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Speaker 1: From met Eaters World News headquarters in Bozeman, Montana. This

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Speaker 1: is Cal's We Can Review with Ryan cal Callahan. Now

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Speaker 1: Here's Cal.

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Speaker 2: This week's special drop of Cal's Weekend Review is really

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Speaker 2: not a spin off, but it's gonna give you some

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Speaker 2: early access into a future Cal in the Field episode.

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Speaker 2: Something you're gonna see a bunch of on the Meat

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Speaker 2: Eater YouTube channel and elsewhere, more than likely of striper fishing,

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Speaker 2: which would be like the hook no pun intended, of the.

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Speaker 3: Of the show. It's like the action, the fun part.

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Speaker 2: But really what we're talking about is catch and release mortality.

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Speaker 2: What this fishery means to Massachusetts. And yeah, I said

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Speaker 2: that right. Massachusetts is where we are. So a lot

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Speaker 2: of people think stripers like Jamaica Bay or even West

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Speaker 2: Coast stripers. Massachusetts is a state. This is just like

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Speaker 2: slightly to the north or slightly severely east if you're

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Speaker 2: talking West Coast stripers, but.

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Speaker 3: Super cool fishery.

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Speaker 2: And I got kind of in touch with this idea,

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Speaker 2: not kind of, but like very much in touch with

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Speaker 2: this idea through back huntry Hunters and Anglers.

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Speaker 3: Chris Borgatti, Chris, what do you do?

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Speaker 4: I am the Eastern policy and Conservation manager for PHA.

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Speaker 3: And why why hear? Why this?

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Speaker 5: Why this?

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Speaker 4: Well, a lot of what I do, the fact that

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Speaker 4: I do this job and live where I live is

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Speaker 4: because of stripe baths. So this is, you know, of

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Speaker 4: all the of all the many issues that I get

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Speaker 4: to work on and over twenty states in the Eastern US,

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Speaker 4: like this one is kind of like a personal passion project.

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Speaker 5: And it was an.

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Speaker 4: Issue that I got involved with as a volunteer with BHA.

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Speaker 4: Our chapter chair, Mike Woods and I we're talking about

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Speaker 4: like how we make our chapter distinct as the New

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Speaker 4: England Chapter and in terms of the issues that we

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Speaker 4: cover and coastal issues, and we came up and then

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Speaker 4: right behind that was stripe pass because it linked It

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Speaker 4: is a fishery that links the entire region and if

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Speaker 4: you fish salt water.

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Speaker 5: You probably are fishing for stripe pass.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, and to pull I guess the podcast curtain

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Speaker 2: back even further, this New England Chapter of BHA, and

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Speaker 2: Chris Borgatti and Mike Woods have been like very good

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Speaker 2: about keeping me and the pod cast in in the

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Speaker 2: loop as far as like what's going on with coastal

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Speaker 2: conservation and stripers and some of the bait fish like

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Speaker 2: Man Hayden issues that we've covered on the show for

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Speaker 2: years now, So that's the connection there, and then Chris

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Speaker 2: introduced me to these two folks I'm going to introduce

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Speaker 2: right now, which would be Bill.

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Speaker 3: Hoffman, and.

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Speaker 2: I've been saying your name all week because I think

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Speaker 2: it's like the most New England to name, but I

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Speaker 2: can't remember your last name, not right now, Ben Agen, Yeah,

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Speaker 2: which is super fun to say.

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Speaker 3: He again, Bill, What do you do?

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Speaker 6: So?

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Speaker 7: I am a senior marine biologist for the Division Marining Fisheries,

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Speaker 7: and I run our fisheries research and monitoring program. So

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Speaker 7: it's kind of two parts. So the fisheries research is

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Speaker 7: what we're going to be talking about a lot more,

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Speaker 7: and the fisheries monitoring. It's kind of the parallel to

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Speaker 7: the observer program if you've ever heard about the federal

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Speaker 7: observer program where but it's a lot smaller scale. We

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Speaker 7: have a small team of biologists that we put out

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Speaker 7: on commercial fishing vessels to collect information as well as

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Speaker 7: people dockside. So when commercial boats come in land fish,

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Speaker 7: they'll collect biological information that's used for management and biological

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Speaker 7: purposes like stock assessments.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we chatted a little bit about that when we

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Speaker 2: first first got here, and folks who listen closely to

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Speaker 2: the podcast, we've covered some of the interesting stories that

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Speaker 2: come out of being an observer on a boat far

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Speaker 2: out at sea, right, because that person doesn't come in.

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Speaker 3: Necessarily trusted all the time or inherently well.

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Speaker 2: Liked, because you could say, you guys are catching too

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Speaker 2: much of this, you can't fish for it anymore.

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Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, the ideas behind the observer program and

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Speaker 7: what we do, it's that it's non biased data and

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Speaker 7: that's how you try to and you want to make

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Speaker 7: sure they're clear that you don't want to alter their

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Speaker 7: fishing behavior. But if they don't understand what the program is,

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Speaker 7: then yeah, there's a lot of resentment for you being there.

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Speaker 7: They just want to go fishing and do their job

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Speaker 7: and they don't want to have to deal with your

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Speaker 7: scales and all your protocols and stuff like that, and

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Speaker 7: there's safety protocols that.

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Speaker 6: They need to abide by.

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Speaker 7: So it's it can be it can be difficult, but

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Speaker 7: a good observer will kind of get over that hump quickly. So,

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Speaker 7: but it's it can be very challenging. But and the

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Speaker 7: one thing about it, I will say, it's like it's

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Speaker 7: not for everyone. I think the turnover at the federal

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Speaker 7: level is like six months. I did it for three

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Speaker 7: years before I came and start working for the Division

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Speaker 7: Arm Fisheries.

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Speaker 6: So obviously I was like a grizzly veteran by then.

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Speaker 7: And you got to love everything about fishing to do

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Speaker 7: it and be good at it, you have to be

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Speaker 7: obsessed with fishing, and luckily I am so.

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Speaker 2: And that's that's the only way you're gonna get over

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Speaker 2: that hump too. Like you got to connect with those

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Speaker 2: people on the boat. Make if not friends, but you

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Speaker 2: got to make communication fast.

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Speaker 7: Absolutely, and in fact, I am really good friends with

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Speaker 7: a lot you know. As evidence is yesterday when we're

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Speaker 7: in the field and we saw that harpom would go

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Speaker 7: off and steam off black smoke. I knew that guy,

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Speaker 7: I knew it. So I text him. He's like, yeah,

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Speaker 7: I saw a tune of fish right over here, and

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Speaker 7: you're at STEMA, So that's pretty cool to be able

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Speaker 7: to do and see that.

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Speaker 3: Yeah for sure, all right, Ben Gehagen.

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Speaker 8: Yeah, I am also a biologist at Division Marine Fisheries.

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Speaker 8: I am currently the recreational fisheries program leader. So I

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Speaker 8: have a small staff and he said, you met Matt

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Speaker 8: out in the field with us. He's one of my

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Speaker 8: staff members. And we got four more, and we in

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Speaker 8: Massachusetts do a fair number of things with our recreational program.

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Speaker 1: A big component of that is doing the m RIP survey,

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Speaker 1: so that's the way we had to do dock.

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Speaker 8: Side interviews, and then there's a follow up telephone interview

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Speaker 8: that's administered by the federal government, but we estimate all

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Speaker 8: the effort and catch of a lot of the recreational

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Speaker 8: species that way by going out and sending staff out

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Speaker 8: to interview pe well, like at Cashman's Landing. That's one

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Speaker 8: of our prime spots up here on the North shore

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Speaker 8: where you guys visited today or yesterday to go interview

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Speaker 8: some people. That's a really popular spot where we interview anglers.

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Speaker 1: We also do a.

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Speaker 8: Lot of public access work, rebuilding ramps and piers, getting.

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Speaker 1: Walk in spots, beach access.

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Speaker 8: Things like that so that our anglers can access the shoreline.

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Speaker 8: And then we do a fair amount of making sure

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Speaker 8: that we are staying in touch with our stakeholders. Just

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Speaker 8: like Bill reached out to that commercial fisherman yesterday, you know,

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Speaker 8: while like Chris was there on the boat with Matt,

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Speaker 8: and Matt was working the phones and the radio the

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Speaker 8: entire time in the last few days, trying to figure

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Speaker 8: out where the straight password so we could buyd those

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Speaker 8: and get some good fishing in if we couldn't find

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Speaker 8: fishing on our own. And I was talking to people

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Speaker 8: as well, texting. So it's great to work as a community.

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Speaker 1: It's kind of a.

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Speaker 8: Big part of what we're trying to do with the

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Speaker 8: fisheries program is build that idea of a community with

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Speaker 8: our four hire captains, our recreational anglers, about our biological staff,

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Speaker 8: like everybody had the Division Marine Fisheries, so we're all

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Speaker 8: working together improved that resource.

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Speaker 2: And Ben what yeah, I guess quick question just to

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Speaker 2: set set this up, the is mass Fisheries part of

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Speaker 2: like Mass fish and Wildlife or how's it? How's it

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Speaker 2: structured in the state of mass Everybody, as you.

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Speaker 8: Know, how you've been around everybody, Every state is a

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Speaker 8: little bit different. So here in Massachusetts we have a

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Speaker 8: Department of Fishing Game it's inside uh what masters, I

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Speaker 8: don't know I've ever since.

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Speaker 1: In other states it's like secretariats, it's really weird.

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Speaker 8: So think there's the governor, then there are secretaries and

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Speaker 8: they have a secretariat under it.

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Speaker 1: So we're with Energy and.

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Speaker 8: Environmental Affairs, Department of Fishing Game, and then we are

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Speaker 8: a division or division marine Fisheries. There's a division of

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Speaker 8: Ecological Restoration. And then there's the Division of Fisheries and Wildlife,

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Speaker 8: which is our inland fisheries folks and wildlife biologists.

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Speaker 1: And then we have an Office of Fishing and Voting

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Speaker 1: Access as well. Okay, we get these four kind of

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Speaker 1: groups under the Department of Fishing Game.

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Speaker 2: And then in Massachusetts it's like we all went on

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Speaker 2: and got our bizarrely even for a non resident ten

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Speaker 2: dollars marine Fisheries stamp or saltwater Fishery stamp ye or

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Speaker 2: permit or validation or whatever it is. But it's online,

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Speaker 2: easy to find and it's ten bucks. You should just

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Speaker 2: get it if you drive through the state. That is

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Speaker 2: what part of your funding. How does Massachusetts work?

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Speaker 1: It's pretty cool.

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Speaker 8: A lot of states and this is kind of a

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Speaker 8: federally mandated thing about fifteen years ago sixteen years ago

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Speaker 8: where either states could create a saltwater license or the

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Speaker 8: Feds were going to have their own registry and they

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Speaker 8: were going to charge ten bucks. So a lot of

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Speaker 8: states did the license, some states didn't. Still they still

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Speaker 8: don't have a license. But in Massachusetts, not only did

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Speaker 8: we do the ten dollars license, but we created a

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Speaker 8: dedicated fund.

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Speaker 1: So we have this dedicated fund.

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Speaker 8: If your ten dollars goes straight to marine fishery, it

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Speaker 8: has to be used to improve recreational fishing, and at

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Speaker 8: least a third of it has to be used on

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Speaker 8: public access, which is a huge I think a huge deal,

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Speaker 8: especially in Massachusetts where you guys, as we go up

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Speaker 8: and down fishing, you see how hard public access could

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Speaker 8: be with the amount of houses on the shoreline, you know.

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Speaker 8: So it's great that we can go out and create

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Speaker 8: sites for people to access the beach, fish rip, bo rams,

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Speaker 8: all of that. And so we pay for some staff,

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Speaker 8: we pay for research, we pay for restoration. Big part

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Speaker 8: is public access, and then we also pay for research.

