girls would try to take count and measurements, but they’d only get a small percentage of them.   I’m not joking when I say it’d fill the entire stern deck of both a 9k and 6k horse tugs with them and that was maybe 15%.   Just thousands.   We had 120 guys onboard and there would be guys who’s take home 30-40# of filets every shift change.  Not legal at all, but at least they weren’t wanton waste at that point.   I obviously have/had some close relationships with scrap steel guys, but I would cheer every time we got a reef job in. I don’t remember the specifics but the state could have done ALOT to help out there, and it would be even better habitat, but they did not. Well look back on that one day and scratch our heads on that wasted opportunity. 

[Lat22 4010]

1 hour ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

Friend of mine that lives in Corpus just posted a picture of what looks like a 50' mat of floating mullet stacked up in the back of a canal on the island. 

We have quite a few mullet floating in our canal at Tiki Island.  Haven't seen any real fish. Kidding.

[Jerry Callo 8694]

4 hours ago, Born to Run said:

I worked a bayshrimp boat one summer as a kid. The amount of bycatch is staggering. Maybe 1 basket of shrimp per 8 of bycatch. You can imagine the survival rates on a hot deck in July. Lots of random weird fish like pufferfish, sea Robin's, tons of small flounder and reds. Just shocking. The liscence buy back program was a great use of funds.
We need to do buy backs on oysters.

I used to support an organization in Texas that raised money for license buy back and actually decommissioned some shrimp boats as well.  I can't remember the name but the initials were SCAT - obviously they couldn't go by the initials.  I used to follow TTMB on the regular and that is where the organization started.  

[fattyflattie 4639]

2 minutes ago, Jerry Callo said:

I used to support an organization in Texas that raised money for license buy back and actually decommissioned some shrimp boats as well.  I can't remember the name but the initials were SCAT - obviously they couldn't go by the initials.  I used to follow TTMB on the regular and that is where the organization started.  

I can’t pos rep anymore today, but I’ll get you.  I don’t know if I can brave the TTMB but I might try for that cause.