Interesting Halibut Topics from Meetings....

tailchaser · 10-28-2003, 07:33 AM

Well for once it seems one of the fisheries in Oregon has come around again for the good of the sportfisheries. A couple of things came out of our local meeting here on the 23rd regarding these issues. I'll see if I can sum them up.

The allocated poundage for the accidental catch for the commercial fisheries was larger than the catch allowed to the sportfishermen. Now that they can't fish beyond the 40 fathom mark, that poundage will be leftover for sportfishing. We didn't even get to the amount allotted this year so several questions were "how are we going to allocate tags this year?" Do we increase the amounts on tags but keep one per day? Go back to the 32,50" marks and possibility for two fish in a day? Or simply allowing two fish per person per day. Most of the people loved the idea of bringing home two fish but one group of people didn't. Guess who they were. The charters. They claim to be on our side but when the lines are drawn it doensn't seem to be that way sometimes. They claimed the poundage would be caught too quickly and it would take paying customers off of their boats for what it seems as thier highest profit fishery. Basically they want it for paying a high price for bringing home one fish. I didn't agree with that at all. Mostly because we never filled our quota this year! Add more than twice that and you're looking at a lot of poundage to be caught. It's not going to happen in a month. The charters also complained how the seasons were too random later in the season and they already had bottomfishing trips booked and couldn't target them. Not sure of the answer to that one or if ODFW can solve it, but charters are already seeing the future of next season and what it's going to do to their business with the added push on the bottomfishing inside 40 fathoms and they're pushing for more fishing days for them on a different fishery. I'm not blaming them for protecting thier livelyhood, but I don't agree with it. They know that not a ton of people like to venture to the halibut grounds for a single fish. Throw a second one in there and it'll gain interest. So there are some interesting politics at work here and the sportfishers better speak up if they want to be heard before the final decisions are made. One fishery may be down, but another one seems to be rising from it.

tc

fish assassin · 10-28-2003, 08:08 AM

tailchaser wrote:

"The allocated poundage for the accidental catch for the commercial fisheries was
larger than the catch allowed to the sportfishermen. Now that they can't fish
beyond the 40 fathom mark, that poundage will be leftover for sportfishing."

"Accidental catch"?? Hmm, haven't heard *that* one discussed before. Would this
be accidental by the bottom draggers? There is no permit for "accidental" catches by
draggers that I know of. If you are talking about "incidental" catch permits then we
need to have a discussion about no fishing beyond the 40 fathom mark ...

-assAssin-

tailchaser · 10-28-2003, 08:38 AM

Wrong term, same meaning.....My bad. Yes, the "incidental" catch poundage accounted for by ODFW was larger than the allotted amounts for the combined sportfishing amounts. This has been going on for years. But it won't anymore due to the 40 fathom rule. This means that the poundage will be given to the sportfishing like it was meant to be originally. They were forced to give a percentage of by-catch because they knew it would happen. Not sure why it was ever so much, but they don't give us that information on how they came to certain numbers on thier own.

tc

Miss B Haven · 10-28-2003, 08:45 AM

tailchaser- Twice you refered to not catching the allotment/quota as if it were a bad thing.

Don't take this personally please, but it seems to me that to catch every last fish we are legally allowed to catch is exactly how the fisheries end up in conditions which require them to be shut down. :depressed: The science just isn't exact enough to know where the sustainable limit really is (in my opinion). :depressed:
Doesn't seem to me to be a problem that we let some get away. (and by "we" I mean the sports and the *******..everybody).

fish assassin · 10-28-2003, 08:54 AM

OK, it WAS incidental catch we are talking about. The incidental permit only
allows a a commercial fisherman to catch halibut during a specific part of
the salmon season ... usually May and June ... and they are only allowed one
halibut for every (x) number of chinook caught, where (x) changes almost every
year. For the past couple of years it's been one halibut for every five chinook
on board, with the exception that you can have one halibut without having ANY chinook
on board. To keep the second halibut you need to have at least 10 chinook on board.

OK, that being said, I've not seen anywhere that the commercial salmon season will
be closed outside of 40 fathoms. I *have* seen that there is a proposal to close
commercial bottom fishing in some areas outside of 30 fathoms, and other areas outside
40 fathoms. If salmon fishing is still permited outside of 40 fathoms, I highly doubt
that the Feds. will be telling us that we can't keep halibut out there while Chinook
fishing. BTW, Halibut is a federally regulated species with other rules imposed by
the State of Oregon.

I *could* see the State and the Feds getting together and totally shutting off the
incidental halibut fishery. Is this what they were proposing in the meeting you went to?

Disclaimer: I have a incidental halibut permit on my boat, although I have not caught
an incidental halibut in the last two years ...

-assAssin-

Miss B Haven · 10-28-2003, 09:08 AM

"Disclaimer: I have a incidental halibut permit on my boat, although I have not caught
an incidental halibut in the last two years ..."

That's cause you been trolling feathers at 7 knots for two years chasing TUNA! :grin:
Oops... maybe that's me. I just cleaned/defrosted and re-arranged the freezer. Lots'a TUNA, not many Salmon this year.

tailchaser · 10-28-2003, 09:09 AM

Man, don't flame the freaking messenger.... No where in my post did I ever say that not catching the total poundage was a bad thing. Jeez. I'm very aware that it's not an exact science in the poundage estimate given to the pacific nw. I just stated it wasn't reached and now adding more is in the future as it was "stated by ODFW".