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Speaker 1: And that, you know.

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Speaker 8: So we have state funding as well that goes into

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Speaker 8: recreational fisheries.

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Speaker 1: We have some federal funding that goes into.

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Speaker 8: Recreational fisheries, but that saltwater license money has allowed us

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Speaker 8: to expand what we do staff wise and project wise immensely,

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Speaker 8: and especially when we talk about special research projects like

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Speaker 8: you guys were helping us with the last few days.

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Speaker 8: That's a huge part of that is coming from that

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Speaker 8: saltwater license money.

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Speaker 1: Got it.

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Speaker 2: And then overall picture, uh, you know, most states are

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Speaker 2: funded primarily at least the money that they use.

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Speaker 3: To match for federal dollars.

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Speaker 2: It's all coming from license and tag revenue sales is

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Speaker 2: a mass kind of the same way.

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Speaker 8: Yeah, we have we use this for federal match, which

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Speaker 8: is great, the wall brow and all that, so we

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Speaker 8: get to go turn around and use this money to

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Speaker 8: match with federal funding because it's.

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Speaker 1: It's never been federalized, so we can use it for match.

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Speaker 1: So it is a big way we do that.

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Speaker 2: But mass isn't like you're not pulling cash out of

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Speaker 2: the general pool tax dollars.

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Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, we do as well, Yeah we do. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we do as well. But you know, we're a small state.

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Speaker 8: We're kind of stuck in that lowest bracket of wallet

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Speaker 8: bro so almost every year we're fully maxed out unless

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Speaker 8: we see a really big boost and license sales, which

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Speaker 8: is probably unrealistic level license sales were probably won'tever step

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Speaker 8: up here in that it's still a small state relatively.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, that's interesting.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, I think like really the topic here, and

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Speaker 2: we'll talk about.

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Speaker 3: The research is.

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Speaker 2: You're a state on the ocean, on the Atlantic, and

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Speaker 2: so every species, I.

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Speaker 3: Assume doesn't just solely belong to.

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Speaker 2: The state of Massachusetts, right, Like every species out there

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Speaker 2: that folks are angling for is connected to states to

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Speaker 2: the north and south, and and a lot of species

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Speaker 2: to the entire Atlantic seaboard.

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Speaker 7: Correct, Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Yeah, And Stripe Pass is obviously

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Speaker 7: a perfect example of one. It's Massachusetts is home for

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Speaker 7: its summer grounds. This is where they all come to feed,

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Speaker 7: not all, but of the majority of the population comes

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Speaker 7: up here in the summer. And but on that way,

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Speaker 7: it's you know, comes all the way from like Virginia

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Speaker 7: and the Chesapeake.

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Speaker 6: Bay area and the winter areas.

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Speaker 7: Now it used to be more even closer to North Carolina,

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Speaker 7: but now it's shift a little bit further north. Now

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Speaker 7: it's like Virginia. They go into the estuaries to Chesapeake Hudson,

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Speaker 7: Delaware to spawn, and then they all come up the

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Speaker 7: coast and they come up to us, and so everybody

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Speaker 7: gets a shot at them and it is the single

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Speaker 7: most important recreational fish and sought after fish on the

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Speaker 7: East Coast.

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Speaker 8: Yeah, it's straight bass are a great example that we

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Speaker 8: have a lot of other species that do it, and

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Speaker 8: I think we talked briefly about it, but this all

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Speaker 8: a lot of those species are managed by the Atlantic

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Speaker 8: States Marine Fisheries Commission, so we have our state level management,

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Speaker 8: but a lot of our fraud management mandates come from ASNFC,

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Speaker 8: and then we make state level decisions and regulations around it.

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Speaker 1: But it is cool. It is like that straight bass, as.

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Speaker 8: Bill was saying, is like that fish that you think

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Speaker 8: of it as your fish, but it's everybody's fish because

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Speaker 8: it's passing through all these different waters. We should be

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Speaker 8: thinking about the ways it really unites us. And it's

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Speaker 8: interesting because you know, Bill's talking about us, like the

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Speaker 8: summary grounds here and everybody up and down the ship

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Speaker 8: coast gets a shot.

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Speaker 1: So it's very important to Massachusetts.

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Speaker 8: Like we back of the envelope calculations, we think it's

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Speaker 8: like six hundred million dollars a year in economic activity

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Speaker 8: in Massachusetts alone, So that's big money for the coastal

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Speaker 8: communities in Massachusetts.

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Speaker 1: But we also have a huge impact.

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Speaker 8: Coast wide on the population, because in any given year,

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Speaker 8: we have the third highest commercial quota.

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Speaker 1: And that's just locked in. Every year we're gonna be

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Speaker 1: the third highest, but.

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Speaker 8: Our recreational effort and mortality is typically like first or

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Speaker 8: second in the entire range. And it's like not it's

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Speaker 8: usually like us Maryland and maybe in New Jersey, and

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Speaker 8: then there's a big drop off.

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Speaker 1: It's not like just like we're a little poka head.

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Speaker 8: It's we're usually way way up there millions of fish.

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Speaker 5: Uh yeah, Chris, I was just gonna say part of

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Speaker 5: that too.

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Speaker 4: And you fish for stripers in other states, so you know,

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Speaker 4: you and you probably experienced the last few days that

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Speaker 4: people here fishing them, fishing for them in a different

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Speaker 4: style and way. And then that that time period that

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Speaker 4: they're here in our waters, say roughly May into October,

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Speaker 4: sometimes even later, it's a big chunk of chunk of

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Speaker 4: the year, and and so and plus there's fish that

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Speaker 4: are hanging around, there's fish that are migrating by that

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Speaker 4: then have to migrate back. So you know, as you

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Speaker 4: kind of said in your intro, like this is a

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Speaker 4: great place to be in terms of fishing for these.

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Speaker 2: Things, and Chris, you're you're a conservation professional, but you're

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Speaker 2: not a wildlife professionals fisheries professional, and you grew up here,

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Speaker 2: and what what's your take on the fishery itself?

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Speaker 3: Like where are we at for population?

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Speaker 4: So you know, as a as an angler like I am,

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Speaker 4: we shouldn't even say.

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Speaker 3: Population, which is just where we like is fishing good?

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Speaker 4: Yeah, I saw like one of the things I and

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Speaker 4: I do have a science background, so I always catch

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Speaker 4: myself like my experience is so subjective, and how I

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Speaker 4: fish is a lot different than a lot of other

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Speaker 4: people fish.

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Speaker 5: I like to be really place based in my hunting.

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Speaker 5: Am I fishing?

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Speaker 4: So where we are here today, I spend most of

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Speaker 4: the time, so I know a lot so many of

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Speaker 4: like the little nooks and crannies where how fish moved

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Speaker 4: through this particular system when they show up, when they

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Speaker 4: typically leave, when I can where I can, like if

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Speaker 4: i'm the fishing is really slow, where I might be

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Speaker 4: able to find a few little schoolies that I can

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Speaker 4: get into. So in the eighteen nineteen years that I've

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Speaker 4: been living here, I may have seen a big sort

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Speaker 4: of change. When I first got here, it was gangbusters.

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Speaker 4: I caught my biggest striper very close to where we

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Speaker 4: are right here, which was over fifty inches in a

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Speaker 4: time of year when the fish, the big fish aren't

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Speaker 4: supposed to be here, like that's the common knowledge, but

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Speaker 4: they were, and they were here for a period of

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Speaker 4: time over those years. But those those fish aren't here anymore.

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Speaker 4: Those fish are gone.

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Speaker 2: And just just for a reference, like a fifty in

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Speaker 2: stripers generally like weight, size.

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Speaker 4: How much, well, it depends the time of year, So

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Speaker 4: this is a fit. This is a migratory fish, so

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Speaker 4: this was in May, so it had migrated from where

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Speaker 4: it's wintering ground, so it was a little bit leaner

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Speaker 4: than if I'd caught that fish this time year in July,

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Speaker 4: so it was probably in the forty low forties typically

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Speaker 4: a fish of that size, which these guys can answer

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Speaker 4: no better better than I. But you're probably talking like

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Speaker 4: a fish that is over eighteen years old, and that's

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Speaker 4: obviously a lot of trips back up and down the coast.

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Speaker 2: So like in Fatty when it's prime gorging though over

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Speaker 2: in October.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, fifty plus.

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Speaker 7: Yeah, the rule of thumb is fifty inches at the

349
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Speaker 7: end of the season. To be up to fifty pounds.

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Speaker 7: It tends to be a little bit leaner up here, especially,

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Speaker 7: like Chris said, in the beginning of the season, after

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Speaker 7: they spawn and they make that migration up here, there

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Speaker 7: lean Like some of these fish that we caught yesterday,

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Speaker 7: they were like forty plus inches.

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Speaker 6: Those are pretty lean fish. You catch that fish, you.

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Speaker 7: Know, the end of the season, it's that forty two

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Speaker 7: inch striper could be thirty eight pounds.

358
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, and the fish that we were catching,

359
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Speaker 2: there were some that were significantly fatter than others, but

360
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Speaker 2: nothing that had like a big beer belly on it.

361
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Speaker 8: Right right, it's even like that really big fish that

362
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Speaker 8: we were talking about, that nice garth and the big

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Speaker 8: head like shoulders coming in. Yeah, but it hadn't developed

364
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Speaker 8: like a big belly yet, so it was fattening up

365
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Speaker 8: and it was getting there. But yeah, if we had

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Speaker 8: caught that fish two months from now, it's a mid September,

367
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Speaker 8: it would have been had another four or five pounds

368
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Speaker 8: on it probably.

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Speaker 5: Yeah.

370
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Speaker 7: I've been fishing up here for over twenty five plus years,

371
00:18:57,400 --> 00:18:58,920
Speaker 7: not too and I've done a lot of bass fishing

372
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Speaker 7: and I've.

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Speaker 6: Yet to get a fifty.

374
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Speaker 7: But Ben and I were at a we're down in

375
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Speaker 7: Jersey and we talked to some charter captains down there,

376
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Speaker 7: and then he said he had but sixty to fifty

377
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Speaker 7: pound fish already.

378
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Speaker 6: I'm like what, but.

379
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Speaker 8: He had one hundred and he had one hundred and

380
00:19:13,400 --> 00:19:16,760
Speaker 8: thirty or one hundred and forty fifties and like fit

381
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Speaker 8: over fifty.

382
00:19:17,520 --> 00:19:21,120
Speaker 7: Six sixties right, okay, which is we just don't get

383
00:19:21,160 --> 00:19:23,880
Speaker 7: that fish. But that's because he's fishing down where they spawned,

384
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Speaker 7: so he's getting the fish on the tail. And after

385
00:19:25,920 --> 00:19:28,560
Speaker 7: they'll come here, they eat all their herring and mackerel

386
00:19:28,640 --> 00:19:29,840
Speaker 7: and gorge up and they get.

387
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Speaker 1: Bulked up, falling and hitting down, all.

388
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Speaker 7: Falling, eating the whole way down and then so it's

389
00:19:34,880 --> 00:19:39,240
Speaker 7: a different fish. But so, I mean, you know that's

390
00:19:39,240 --> 00:19:41,320
Speaker 7: that's a trophy. What Chris caught that fifty plus?

391
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Speaker 4: Yeah, when he said that's like yeah, So those fish

392
00:19:44,080 --> 00:19:46,719
Speaker 4: like that was a like those early season fish that

393
00:19:46,880 --> 00:19:49,919
Speaker 4: lasted for I mean that was mid two thousands, and

394
00:19:50,320 --> 00:19:52,880
Speaker 4: you know, on the different systems around here, those fish

395
00:19:52,920 --> 00:19:56,159
Speaker 4: were present for four years or so and then they

396
00:19:56,240 --> 00:19:58,719
Speaker 4: kind of drifted off and there were a lot more

397
00:19:58,880 --> 00:20:03,920
Speaker 4: smaller fish, a bigger, broader mix of fish, and then recently,

398
00:20:05,000 --> 00:20:07,000
Speaker 4: the last couple of years, We've got a lot of

399
00:20:07,680 --> 00:20:10,000
Speaker 4: nice fish, forty inch plus fish.

400
00:20:10,040 --> 00:20:13,200
Speaker 5: But we have not been catching the younger.

401
00:20:12,960 --> 00:20:17,520
Speaker 4: Year class fish, what we call schoolies like those have

402
00:20:17,680 --> 00:20:20,800
Speaker 4: definitely been fewer and far you know, fewer and far between,

403
00:20:22,520 --> 00:20:25,440
Speaker 4: and you know, I we'll talk about it later, but

404
00:20:25,680 --> 00:20:29,200
Speaker 4: they do mass or Division Marine Fisheries does do these

405
00:20:29,560 --> 00:20:33,840
Speaker 4: citizen science projects where you know, we're tracking and I'm

406
00:20:33,960 --> 00:20:35,879
Speaker 4: keeping track of some of the fish that I catch,

407
00:20:36,400 --> 00:20:39,000
Speaker 4: and you know, most of the fish that this season

408
00:20:39,040 --> 00:20:41,760
Speaker 4: that I've caught have been in the sort of twenty

409
00:20:41,840 --> 00:20:45,159
Speaker 4: five to thirty five inch range, the real small fish.

410
00:20:46,600 --> 00:20:48,000
Speaker 5: Maybe I got.

411
00:20:47,840 --> 00:20:52,919
Speaker 4: One, and that sort of that's part of the reason

412
00:20:53,760 --> 00:20:57,120
Speaker 4: BHA has been involved in this UH and involved with

413
00:20:57,640 --> 00:21:02,160
Speaker 4: the Land States Marine Fisheries Amendment to the Fishery Management Plan.

414
00:21:02,760 --> 00:21:06,320
Speaker 4: And you know why there's this sort of growing concern

415
00:21:06,400 --> 00:21:10,399
Speaker 4: around this fishery because the younger year class of fish

416
00:21:10,560 --> 00:21:13,080
Speaker 4: are not out there. And then on top of that,

417
00:21:13,640 --> 00:21:19,159
Speaker 4: recruitment has been pretty poor the last few years, and

418
00:21:19,240 --> 00:21:22,240
Speaker 4: so we're kind of concerned about the future of this fishery,

419
00:21:22,880 --> 00:21:23,440
Speaker 4: meaning that.

420
00:21:25,840 --> 00:21:28,560
Speaker 2: Like, I mean, here's the hard part, right, Like fishing

421
00:21:28,640 --> 00:21:32,800
Speaker 2: is subjective, like I feel like the last two days

422
00:21:32,840 --> 00:21:34,760
Speaker 2: of our fishing has been very good.

423
00:21:34,880 --> 00:21:37,639
Speaker 3: Yeah, Like I would be like, oh, yeah, kick an ass,

424
00:21:37,920 --> 00:21:38,480
Speaker 3: this is great.

425
00:21:39,080 --> 00:21:39,240
Speaker 1: Now.

426
00:21:39,359 --> 00:21:42,600
Speaker 2: We went down and grabbed a captain off the dock

427
00:21:42,840 --> 00:21:47,040
Speaker 2: last night and we, you know, just did your typical

428
00:21:47,880 --> 00:21:48,840
Speaker 2: fishermen bs.

429
00:21:48,920 --> 00:21:51,000
Speaker 3: I'm there on the dock.

430
00:21:50,840 --> 00:21:53,600
Speaker 9: And he was like, oh, He's like, yeah, you guys

431
00:21:53,640 --> 00:21:58,119
Speaker 9: are probably the only folks that really beat him up today. Yeah,

432
00:21:58,200 --> 00:22:02,639
Speaker 9: And he's like, this was my worst day of the sea.

433
00:22:04,119 --> 00:22:04,320
Speaker 1: Right.

434
00:22:04,400 --> 00:22:09,200
Speaker 2: So it is like just like anywhere in a snapshot

435
00:22:09,280 --> 00:22:09,600
Speaker 2: in time.

436
00:22:09,640 --> 00:22:10,720
Speaker 3: It's just like anywhere where.

437
00:22:10,720 --> 00:22:14,760
Speaker 2: It's like, you know, you can be relatively close to

438
00:22:14,800 --> 00:22:18,000
Speaker 2: another boat fishing for the exact same thing, probably have

439
00:22:18,040 --> 00:22:22,359
Speaker 2: the exact same stuff, and somebody's doing good and somebody's

440
00:22:22,400 --> 00:22:23,280
Speaker 2: having the worst day ever.

441
00:22:23,440 --> 00:22:26,480
Speaker 4: And that's why I qualify my experience because I spend

442
00:22:26,480 --> 00:22:28,880
Speaker 4: so much time in this system. You know, I talk

443
00:22:28,920 --> 00:22:33,240
Speaker 4: to people down say Cape Cod Buzzard's Bay. They might

444
00:22:33,280 --> 00:22:38,120
Speaker 4: be into more small fish, and so it's a it's

445
00:22:38,160 --> 00:22:41,160
Speaker 4: a real tough thing. And that's why being an angler

446
00:22:41,280 --> 00:22:43,520
Speaker 4: advocate on the kind of the Rex side is a

447
00:22:43,880 --> 00:22:47,280
Speaker 4: tough thing because everybody's experience is so different from one another.

448
00:22:47,720 --> 00:22:51,320
Speaker 4: But back to you guys catching fish or being in

449
00:22:51,359 --> 00:22:54,359
Speaker 4: the fish. Yesterday, I thought I didn't have bills number

450
00:22:54,440 --> 00:22:56,919
Speaker 4: my phone. It turns out I did it. I have

451
00:22:57,160 --> 00:23:02,400
Speaker 4: like under my like under the the work I identification

452
00:23:02,480 --> 00:23:04,680
Speaker 4: of my on the number my contact list it says

453
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:06,600
Speaker 4: DMF badass fishermen.

454
00:23:10,920 --> 00:23:14,400
Speaker 2: I'm not trying to pump anybody's tires here, but I've

455
00:23:14,440 --> 00:23:18,040
Speaker 2: been fishing a long time and have got to have

456
00:23:18,040 --> 00:23:19,760
Speaker 2: a lot of experiences, and.

457
00:23:21,200 --> 00:23:23,080
Speaker 3: I was not ignorant to.

458
00:23:23,040 --> 00:23:26,159
Speaker 2: The fact that these guys Ben and Bill know what

459
00:23:26,160 --> 00:23:29,960
Speaker 2: they're doing, and we were benefiting from a lot, a

460
00:23:30,000 --> 00:23:33,640
Speaker 2: lot of knowledge, a lot of knowledge. Yeah, yeah, very

461
00:23:33,840 --> 00:23:40,080
Speaker 2: very pro level fishermen. So here's like the fun thing

462
00:23:40,119 --> 00:23:42,600
Speaker 2: about the ocean or any fishery, right, it's like the

463
00:23:42,680 --> 00:23:47,159
Speaker 2: how do we know? So Bill and Ben like, we

464
00:23:47,240 --> 00:23:50,760
Speaker 2: have the anecdotal experience of all these fishermen out there,

465
00:23:52,480 --> 00:23:56,600
Speaker 2: and it's your guys' job to be like right, wrong,

466
00:23:57,040 --> 00:23:59,720
Speaker 2: maybe yeah.

467
00:23:59,080 --> 00:24:01,159
Speaker 3: Right, how how do we know?

468
00:24:01,960 --> 00:24:02,160
Speaker 6: Yeah?

469
00:24:02,160 --> 00:24:04,680
Speaker 8: I mean that's always the before you drill right into

470
00:24:04,680 --> 00:24:06,600
Speaker 8: how do we know? That's always the interesting thing is

471
00:24:06,600 --> 00:24:08,639
Speaker 8: that I can you know, as the you know, the

472
00:24:08,800 --> 00:24:11,080
Speaker 8: on the front line being like the faces of DMF

473
00:24:11,080 --> 00:24:13,119
Speaker 8: and talking to English like we go into tackle shops

474
00:24:13,119 --> 00:24:15,479
Speaker 8: so we hear people like and Chris is a very

475
00:24:15,520 --> 00:24:17,040
Speaker 8: well informed recreational anguage.

476
00:24:17,040 --> 00:24:19,440
Speaker 1: We get like the full gamut of everybody and.

477
00:24:19,480 --> 00:24:21,800
Speaker 8: Telling that's exactly how good or bad the fishing is,

478
00:24:21,880 --> 00:24:24,119
Speaker 8: and how good or bad that connection straight to them

479
00:24:24,240 --> 00:24:25,760
Speaker 8: is like straight bass.

480
00:24:25,480 --> 00:24:26,000
Speaker 1: Have a problem.

481
00:24:26,040 --> 00:24:27,919
Speaker 8: I haven't caught fish this week, like you know, like

482
00:24:28,000 --> 00:24:29,960
Speaker 8: or like this last month sucked, Like what's going on?

483
00:24:31,080 --> 00:24:33,959
Speaker 1: Another guy? You go five towns over, like jump across

484
00:24:33,960 --> 00:24:36,080
Speaker 1: into Buzzers Bay or something like that. They're like, holy,

485
00:24:36,640 --> 00:24:39,200
Speaker 1: it's good. Yeah, I don't think you guys need to

486
00:24:39,240 --> 00:24:41,119
Speaker 1: be worried about straight bass. Right. Let me tell you

487
00:24:41,160 --> 00:24:42,800
Speaker 1: how good the fishing has been out here this year,

488
00:24:43,200 --> 00:24:43,399
Speaker 1: you know.

489
00:24:43,600 --> 00:24:46,440
Speaker 3: So it is, it's real and experiences are so.

490
00:24:48,000 --> 00:24:51,680
Speaker 2: Different, right, It's like, Oh, I've been straight bass fishing

491
00:24:52,520 --> 00:24:56,600
Speaker 2: for a year. I come to this same rock after work,

492
00:24:57,160 --> 00:25:00,439
Speaker 2: I fish for an hour and I never catch anything,

493
00:25:00,440 --> 00:25:03,760
Speaker 2: And this week I got two fish, like like something's

494
00:25:03,760 --> 00:25:06,640
Speaker 2: going on. It's the best fishery ever all of a sudden, right, Yeah.

495
00:25:06,680 --> 00:25:11,160
Speaker 2: But then there's people who work really hard. They they

496
00:25:11,560 --> 00:25:15,080
Speaker 2: kind of know their numbers. They know how much gas

497
00:25:15,119 --> 00:25:17,160
Speaker 2: money they're throwing at things, how much time they're throwing

498
00:25:17,200 --> 00:25:18,280
Speaker 2: at things, and.

499
00:25:19,800 --> 00:25:21,520
Speaker 3: They're very confident in their.

500
00:25:21,400 --> 00:25:24,720
Speaker 2: Ability to They have those spots kind of like we

501
00:25:24,720 --> 00:25:28,000
Speaker 2: we hit this week where it's like, oh, okay, I

502
00:25:28,119 --> 00:25:30,640
Speaker 2: haven't been catch him, but I know if I go here,

503
00:25:31,359 --> 00:25:33,159
Speaker 2: there's always bass there and I'll catch him. And if

504
00:25:33,200 --> 00:25:34,800
Speaker 2: they go there and they're not there, they're like, okay,

505
00:25:34,840 --> 00:25:35,840
Speaker 2: now something's.