As of the salmon trollers I have no idea what's in store you you assasin. They really didn't go into that but merely stated with the 40 fathom restriction it's less likely that "incidental catches will occur by commercials". It wasn't taken farther than that because most of the people there were sport fishing related and so was the topic of discussion dealing with halibut. I guess time will tell on the restrictions for both sides.

tc

10-28-2003, 09:12 AM

Miss B,
I only tagged two salmon this year, both from your boat. To bad we couldn't keep that BIG COHO!

Plenty of tuna though

Mello-Yello · 10-28-2003, 09:38 AM

For the sake of safety alone, I would like to see the recreational daily limit on Halibut upped to two. Also, I'm inclined to believe that if the limit were raised to two per day, there would be fewer fish released that were 1/16" too small, if you know what I mean. A lot of people are able to go only once or twice, and they don't want to keep the first 32" of halibut to hit the boat.

This in turn, may allow for some of our halibut to grow to even larger numbers, as folks may not be so inclined to hold out for mister big.

Disclaimer: I know what the law is, firt 32" fish 'landed'. I also know that there's more than one definition to this rule, as the regs don't solidly define it. But I also have to believe that if a guy catches a fish that's barely legal, and he is not of the highest ethical standard, he's gonna be inclined to release it in hopes of catching a bigger one, thus helping make his trip more worthwhile. With a second chance available, I think he might be more inclined to keep the smaller fish.

Then again, I'm trying to read the minds of those less ethical than myself..... :grin:

Miss B Haven · 10-28-2003, 09:39 AM

No flame for you intended - sorry if it came across that way TC!

I WAS intending to flame some of the fishery decisions when it comes to allowing stocks to be overfished to the point where they get shut down. The groundfish thing is a perfect example.

tailchaser · 10-28-2003, 09:50 AM

No problems Miss B, I also agree with what Mello has to say about safety issues and releasing of fish. One tidbit though about releasing of fish. If they never come out of the water, they aren't considered landed. This was described to us from an OSP Game officer that was fishing with us. Therefore, if you unhook a fish next to the boat you aren't breaking the law. We also fished with a person who worked for ODFW and agreed on the practice. But that's another can of worms I'm sure someone will nail to me. People did voice concerns over that also when people bring in fish and the next thing you know, oops how did that happen?

And he's over the other side of the boat.

They didn't give a timeframe of when the official rules would be handed out, but I'll be paying attention to see what's going to change and how much they really took into account from the public's view.

tc

[ 10-28-2003, 10:55 AM: Message edited by: tailchaser ]

blubeast · 10-28-2003, 12:27 PM

TC.. thanks for the report on your meeting. The 'incedental catch' topic did not come up in Newport... however ODFW made it very clear that they were not expecting the 40 fathom rule to have ANY impact on halibut, salmom, or tuna.

Nor was there any conversation about uping the catch to two fish per day. The topics open for discussion were pretty limited to the proposed changes per the original adjenda.

[ 10-28-2003, 04:06 PM: Message edited by: blubeast ]

KeyWest · 10-28-2003, 06:46 PM

Just a question - should the sport fleet be asking for an "incidental catch" quota as well?

KeyWest · 10-28-2003, 06:49 PM

Meaning...

Seems as though we are being shut off from bottom fishing because we might catch a canary. But it is acceptable for the commercial fleet to "accidentially" catch 40 tons or so. Anything amiss with that?

tailchaser · 10-28-2003, 08:50 PM

We asked that question years ago at multiple meetings and were ignored completely. No one seems to understand why they're allowed to keep the fish. Granted, there may be times when a fish grabs a bottom dragged herring by a commercial, but if you know you can keep a few, why not target them at the same time???? Who's to say you weren't? Everyone knows it happens, but nothing was done about it and the sport fishery suffered in years where the season was very short. It seems like this maybe a turn for the better on the sportfishing side, but nothing has been adopted yet so we'll see. Right now it's only talk.

tc

Lepper · 10-28-2003, 09:11 PM

I'd vote for the 2 fish per day... After running 20 sum miles to the fishing hole it would be nice to be able to come back with more then 1 fish.

And as mello stated a few unethically minded people might be more inclined to keep that first fish barely over 32"

fish assassin · 10-29-2003, 04:54 AM

Not sure which commercial fishermen get to keep "40 tons" of yellow-eye or
canary rock fish, but MY quota (for trolling/jigging) is ZERO fish per year!
I'd sure like to get in on some of that 40 ton per year stuff! The Asian market
absolutly LOVES any fish with color and the red ones bring a premium price
at the dock (back in the day when we were allowed to keep any).

-assAssin-

blubeast · 10-29-2003, 07:39 AM

At the Newport meeting, there was a little discussion about an 'incedental' limit of 1 for sport fishers....however ODFW opposed it as they were concerned that even if it were intended to be for those times the wrong fish had a death wish...ODFW feared some fishers would TARGET that one fish .... since it was allowed, some would try and catch it.

That ended the conversation.

Bounty Hunter · 10-29-2003, 09:22 AM

Thanks for the report! [img]graemlins/applause.gif[/img]