506
00:25:36,960 --> 00:25:38,720
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what it's like.

507
00:25:38,880 --> 00:25:40,760
Speaker 8: It's like one of the things pulling you're talking about

508
00:25:40,800 --> 00:25:44,439
Speaker 8: the podcast or like the biologist curtain, like that conversation

509
00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:47,000
Speaker 8: of like how do we get this person? Bill and

510
00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:48,399
Speaker 8: I have this conversation all the time, like how do

511
00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:51,439
Speaker 8: we get people to look beyond their place yep, and

512
00:25:51,480 --> 00:25:54,040
Speaker 8: like try and understand that their experience is one of many.

513
00:25:54,119 --> 00:25:55,680
Speaker 8: So it's like something we think about a lot and

514
00:25:55,760 --> 00:25:57,679
Speaker 8: trying to communicate that so hopefully we can do a

515
00:25:57,680 --> 00:26:01,960
Speaker 8: good job. You've asked that, but but it's your chance.

516
00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:02,480
Speaker 1: Yeah exactly.

517
00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:05,359
Speaker 8: But for straight bass, we have a bunch of different

518
00:26:05,400 --> 00:26:08,800
Speaker 8: sources of information that come in a big part of

519
00:26:08,840 --> 00:26:11,280
Speaker 8: that is that m RIP survey I was talking about,

520
00:26:11,720 --> 00:26:14,160
Speaker 8: where you know, every state's doing it and we're going

521
00:26:14,520 --> 00:26:18,159
Speaker 8: coast wide. It's a survey that has its issues. For

522
00:26:18,240 --> 00:26:20,119
Speaker 8: straight bass, it's one of the really one of the

523
00:26:20,119 --> 00:26:22,680
Speaker 8: better species because they're so frequently encountered. So we have

524
00:26:22,720 --> 00:26:26,080
Speaker 8: a really good data stream coming in. So that's a

525
00:26:26,080 --> 00:26:28,160
Speaker 8: big part of it is like what are people catching

526
00:26:28,200 --> 00:26:31,280
Speaker 8: and what size of fish are people catching. We augment that.

527
00:26:32,000 --> 00:26:34,720
Speaker 8: All the states augment that by also getting age information.

528
00:26:34,840 --> 00:26:38,480
Speaker 8: And here in Massachusetts we have a special program that's

529
00:26:38,560 --> 00:26:40,959
Speaker 8: called the Sportfish Angler Data Collection Team, And if you're

530
00:26:40,960 --> 00:26:42,679
Speaker 8: a Master Uset's resident, you want to sign up, you

531
00:26:42,680 --> 00:26:46,159
Speaker 8: can do that and you go out and collect biological

532
00:26:46,240 --> 00:26:48,560
Speaker 8: information about the straight bass you're getting it. We'll mail

533
00:26:48,600 --> 00:26:52,080
Speaker 8: you envelopes and other sampling the gear so you can

534
00:26:52,119 --> 00:26:55,200
Speaker 8: go out, take some scales right down all the information

535
00:26:55,280 --> 00:26:57,080
Speaker 8: about that fish, where you caught it, when you caught it,

536
00:26:57,280 --> 00:27:00,200
Speaker 8: what size it was, and give us scales and then

537
00:27:00,240 --> 00:27:02,200
Speaker 8: we'll age them. And so now we have age data

538
00:27:02,240 --> 00:27:04,159
Speaker 8: that goes into the stock assessment as well, so we know,

539
00:27:04,720 --> 00:27:06,600
Speaker 8: you know, trying to manage any population, we need to

540
00:27:06,640 --> 00:27:07,200
Speaker 8: know how.

541
00:27:07,000 --> 00:27:10,440
Speaker 1: Many are we think there are, how many are getting.

542
00:27:10,119 --> 00:27:13,000
Speaker 8: Caught, and what that age structure is that that population

543
00:27:13,080 --> 00:27:16,040
Speaker 8: demography is so we get that information.

544
00:27:16,560 --> 00:27:20,920
Speaker 1: And then Chris talked about recruitment. The major spawning.

545
00:27:20,600 --> 00:27:22,359
Speaker 8: Areas which are the Delaware of the Chess, all the

546
00:27:22,440 --> 00:27:26,440
Speaker 8: rivers in the Chesapeak Bay and then Hudson have surveys

547
00:27:26,520 --> 00:27:28,520
Speaker 8: saying surveys that go on during the summer.

548
00:27:28,600 --> 00:27:30,800
Speaker 1: After the story, bass spawn in the spring.

549
00:27:31,000 --> 00:27:34,760
Speaker 8: And these are long term indices and there are estimates

550
00:27:34,760 --> 00:27:39,359
Speaker 8: of how successful spawning efforts were because there is a relationship,

551
00:27:39,520 --> 00:27:41,800
Speaker 8: like the kind of holy grail of fishery science is

552
00:27:42,000 --> 00:27:45,359
Speaker 8: chasing around these stock recruitment relationships, being like we have

553
00:27:45,560 --> 00:27:47,280
Speaker 8: X number of adults, is it going to give us

554
00:27:47,320 --> 00:27:48,480
Speaker 8: why it predicted.

555
00:27:48,119 --> 00:27:48,640
Speaker 1: Like how many?

556
00:27:49,040 --> 00:27:49,200
Speaker 3: Why?

557
00:27:49,400 --> 00:27:51,119
Speaker 1: Number of babies there will be?

558
00:27:51,440 --> 00:27:55,320
Speaker 8: And some of those species of relationships are really non existence,

559
00:27:55,320 --> 00:28:00,240
Speaker 8: so they're okay, straight past is pretty like there is

560
00:28:00,240 --> 00:28:04,600
Speaker 8: a relationship, but it's very environmentally driven, very very environmentally driven.

561
00:28:04,600 --> 00:28:07,520
Speaker 8: They have a really narrow set of conditions they need

562
00:28:07,560 --> 00:28:08,400
Speaker 8: to successfully.

563
00:28:08,880 --> 00:28:10,440
Speaker 1: They can go and spawn, you can have a lot

564
00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:11,800
Speaker 1: of them spawning, but.

565
00:28:12,359 --> 00:28:17,119
Speaker 8: To actually have those eggs mature, hatch and larva survive

566
00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:20,439
Speaker 8: to a point where their fingerlings and then their survivorship

567
00:28:20,480 --> 00:28:22,720
Speaker 8: really starts to go up do you have to have

568
00:28:22,760 --> 00:28:26,000
Speaker 8: a really narrow set of good, good conditions and the

569
00:28:26,080 --> 00:28:29,600
Speaker 8: right things happening both temperature wise and flow wise in

570
00:28:29,680 --> 00:28:33,000
Speaker 8: these tributaries, or it does not its est rais or

571
00:28:33,040 --> 00:28:35,040
Speaker 8: it doesn't work out really well. And that seems to

572
00:28:35,040 --> 00:28:37,119
Speaker 8: be the real issue we have going on right now, and.

573
00:28:37,560 --> 00:28:41,080
Speaker 3: Just that survey, that's that's happening in these spawning.

574
00:28:40,960 --> 00:28:43,320
Speaker 8: So that's like another input into like how many fish

575
00:28:43,360 --> 00:28:44,080
Speaker 8: do we think we have?

576
00:28:44,800 --> 00:28:48,000
Speaker 2: Right And that's that's like the thing that gets extrapolated

577
00:28:49,600 --> 00:28:52,320
Speaker 2: because and really it's because it's a long term survey.

578
00:28:52,600 --> 00:28:54,880
Speaker 2: It's been going on long enough to where you can

579
00:28:54,960 --> 00:28:59,840
Speaker 2: kind of be like, okay, within a certain margin of

580
00:29:00,960 --> 00:29:03,600
Speaker 2: this is how many fish we're dealing with.

581
00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:06,400
Speaker 8: Right It's it's like saying when you do a stock assessment,

582
00:29:06,400 --> 00:29:08,320
Speaker 8: they're saying, this is all the data we had in

583
00:29:08,320 --> 00:29:10,000
Speaker 8: the past, and we're gonna use it to project, like

584
00:29:10,040 --> 00:29:11,840
Speaker 8: ten years forward, what do we think is going to

585
00:29:11,880 --> 00:29:13,680
Speaker 8: happen in the next ten years. And as you go

586
00:29:13,720 --> 00:29:16,640
Speaker 8: further out those intervals like that, your confidence you have

587
00:29:16,760 --> 00:29:18,560
Speaker 8: about that and what we think the future might be

588
00:29:18,640 --> 00:29:21,560
Speaker 8: gets wider. Typically, but a big predictor of what we

589
00:29:21,640 --> 00:29:24,000
Speaker 8: think is going to happen five ten years from now,

590
00:29:24,280 --> 00:29:26,360
Speaker 8: is what are like the last five years of these

591
00:29:26,440 --> 00:29:29,960
Speaker 8: recruitment indicies, these young of the year surveys, what do

592
00:29:30,040 --> 00:29:33,680
Speaker 8: they say? And then that gets fed into when because

593
00:29:33,680 --> 00:29:35,280
Speaker 8: typically if you have like a really great year in

594
00:29:35,400 --> 00:29:38,080
Speaker 8: chest peak, somewhere like two or to three years later

595
00:29:38,280 --> 00:29:41,840
Speaker 8: up here, you'll start seeing catch rates go up because

596
00:29:41,840 --> 00:29:44,560
Speaker 8: everybody's getting like Chris is talking about those small fishes schools,

597
00:29:44,600 --> 00:29:47,000
Speaker 8: they'll start out twelve to eighteen inches. They'll start showing

598
00:29:47,080 --> 00:29:51,000
Speaker 8: up Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and everybody's like

599
00:29:51,120 --> 00:29:53,360
Speaker 8: they're not keepers, but everybody's in fish.

600
00:29:53,080 --> 00:29:53,480
Speaker 1: All the time.

601
00:29:53,600 --> 00:29:56,080
Speaker 8: So we do the interviews, they say, Okay, yeah, like

602
00:29:56,160 --> 00:29:58,040
Speaker 8: you know, we're getting a lot of small fish.

603
00:29:58,080 --> 00:30:00,080
Speaker 1: Now that's not part of the fishery yet, Like it's not.

604
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:03,239
Speaker 8: Like really part of the target number we're managing for

605
00:30:03,400 --> 00:30:05,760
Speaker 8: is spawning stock biomass.

606
00:30:05,360 --> 00:30:08,200
Speaker 1: Which is the weight of adult females we think is

607
00:30:08,240 --> 00:30:08,600
Speaker 1: out there.

608
00:30:09,200 --> 00:30:11,680
Speaker 8: But we can factor that in and so that those

609
00:30:11,680 --> 00:30:13,440
Speaker 8: are things that are kind of projecting. So if you're

610
00:30:13,440 --> 00:30:15,640
Speaker 8: gonna say, like what's gonna look like, what's our spawning

611
00:30:15,680 --> 00:30:18,880
Speaker 8: stock biomass can look like five years from now, you'd say, well,

612
00:30:18,880 --> 00:30:20,959
Speaker 8: what was the recruitment induses leading into that, all the

613
00:30:20,960 --> 00:30:23,400
Speaker 8: recruitment indosies leading into what we'll be out there and

614
00:30:23,400 --> 00:30:25,080
Speaker 8: what do we see for the catch, Like that's like

615
00:30:25,160 --> 00:30:27,200
Speaker 8: our next step in predicting what things will be. And

616
00:30:27,200 --> 00:30:31,000
Speaker 8: then you get to like actual landings of fish, harvested fish,

617
00:30:31,800 --> 00:30:33,520
Speaker 8: commercial harvest things like that.

618
00:30:33,320 --> 00:30:36,480
Speaker 1: That'll feed in. Effort plays into it. Effort plays.

619
00:30:36,680 --> 00:30:39,400
Speaker 8: Yeah, so there's not just landings, it's you know, obviously

620
00:30:39,560 --> 00:30:41,880
Speaker 8: post release mortality, Like we've been working where it's like

621
00:30:41,920 --> 00:30:43,200
Speaker 8: that effort, how much effort is.

622
00:30:43,160 --> 00:30:45,280
Speaker 1: There and how many fish are being encountered and released?

623
00:30:45,960 --> 00:30:51,600
Speaker 2: So Bill, from your perspective, Uh, I'm waying with some

624
00:30:51,680 --> 00:30:52,640
Speaker 2: serious foundation.

625
00:30:53,080 --> 00:30:57,200
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, got deep out.

626
00:30:58,840 --> 00:31:01,320
Speaker 2: Well, I'm spent enough time I'm around fishermen right for

627
00:31:01,600 --> 00:31:03,320
Speaker 2: to hear everybody in the back of my mind being

628
00:31:03,320 --> 00:31:11,800
Speaker 2: like bullshit, Bill, Like what's your experience tell you? Like,

629
00:31:12,040 --> 00:31:16,160
Speaker 2: where's where's the fishery at right now? And then just

630
00:31:16,720 --> 00:31:19,640
Speaker 2: because I can't ever ask just one question, what is

631
00:31:19,800 --> 00:31:24,160
Speaker 2: the like from your perspective, like the awareness level of

632
00:31:24,520 --> 00:31:26,640
Speaker 2: fishermen out there on the water as far as.

633
00:31:26,560 --> 00:31:30,040
Speaker 7: Like, yeah, I think everybody's touched on this a little bit,

634
00:31:30,080 --> 00:31:33,840
Speaker 7: but I agree, like right now we're not like the

635
00:31:33,880 --> 00:31:36,920
Speaker 7: house isn't burning down yet, but we're at a point

636
00:31:36,960 --> 00:31:40,080
Speaker 7: where we need to be concerned. This lack of recruitment

637
00:31:40,080 --> 00:31:42,960
Speaker 7: that's coming out of the chestbeak specifically is starting to

638
00:31:42,960 --> 00:31:44,720
Speaker 7: put us in a little bit of a precarious position.

639
00:31:45,520 --> 00:31:49,760
Speaker 7: And so and managers have responded and they've put in

640
00:31:49,840 --> 00:31:54,520
Speaker 7: stricter you know, slot limits and daily bags and and

641
00:31:54,520 --> 00:31:57,280
Speaker 7: and then for good reason, I think, so, yeah, I

642
00:31:57,280 --> 00:31:59,520
Speaker 7: mean we're seeing everything and so you know, kind of

643
00:31:59,600 --> 00:32:03,000
Speaker 7: touch on like you know, everybody sees what's in their backyard,

644
00:32:03,000 --> 00:32:04,360
Speaker 7: and there may be a lot of fish, may not

645
00:32:04,360 --> 00:32:06,200
Speaker 7: be a lot of fish, but we have better and

646
00:32:06,200 --> 00:32:07,840
Speaker 7: I have a network up and down these coasts. We

647
00:32:07,880 --> 00:32:09,920
Speaker 7: really do have a good sense of what's going on.

648
00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:14,040
Speaker 7: And yeah, it's it's the fishery is not in this

649
00:32:14,160 --> 00:32:15,960
Speaker 7: best spot right now, and that's why we're doing a

650
00:32:16,040 --> 00:32:17,840
Speaker 7: lot of this work right now that we are doing.

651
00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:22,000
Speaker 2: And even like if you went out on the water

652
00:32:22,080 --> 00:32:24,800
Speaker 2: and had a day like we had yesterday where we

653
00:32:24,800 --> 00:32:31,480
Speaker 2: didn't have necessarily a ton of fish, it wasn't like

654
00:32:31,520 --> 00:32:34,840
Speaker 2: the thirty or fifty fish days that people talk about

655
00:32:34,920 --> 00:32:38,040
Speaker 2: sometimes with striper fishing, but we caught some like quality

656
00:32:38,040 --> 00:32:41,320
Speaker 2: fish and everybody on the boat cat fish.

657
00:32:41,760 --> 00:32:44,160
Speaker 3: Would you be like, oh, it's not doing well.

658
00:32:44,680 --> 00:32:46,440
Speaker 7: Yeah, no that I mean for me, the last few

659
00:32:46,480 --> 00:32:49,040
Speaker 7: days are slow. I mean, I'm not gonna lie.

660
00:32:49,160 --> 00:32:51,719
Speaker 8: We were like we looked and smiles at each other

661
00:32:51,800 --> 00:32:54,280
Speaker 8: because like after that, like after we were dead the

662
00:32:54,320 --> 00:32:55,440
Speaker 8: day and you get it and you guys are all

663
00:32:55,440 --> 00:32:57,840
Speaker 8: pumped up. We were happy with the day. No, we

664
00:32:57,920 --> 00:32:59,000
Speaker 8: like we got what we wanted.

665
00:32:59,040 --> 00:33:02,400
Speaker 5: But we looked at like, yeah, I think the phrase

666
00:33:02,560 --> 00:33:03,480
Speaker 5: they don't know any better.

667
00:33:07,400 --> 00:33:10,120
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean it was a good day. And I

668
00:33:10,160 --> 00:33:13,080
Speaker 7: mean the other thing that I made me happy is

669
00:33:13,080 --> 00:33:16,000
Speaker 7: that's exactly how we planned it. The first day. We're

670
00:33:16,000 --> 00:33:17,400
Speaker 7: gonna go out and we're gonna pound in the rocks

671
00:33:17,400 --> 00:33:19,400
Speaker 7: and get some little fish, get some numbers up, get

672
00:33:19,440 --> 00:33:21,920
Speaker 7: the footage that we needed, and have the conversations we needed.

673
00:33:22,160 --> 00:33:24,200
Speaker 7: And then once you guys are like yeah, we're pretty good,

674
00:33:24,240 --> 00:33:26,360
Speaker 7: then like, okay, now let's see if we can get

675
00:33:26,360 --> 00:33:26,920
Speaker 7: big fish.

676
00:33:27,000 --> 00:33:29,080
Speaker 6: And we like specifically went to there.

677
00:33:29,400 --> 00:33:31,760
Speaker 7: Knew we weren't gonna have big numbers, but the chance

678
00:33:31,800 --> 00:33:34,520
Speaker 7: of getting a big forty plus fish was that's what

679
00:33:34,560 --> 00:33:35,120
Speaker 7: we tried to do.

680
00:33:35,520 --> 00:33:36,200
Speaker 6: So that was great.

681
00:33:36,200 --> 00:33:39,080
Speaker 7: But in terms of yeah, I mean we've had yeah,

682
00:33:39,440 --> 00:33:43,280
Speaker 7: much better days. Yeah, but it was good fishing.

683
00:33:43,760 --> 00:33:43,920
Speaker 8: You know.

684
00:33:44,000 --> 00:33:46,080
Speaker 2: That's an interesting thing though, when you talk about like

685
00:33:46,120 --> 00:33:51,480
Speaker 2: the economics of wildlife, right, you have your residence. Within

686
00:33:51,600 --> 00:33:55,920
Speaker 2: that pool of residents, you have people that sometimes fish,

687
00:33:56,320 --> 00:34:01,600
Speaker 2: people who call themselves anglers, and then within that group

688
00:34:01,640 --> 00:34:03,800
Speaker 2: you have the people who are actual anglers that are

689
00:34:03,800 --> 00:34:06,640
Speaker 2: going out and doing a lot and they're very aware

690
00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:07,600
Speaker 2: of the fishery.

691
00:34:07,880 --> 00:34:11,399
Speaker 3: And then you have this big wump of non residents who.

692
00:34:11,360 --> 00:34:12,920
Speaker 2: Can come in like I just did and be like,

693
00:34:12,920 --> 00:34:15,040
Speaker 2: holy shit, this is amazing, this is great.

694
00:34:15,440 --> 00:34:16,040
Speaker 1: It's right.

695
00:34:16,200 --> 00:34:18,560
Speaker 8: Last year we had to do an emergency action, right,

696
00:34:18,600 --> 00:34:20,720
Speaker 8: which is like the third time in all of history

697
00:34:20,760 --> 00:34:23,080
Speaker 8: for all species of America in Lant State's marine fisheries

698
00:34:23,120 --> 00:34:25,520
Speaker 8: is done in the emergency action to narrow this lot

699
00:34:25,560 --> 00:34:27,719
Speaker 8: from twenty eight to thirty five inches to twenty eight

700
00:34:27,760 --> 00:34:32,319
Speaker 8: to thirty one inches coastwide. I mean, it took three

701
00:34:32,320 --> 00:34:34,680
Speaker 8: weeks of my time. It was just like when that happened,

702
00:34:34,719 --> 00:34:36,040
Speaker 8: it was I was just into, like, how do we

703
00:34:36,080 --> 00:34:40,000
Speaker 8: communicate this writing FAQ's signed like graphic design all right,

704
00:34:40,200 --> 00:34:42,960
Speaker 8: Like talking to people, talking to charter captains trying to

705
00:34:42,960 --> 00:34:44,840
Speaker 8: like put out fires. You just feel like it's the

706
00:34:44,880 --> 00:34:46,960
Speaker 8: center of the world. And Bill's you know, we're Bill

707
00:34:47,000 --> 00:34:48,480
Speaker 8: and I are talking. We're all like talking to like

708
00:34:48,480 --> 00:34:50,480
Speaker 8: people were like Chris, who's like on the policy side,

709
00:34:50,480 --> 00:34:53,640
Speaker 8: and it's drilling in on this and like it's like

710
00:34:53,719 --> 00:34:55,760
Speaker 8: the center of our world. And I'd go to Surfland

711
00:34:55,760 --> 00:34:57,439
Speaker 8: and I talk to a guy who has a boat

712
00:34:57,480 --> 00:35:00,400
Speaker 8: at my marina who fishes for stripers fairly often. I like, so,

713
00:35:00,440 --> 00:35:02,480
Speaker 8: what do you think about the regulation change? It's like

714
00:35:03,800 --> 00:35:05,200
Speaker 8: regulation change, what.

715
00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:05,839
Speaker 1: Are you talking about?

716
00:35:06,400 --> 00:35:08,360
Speaker 8: You know, like so, yeah, there's like this huge pool

717
00:35:08,360 --> 00:35:10,399
Speaker 8: of people who fish all the time, but.

718
00:35:10,880 --> 00:35:13,880
Speaker 1: Like it doesn't it's not right there, that's exactly.

719
00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:14,200
Speaker 8: Yeah.

720
00:35:14,960 --> 00:35:16,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it's crazy.

721
00:35:17,400 --> 00:35:21,040
Speaker 2: The charter the guide industry, right, like at the end

722
00:35:21,080 --> 00:35:23,000
Speaker 2: of the day, what they care about is like that

723
00:35:23,040 --> 00:35:25,359
Speaker 2: person having a good time on the boat, So.

724
00:35:25,280 --> 00:35:27,040
Speaker 3: They don't necessarily need to know that it was a

725
00:35:27,080 --> 00:35:30,719
Speaker 3: slow day. Yeah, they've got smiles on their face and.

726
00:35:30,719 --> 00:35:34,480
Speaker 4: That that in itself is a really complex thing because

727
00:35:35,120 --> 00:35:38,440
Speaker 4: the way the higher fleet operates.

728
00:35:39,320 --> 00:35:42,480
Speaker 5: Is pretty wide and it varies from state to state.

729
00:35:43,040 --> 00:35:46,279
Speaker 4: So in a state like Massachusetts and this is like there, Well,

730
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:48,680
Speaker 4: I shouldn't say that anywhere. Most up and down the

731
00:35:48,719 --> 00:35:53,560
Speaker 4: Striper coast there are four hire captains that operate almost

732
00:35:53,760 --> 00:35:54,760
Speaker 4: strictly a catch.

733
00:35:54,520 --> 00:35:55,400
Speaker 5: And release business.

734
00:35:55,680 --> 00:35:58,399
Speaker 4: They're going out, they're hooking fish and they're releasing them,

735
00:35:58,760 --> 00:36:02,319
Speaker 4: and so that that success is oftentimes measured on like

736
00:36:02,440 --> 00:36:04,959
Speaker 4: the quality of that day, how many fish they caught,

737
00:36:05,080 --> 00:36:06,920
Speaker 4: or the experience and all that kind of stuff. And

738
00:36:06,960 --> 00:36:11,760
Speaker 4: then there's other for higher fleet folks who they measure

739
00:36:11,880 --> 00:36:16,520
Speaker 4: success as fish in the cooler, fish going home. And

740
00:36:17,000 --> 00:36:22,279
Speaker 4: within that spectrum there are the clientele that have are

741
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:25,080
Speaker 4: looking for one of those things or someplace in the middle.

742
00:36:25,520 --> 00:36:29,279
Speaker 4: So that becomes a very complex thing. And on the

743
00:36:29,320 --> 00:36:35,920
Speaker 4: policy side, when there's a four higher community that is

744
00:36:35,920 --> 00:36:38,200
Speaker 4: looking at this as a casual release fishery and then

745
00:36:38,239 --> 00:36:41,720
Speaker 4: a four higher fleet that is looking at it as

746
00:36:42,000 --> 00:36:47,920
Speaker 4: you know, bringing filat's home, it's a real real challenge.

747
00:36:48,400 --> 00:36:51,359
Speaker 4: And then obviously then there's the huge recreational side, because

748
00:36:51,360 --> 00:36:52,960
Speaker 4: at the end of the day, the only thing that

749
00:36:52,960 --> 00:36:57,680
Speaker 4: fishery managers can do is somehow limit mortality. It'd be

750
00:36:57,719 --> 00:37:02,920
Speaker 4: great if we could bolster environmental conditions that the stripers

751
00:37:02,960 --> 00:37:07,200
Speaker 4: need for spawning success, but we can't. So we all

752
00:37:07,239 --> 00:37:11,759
Speaker 4: we can do is restrict how many fish we kill.

753
00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:14,160
Speaker 4: And that's where like a lot of their research is

754
00:37:14,200 --> 00:37:18,200
Speaker 4: coming in, particularly in that the release mortality. How many

755
00:37:18,239 --> 00:37:24,920
Speaker 4: fish are unintentionally dying or needlessly dying upon release.

756
00:37:25,880 --> 00:37:28,480
Speaker 5: And that's so what is the.

757
00:37:30,600 --> 00:37:34,759
Speaker 3: Healthiest bag limits? The most liberal bag limits?

758
00:37:35,000 --> 00:37:39,279
Speaker 2: Everybody at this table is seen for stripers in their

759
00:37:39,320 --> 00:37:42,000
Speaker 2: lifetime and compared to what it is now.

760
00:37:42,520 --> 00:37:45,120
Speaker 7: Two fish at twenty eight yeah, yeah, twenty eight and

761
00:37:45,160 --> 00:37:48,319
Speaker 7: over yeah, to fish too, fish okay, and that that

762
00:37:48,480 --> 00:37:49,080
Speaker 7: was when.

763
00:37:50,360 --> 00:37:54,319
Speaker 1: Two thousand to twenty fifteen, twenty seven, twenty.

764
00:37:54,239 --> 00:37:59,160
Speaker 7: Eighteen, yeah yeah, but it was done there.

765
00:37:59,239 --> 00:37:59,600
Speaker 6: Yeah yeah.

766
00:37:59,760 --> 00:38:03,440
Speaker 3: Is that up the whole stripe or range or is

767
00:38:03,440 --> 00:38:04,680
Speaker 3: that just mass we.

768
00:38:04,840 --> 00:38:09,160
Speaker 8: There can be very localized variations. There's something that was

769
00:38:09,200 --> 00:38:12,520
Speaker 8: going on for a period of years. So conservation equivalency,

770
00:38:12,520 --> 00:38:14,680
Speaker 8: where if a state wanted to deviate from the coast

771
00:38:14,719 --> 00:38:16,280
Speaker 8: wide regulation and could.

772
00:38:16,040 --> 00:38:17,759
Speaker 1: Show that they were going to have.

773
00:38:17,719 --> 00:38:21,879
Speaker 8: An equivalent amount of harvest or mortality, I should say,

774
00:38:22,280 --> 00:38:25,120
Speaker 8: because I had to include post release mortality, that they

775
00:38:25,160 --> 00:38:26,839
Speaker 8: could change the regulations.

776
00:38:26,920 --> 00:38:29,080
Speaker 1: But because it's that migratory fish.

777
00:38:29,080 --> 00:38:33,239
Speaker 8: Because it's so popular, the ASNFC has been very cognizanve

778
00:38:33,400 --> 00:38:36,759
Speaker 8: than like, very driven to have a coast wide regulation

779
00:38:37,000 --> 00:38:39,440
Speaker 8: for this fish. So typically it's kind of been there's

780
00:38:39,480 --> 00:38:43,640
Speaker 8: some little carbouts, like the Chesapeake Bay almost all of

781
00:38:43,680 --> 00:38:47,400
Speaker 8: the larger breeding sized fish leave. They're only in Chesapeake

782
00:38:47,400 --> 00:38:51,279
Speaker 8: Bay from maybe March to the beginning of May, so

783
00:38:51,320 --> 00:38:53,799
Speaker 8: it's like if you're twenty eight and over, like you're

784
00:38:53,840 --> 00:38:55,839
Speaker 8: just not going to get keeper fish.

785
00:38:55,840 --> 00:38:58,080
Speaker 1: So they would have like a bay wide.

786
00:38:57,800 --> 00:39:02,600
Speaker 8: Regulation, but for the ocean coastal waters, it's pretty much

787
00:39:02,680 --> 00:39:03,480
Speaker 8: the same, okay.

788
00:39:03,840 --> 00:39:06,400
Speaker 3: And then during that same time, what was the commercial.

789
00:39:05,960 --> 00:39:10,759
Speaker 7: Take, Well, it's changed, but it was it's changed a lot.

790
00:39:10,880 --> 00:39:15,319
Speaker 7: Like back the most like robust was I think it

791
00:39:15,400 --> 00:39:18,719
Speaker 7: was sixty fish thirty four or up a day. So

792
00:39:18,719 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 7: that's when in the heyday, back in the early nineties,

793
00:39:21,239 --> 00:39:23,560
Speaker 7: and it's been rationeting down to the point now where

794
00:39:23,600 --> 00:39:26,960
Speaker 7: it's fifteen fish, thirty five and up.

795
00:39:27,160 --> 00:39:30,920
Speaker 1: Early two thousands, yeah, not early nineties, early two thousands.

796
00:39:31,640 --> 00:39:33,920
Speaker 1: Was there were you guys were operating that in the

797
00:39:33,960 --> 00:39:35,200
Speaker 1: early nineties.

798
00:39:34,840 --> 00:39:38,680
Speaker 7: Yeah, late nineties, late nineties, yeah, definitely, Yeah, late nineties

799
00:39:38,760 --> 00:39:41,279
Speaker 7: and then but then it's been slowly rationting down to

800
00:39:41,360 --> 00:39:43,200
Speaker 7: now in the number of days that you could fish.

801
00:39:43,640 --> 00:39:45,600
Speaker 7: Now it was like five days a week, and then

802
00:39:45,760 --> 00:39:48,279
Speaker 7: now it's down to you'rely allowed in Massachusetts of fish

803
00:39:48,280 --> 00:39:51,360
Speaker 7: two days a week commercially, and it's fifteen fish thirty

804
00:39:51,360 --> 00:39:52,360
Speaker 7: five inches inches and.

805
00:39:53,960 --> 00:40:01,960
Speaker 3: So big change, right, I mean hard to argue that.

806
00:40:03,840 --> 00:40:03,920
Speaker 1: What.

807
00:40:05,600 --> 00:40:10,320
Speaker 2: So now the kind of condensed picture is we're seeing

808
00:40:11,000 --> 00:40:14,640
Speaker 2: some gaps in our age classes. There's like that, just

809
00:40:14,680 --> 00:40:19,560
Speaker 2: that steady flow of fish in across like the breadth

810
00:40:19,800 --> 00:40:24,919
Speaker 2: of sizes ages I have to have some big, big

811
00:40:24,960 --> 00:40:28,560
Speaker 2: holes in it. It's like a ladder missing some rungs essentially.

812
00:40:29,880 --> 00:40:35,759
Speaker 2: As because of that, we're adjusting regulations in a bunch

813
00:40:35,800 --> 00:40:39,200
Speaker 2: of different ways. Slot limit being one, total bag limit

814
00:40:39,280 --> 00:40:45,320
Speaker 2: being another. The you know, something I don't think about

815
00:40:45,320 --> 00:40:48,920
Speaker 2: because it is something that's way more on the saltwater

816
00:40:48,960 --> 00:40:52,919
Speaker 2: commercial fishery side is days that you can fish, right which,

817
00:40:53,080 --> 00:40:55,560
Speaker 2: like in Alaska they'd be like seasons, right, but a

818
00:40:55,600 --> 00:40:57,760
Speaker 2: season's a three day season or a five day season.

819
00:40:58,560 --> 00:41:00,960
Speaker 3: Here in mass you're doing like a Monday and a

820
00:41:00,960 --> 00:41:01,920
Speaker 3: Wednesday season.

821
00:41:02,239 --> 00:41:03,600
Speaker 6: Tuesday Wednesday right now.

822
00:41:03,560 --> 00:41:06,560
Speaker 2: For bas Yeah, so every week Tuesday Wednesday. If you're

823
00:41:06,560 --> 00:41:11,000
Speaker 2: a commercial angler, those are your days to adhere to

824
00:41:11,880 --> 00:41:19,120
Speaker 2: that commercial regulation of thirty five and over and a

825
00:41:19,160 --> 00:41:20,920
Speaker 2: fifteen fish bag one up.

826
00:41:21,000 --> 00:41:24,920
Speaker 1: That's from about to fish for sure, to fish from.

827
00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:27,399
Speaker 6: Your yeah right, yeah, yeah right.

828
00:41:27,719 --> 00:41:30,399
Speaker 7: So to really key part of that is that it's

829
00:41:30,400 --> 00:41:33,520
Speaker 7: also quota managed. So that's the other thing. So when

830
00:41:33,880 --> 00:41:37,160
Speaker 7: you bring a fish to market, that fish is tagged

831
00:41:37,600 --> 00:41:41,480
Speaker 7: and that's reported, and we have our statistics program at

832
00:41:41,520 --> 00:41:44,759
Speaker 7: d MF and they will track landings and they'll up

833
00:41:44,800 --> 00:41:47,120
Speaker 7: to a certain amount. So it used to be I

834
00:41:47,120 --> 00:41:49,560
Speaker 7: think the largest the quotas was like one point two

835
00:41:49,760 --> 00:41:51,360
Speaker 7: million pounds and now what.

836
00:41:51,480 --> 00:41:54,479
Speaker 1: Is It's like six six six fifty six.

837
00:41:54,520 --> 00:41:57,520
Speaker 7: Eighty I think it is like a thousand pounds. So

838
00:41:57,560 --> 00:41:59,839
Speaker 7: it's really like the size of the fishery. Not only

839
00:41:59,840 --> 00:42:01,720
Speaker 7: the days have been limited, but the amount of quota

840
00:42:01,719 --> 00:42:04,000
Speaker 7: that it's allowed to be harvested has been cut in half.

841
00:42:04,719 --> 00:42:07,440
Speaker 8: And just like so the emergency action that we referenced

842
00:42:07,480 --> 00:42:10,600
Speaker 8: two years ago to shrink that slot, they followed that

843
00:42:10,680 --> 00:42:13,560
Speaker 8: up with going through the full public hearing process in

844
00:42:13,600 --> 00:42:15,720
Speaker 8: the fall of twenty twenty three and then rule making

845
00:42:15,719 --> 00:42:17,680
Speaker 8: in the spring of twenty twenty four and that included

846
00:42:17,840 --> 00:42:20,360
Speaker 8: a commercial reduction as well, so they stuck to that

847
00:42:20,360 --> 00:42:23,480
Speaker 8: twenty to thirty one inch sloth recreational anglers, but recognizing

848
00:42:23,680 --> 00:42:26,920
Speaker 8: they also didn't have the commercial sector writting down there.

849
00:42:27,000 --> 00:42:30,960
Speaker 8: Landing as well contribute to conservation. So there has been reduction.

850
00:42:31,040 --> 00:42:33,400
Speaker 8: So we have a new quota in Massachusetts.

851
00:42:32,800 --> 00:42:36,120
Speaker 4: And I we should probably not everyone is aware that

852
00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:40,719
Speaker 4: this fishery has previously crashed and has recovered. So like

853
00:42:40,800 --> 00:42:43,759
Speaker 4: the late seventies, in their early eighties we kind of

854
00:42:43,880 --> 00:42:47,480
Speaker 4: bottomed out. The same story plays out played out not

855
00:42:47,600 --> 00:42:52,359
Speaker 4: many small fish, and so restrictions were put in place.

856
00:42:52,400 --> 00:42:57,640
Speaker 4: I mean, they did utilize moratoriums. But so here we

857
00:42:57,680 --> 00:43:02,359
Speaker 4: are in an overfish state and we have this very

858
00:43:02,480 --> 00:43:06,120
Speaker 4: narrow slot limit, and then that slot limit exists in

859
00:43:06,200 --> 00:43:09,200
Speaker 4: order to protect a particular age class of fish that

860
00:43:09,280 --> 00:43:14,840
Speaker 4: was pretty robust. So giving that that sort of narrow

861
00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:18,200
Speaker 4: or that particular age class was at twenty fifteen twenty

862
00:43:18,200 --> 00:43:23,160
Speaker 4: fifteen to have better opportunities for spawning.

863
00:43:23,480 --> 00:43:27,279
Speaker 5: So in the eighties that sort of approach also worked.

864
00:43:27,280 --> 00:43:30,760
Speaker 4: They were protecting a couple of different age classes of fish,

865
00:43:31,239 --> 00:43:35,960
Speaker 4: and those generations were able to rebuild the stock completely,

866
00:43:36,400 --> 00:43:39,640
Speaker 4: so instead like to the nineties and two thousands we

867
00:43:39,640 --> 00:43:43,680
Speaker 4: were referring to earlier. So hopefully, you know, with this restriction,

868
00:43:44,080 --> 00:43:50,000
Speaker 4: with some environmental luck, will have some good young year classes.

869
00:43:50,280 --> 00:43:54,439
Speaker 4: And you know, this this particular age class, that twenty

870
00:43:54,440 --> 00:43:57,000
Speaker 4: fifteen age class can do what it can do to,

871
00:43:57,520 --> 00:44:00,279
Speaker 4: you know, help build the stock back up. So there's

872
00:44:00,320 --> 00:44:03,480
Speaker 4: like there is methods to it and reasons for why

873
00:44:04,000 --> 00:44:07,120
Speaker 4: it's a narrower slide. It's not just controlling efforts. It's

874
00:44:07,160 --> 00:44:09,640
Speaker 4: sort of protecting that age class, which is kind of

875
00:44:09,640 --> 00:44:11,400
Speaker 4: neat when you think about it. And you know, I

876
00:44:11,400 --> 00:44:16,560
Speaker 4: should also mention that of all the Atlantic, all the

877
00:44:16,600 --> 00:44:20,520
Speaker 4: fish in the Atlantic that the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries manages,

878
00:44:20,600 --> 00:44:23,080
Speaker 4: this is probably the most researched fish. I mean, I

879
00:44:23,080 --> 00:44:26,280
Speaker 4: can't really mean, is there anything that gets this much attention?

880
00:44:27,040 --> 00:44:35,760
Speaker 10: Yeah, yeah, well sturgeon, but yeah, so a lot of attention,

881
00:44:36,040 --> 00:44:41,560
Speaker 10: a lot of of of research and and you know.

882
00:44:41,560 --> 00:44:44,080
Speaker 4: And these guys are too modest to say it, but

883
00:44:44,840 --> 00:44:48,239
Speaker 4: Massachusetts is doing some of the best stuff when it

884
00:44:48,320 --> 00:44:53,160
Speaker 4: comes to the research, and that research is going to

885
00:44:53,280 --> 00:44:57,320
Speaker 4: inform fisheries managers on the stripe ass boards and to

886
00:44:57,440 --> 00:45:01,640
Speaker 4: hopefully make better decisions and also say because these guys

887
00:45:01,640 --> 00:45:07,480
Speaker 4: can't that the ASNFC stripe pass board. Like, There's been times,

888
00:45:07,640 --> 00:45:10,560
Speaker 4: and it's a fair criticism, there's been times where they

889
00:45:10,600 --> 00:45:16,279
Speaker 4: haven't been very responsive to uh we'll say downturns in

890
00:45:16,320 --> 00:45:19,520
Speaker 4: the stock assessment. They weren't responsive and they weren't taking

891
00:45:19,760 --> 00:45:26,240
Speaker 4: necessary steps because it's a political process. Now, in recent years,

892
00:45:26,239 --> 00:45:30,279
Speaker 4: thanks to pressure from the rec community, I would I

893
00:45:30,320 --> 00:45:34,440
Speaker 4: would credit it to the rec community, conservation organizations and

894
00:45:34,480 --> 00:45:37,760
Speaker 4: the education that's been done. I think they are listening

895
00:45:38,280 --> 00:45:41,960
Speaker 4: and they they took this emergency action that that Ben

896
00:45:42,000 --> 00:45:42,560
Speaker 4: talked about.

897
00:45:42,800 --> 00:45:44,200
Speaker 5: So they're being more responsive.

898
00:45:44,719 --> 00:45:49,320
Speaker 4: They're listening to the to the to the research, and

899
00:45:49,719 --> 00:45:53,640
Speaker 4: so hopefully, you know, we're gonna repeat history and bring

900
00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:58,680
Speaker 4: this the stock back. But it's a complicated, it's a

901
00:45:58,680 --> 00:46:03,520
Speaker 4: political process. There's in fighting within the community. Every state

902
00:46:03,560 --> 00:46:07,600
Speaker 4: has its own representatives on this board, and within every

903
00:46:07,719 --> 00:46:11,600
Speaker 4: every group of the state's representative, there are sometimes different

904
00:46:11,640 --> 00:46:12,319
Speaker 4: points of view.

905
00:46:13,440 --> 00:46:15,920
Speaker 2: So well, I don't I don't get that. I mean fisheries,

906
00:46:16,360 --> 00:46:18,040
Speaker 2: I mean fishermen always get along.

907
00:46:18,160 --> 00:46:22,399
Speaker 10: There's it's not just fishermen board.

908
00:46:22,440 --> 00:46:25,160
Speaker 8: There's three representatives from the state. Okay, So there's a

909
00:46:25,560 --> 00:46:28,600
Speaker 8: management representative, and so for the Division of Ring Fisheries

910
00:46:28,920 --> 00:46:31,600
Speaker 8: for a long time that was doctor Mike Armstrong who's

911
00:46:31,600 --> 00:46:34,240
Speaker 8: retiring now, and so Nikolin the Surge will be our

912
00:46:34,320 --> 00:46:38,600
Speaker 8: new representative. But then we have a congressional appointee. Yeah,

913
00:46:38,640 --> 00:46:40,840
Speaker 8: we have a congressional liaison who's been Sarah Peak, but

914
00:46:40,960 --> 00:46:44,040
Speaker 8: she's also retiring. And then you also have a governor's appointee.

915
00:46:44,120 --> 00:46:47,360
Speaker 8: So you have two political people and one scientific person,

916
00:46:47,920 --> 00:46:50,839
Speaker 8: and so you can have basically a null vote if

917
00:46:50,840 --> 00:46:53,680
Speaker 8: you can't get people to agree, just like a state

918
00:46:53,719 --> 00:46:55,080
Speaker 8: could be like, yeah, we're not going to vote on this,

919
00:46:55,680 --> 00:46:58,160
Speaker 8: you know, we'll say because we can't even agree what

920
00:46:58,200 --> 00:47:00,839
Speaker 8: we want to do. Or maybe this scientific person gets

921
00:47:00,840 --> 00:47:04,560
Speaker 8: completely outvoted by the other two political persons people and

922
00:47:05,160 --> 00:47:08,160
Speaker 8: they ends up being like a politically biased vote rather

923
00:47:08,200 --> 00:47:12,200
Speaker 8: than scientifically best practically formed vote.

924
00:47:12,440 --> 00:47:16,319
Speaker 4: This wasn't always the way this changed. I guess it

925
00:47:16,360 --> 00:47:19,840
Speaker 4: was a late eighties of around I think the third

926
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:24,200
Speaker 4: change the amendment plan or management plan around that area.

927
00:47:24,239 --> 00:47:27,280
Speaker 4: But yeah, we've been in this situation where the Fisheries

928
00:47:27,320 --> 00:47:30,359
Speaker 4: has actually trained fisheries managers. The scientists have sort of

929
00:47:30,960 --> 00:47:35,239
Speaker 4: like their their voice has sort of been minimized over time.

930
00:47:35,800 --> 00:47:38,759
Speaker 4: And it's not to say that every state's making are

931
00:47:39,200 --> 00:47:42,080
Speaker 4: not advocating for the resource. It's that's not always the case.

932
00:47:42,120 --> 00:47:45,480
Speaker 4: But this has been a like this has been part

933
00:47:45,480 --> 00:47:46,080
Speaker 4: of the problem.

934
00:47:46,320 --> 00:47:50,080
Speaker 2: Well, you got a lot of the things anything public, right,

935
00:47:50,120 --> 00:47:55,040
Speaker 2: You have a lot of different interests with different levels

936
00:47:55,080 --> 00:47:57,040
Speaker 2: of investment in a resource.

937
00:47:57,400 --> 00:47:57,600
Speaker 1: Right.

938
00:47:57,719 --> 00:48:01,040
Speaker 2: So it's like one thing that rives me crazy when

939
00:48:01,040 --> 00:48:04,640
Speaker 2: we hear out West a lot is like, well, everybody

940
00:48:04,719 --> 00:48:08,160
Speaker 2: knows that private lands managed better than public land, And

941
00:48:08,200 --> 00:48:13,920
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, is that a fair comparison? Right, Like, no,

942
00:48:14,320 --> 00:48:18,240
Speaker 2: you don't have everyone in the world with a thought

943
00:48:18,520 --> 00:48:20,719
Speaker 2: interest in how you should manage your living room.

944
00:48:21,920 --> 00:48:22,160
Speaker 8: Right.

945
00:48:23,160 --> 00:48:26,360
Speaker 2: Right, If I said, Bill, I don't really like the

946
00:48:26,400 --> 00:48:28,560
Speaker 2: flow in here. I think we should move some ship around,

947
00:48:28,880 --> 00:48:40,440
Speaker 2: you get to say, wife, So what what's happening on

948
00:48:40,440 --> 00:48:43,640
Speaker 2: on on the on the study side, like the the

949
00:48:43,680 --> 00:48:46,719
Speaker 2: things the angler can affect and.

950
00:48:48,800 --> 00:48:50,040
Speaker 3: You're your research man.

951
00:48:50,440 --> 00:48:54,880
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, So we're doing a lot of straight back research.

952
00:48:54,920 --> 00:48:57,880
Speaker 8: As Chris said, our most recent project has been about

953
00:48:57,880 --> 00:49:00,279
Speaker 8: post release mortality and going back to what you're saying

954
00:49:00,320 --> 00:49:02,719
Speaker 8: about like people being informed or recreation, Like you were

955
00:49:02,719 --> 00:49:04,919
Speaker 8: asking about are people more informed now you were saying

956
00:49:04,960 --> 00:49:07,759
Speaker 8: the recreational community. It is really cool because like I,

957
00:49:08,760 --> 00:49:10,840
Speaker 8: in our kind of team of researchers, I'm often the

958
00:49:10,840 --> 00:49:12,960
Speaker 8: one who goes out and talks to, especially with my

959
00:49:12,960 --> 00:49:15,360
Speaker 8: position now, who goes and talks to like fishing clubs

960
00:49:15,800 --> 00:49:16,520
Speaker 8: and charter.

961
00:49:16,360 --> 00:49:17,400
Speaker 1: Captains and stuff like that.

962
00:49:17,440 --> 00:49:19,319
Speaker 8: And I'll get up and I'll talk about what's going

963
00:49:19,360 --> 00:49:21,560
Speaker 8: on with straight bass and a big part of the

964
00:49:21,600 --> 00:49:24,880
Speaker 8: story now and we'll dive into it is post release mortality.

965
00:49:25,280 --> 00:49:28,160
Speaker 8: And for years, you know, it's been like recreational fishermen

966
00:49:28,239 --> 00:49:30,680
Speaker 8: saying we're not the problem. Commercial fisheries are the problem.

967
00:49:30,760 --> 00:49:32,719
Speaker 8: This is the problem, but anything but recreational fishermen. Now

968
00:49:32,800 --> 00:49:34,839
Speaker 8: I'll talk about it. I'll talk about how post release

969
00:49:34,880 --> 00:49:38,400
Speaker 8: mortality is a huge issue for this fishery, and somebody

970
00:49:38,440 --> 00:49:41,720
Speaker 8: will start being like, ah, bullshit, like and then somebody

971
00:49:41,719 --> 00:49:44,080
Speaker 8: else will stand up and be like, no, it's us.

972
00:49:44,200 --> 00:49:46,960
Speaker 8: We have to own it, like you're you're wrong, Like

973
00:49:47,120 --> 00:49:49,919
Speaker 8: you you got to read the science and understand, like we.

974
00:49:49,920 --> 00:49:50,880
Speaker 1: Need to take care of this.

975
00:49:51,000 --> 00:49:53,680
Speaker 8: So it is cool like to see the increased participation

976
00:49:53,719 --> 00:49:54,960
Speaker 8: and increase awareness.

977
00:49:55,040 --> 00:49:59,480
Speaker 3: So listen, our first track, I was like we got

978
00:49:59,480 --> 00:50:00,680
Speaker 3: all that for video.

979
00:50:00,680 --> 00:50:02,879
Speaker 8: And I was like callous spending way too much time

980
00:50:02,920 --> 00:50:06,880
Speaker 8: on like this is what we're gonna get. Oh boy.

981
00:50:07,880 --> 00:50:08,160
Speaker 1: Yeah.

982
00:50:08,200 --> 00:50:11,440
Speaker 8: So so one of the things, like Chris was saying, like,

983
00:50:11,480 --> 00:50:14,400
Speaker 8: so we have the environmental issues, which really and I

984
00:50:14,440 --> 00:50:17,720
Speaker 8: was kind of alluding to it straight bass for successful spawning,

985
00:50:18,320 --> 00:50:21,160
Speaker 8: like they can spawn and have successful egg hatching over

986
00:50:21,239 --> 00:50:23,799
Speaker 8: like six or seven degrees eight degrees centigree, but to

987
00:50:23,880 --> 00:50:27,279
Speaker 8: have really high like hatch rates and like a lot

988
00:50:27,320 --> 00:50:28,880
Speaker 8: of those eggs successfully hashing, it's.

989
00:50:28,760 --> 00:50:31,839
Speaker 1: Like two or three degrees really narrow window, right, and

990
00:50:31,880 --> 00:50:32,880
Speaker 1: then they need.

991
00:50:32,719 --> 00:50:35,120
Speaker 8: To have the right environmental conditions for after they hatch,

992
00:50:35,160 --> 00:50:36,719
Speaker 8: so there's lots of food for them, which is a

993
00:50:36,719 --> 00:50:39,160
Speaker 8: whole other thing that has to happen right environmentally, So

994
00:50:39,200 --> 00:50:40,960
Speaker 8: we can't it's really hard for us to affect that.

995
00:50:41,320 --> 00:50:43,200
Speaker 8: A layer on top of that climate change layer on

996
00:50:43,280 --> 00:50:46,240
Speaker 8: top of that the Chestnut Bay Watershed having nearly eighteen

997
00:50:46,239 --> 00:50:50,040
Speaker 8: million people now so everything that goes with that, So

998
00:50:50,360 --> 00:50:51,359
Speaker 8: we can't handle.

999
00:50:51,040 --> 00:50:52,560
Speaker 1: That as of fishery.

1000
00:50:52,600 --> 00:50:58,359
Speaker 8: What we do see happening is that because like and

1001
00:50:58,400 --> 00:51:01,200
Speaker 8: I came in I grew up up in Long Island Sound,

1002
00:51:01,280 --> 00:51:04,520
Speaker 8: so further south than these guys. And when I started fishing,

1003
00:51:04,560 --> 00:51:07,520
Speaker 8: it was like you went fishing for bluefish in the

1004
00:51:07,600 --> 00:51:09,960
Speaker 8: nineties because there were not like early nineties.

1005
00:51:09,680 --> 00:51:12,200
Speaker 1: Because they were not straight past to target. They just

1006
00:51:12,200 --> 00:51:13,399
Speaker 1: weren't plentiful enough target.

1007
00:51:13,440 --> 00:51:15,160
Speaker 8: You hear you catch one, or you'd hear somebody catch me,

1008
00:51:15,160 --> 00:51:17,960
Speaker 8: You're like, sweet, somebody cuts straight past. I maybe tomorrow

1009
00:51:17,960 --> 00:51:19,719
Speaker 8: I'll catch a straight past. I mean the summer, at

1010
00:51:19,719 --> 00:51:20,520
Speaker 8: some point I'll catch one.

1011
00:51:20,960 --> 00:51:23,480
Speaker 1: And then by the late two.

1012
00:51:23,360 --> 00:51:25,759
Speaker 8: Thousands, I was like, I am not taking out my

1013
00:51:25,800 --> 00:51:28,000
Speaker 8: camera unless that fish is over thirty five pounds.

1014
00:51:28,160 --> 00:51:28,600
Speaker 3: I don't care.

1015
00:51:28,920 --> 00:51:31,440
Speaker 8: Like that's like that's what happened in like ten years.

1016
00:51:31,480 --> 00:51:33,720
Speaker 1: It was just like that was the change that happened.

1017
00:51:34,480 --> 00:51:37,759
Speaker 8: But I also saw people who didn't start fishing as

1018
00:51:37,800 --> 00:51:39,759
Speaker 8: young as I did and didn't.

1019
00:51:39,480 --> 00:51:41,680
Speaker 1: Go through those years of really tough.

1020
00:51:41,440 --> 00:51:44,600
Speaker 8: Fishing, who didn't know what was going on, being like,

1021
00:51:46,520 --> 00:51:49,520
Speaker 8: you know, this fishing is amazing. Yeah, like joining the peak,

1022
00:51:49,840 --> 00:51:51,520
Speaker 8: I'm gonna go out three days a week and I'm

1023
00:51:51,520 --> 00:51:55,640
Speaker 8: gonna take my two over twenty eight every single day.

1024
00:51:55,920 --> 00:51:57,200
Speaker 8: It's like, what are you doing?

1025
00:51:57,239 --> 00:51:57,399
Speaker 1: Man?

1026
00:51:57,440 --> 00:51:59,120
Speaker 8: But like so that's like what we're now. We're going

1027
00:51:59,160 --> 00:52:01,759
Speaker 8: back down on this side of it, and so we're

1028
00:52:01,760 --> 00:52:03,320
Speaker 8: trying you have all these people who joined at the

1029
00:52:03,320 --> 00:52:05,520
Speaker 8: peaking don't really understand, we're trying to educate them. But

1030
00:52:06,280 --> 00:52:09,319
Speaker 8: especially in the in you know, maybe New York and uh,

1031
00:52:09,840 --> 00:52:12,120
Speaker 8: it's really a catch and really the ease fishery. There's

1032
00:52:12,160 --> 00:52:16,080
Speaker 8: more harvest, more interest in harvest and keeping fish and.

1033
00:52:15,920 --> 00:52:17,920
Speaker 1: Like meat fishing in the Mid Atlantic.

1034
00:52:17,920 --> 00:52:20,200
Speaker 8: And I'm not saying meat fishing is like a derogatory term,

1035
00:52:20,320 --> 00:52:24,160
Speaker 8: just with like there's a far more higher valuation of

1036
00:52:24,239 --> 00:52:27,040
Speaker 8: like taking a fish home and eating it as part

1037
00:52:27,040 --> 00:52:29,560
Speaker 8: of the culture more. I think, especially around straight Pass

1038
00:52:29,960 --> 00:52:31,719
Speaker 8: once you get New New Jersey.

1039
00:52:31,680 --> 00:52:34,440
Speaker 1: Delaware, Virginia, Maryland, all those states.

1040
00:52:35,280 --> 00:52:38,160
Speaker 8: But there's just everybody up here loves to fish for

1041
00:52:38,200 --> 00:52:40,759
Speaker 8: straight Pass, but we tend to eat some different fish

1042
00:52:40,680 --> 00:52:43,440
Speaker 8: and it's not as much of a focus on harvesting.

1043
00:52:43,920 --> 00:52:47,320
Speaker 8: So what's happened is that, well, harvest tends to be

1044
00:52:47,440 --> 00:52:50,719
Speaker 8: pretty static year to year and it's a manageable level,

1045
00:52:50,760 --> 00:52:53,280
Speaker 8: and we have like these really good direct controls on harvest.

1046
00:52:53,400 --> 00:52:55,560
Speaker 8: We hope, you know, people have to follow the regulations,

1047
00:52:55,880 --> 00:52:58,880
Speaker 8: but we can say here's your length limits, here's how

1048
00:52:58,880 --> 00:53:00,239
Speaker 8: many fish you can put in your back. We have

1049
00:53:00,280 --> 00:53:03,440
Speaker 8: like real levers we can pull as managers. The the

1050
00:53:03,600 --> 00:53:06,520
Speaker 8: unseen thing here is the post release mortality. So all

1051
00:53:06,560 --> 00:53:08,640
Speaker 8: these fish are being caught and caught again, you guys

1052
00:53:08,680 --> 00:53:09,719
Speaker 8: probably saw a fish that.

1053
00:53:09,760 --> 00:53:13,080
Speaker 3: Which is basically unseen for any form of fishing anywhere.

1054
00:53:13,160 --> 00:53:15,319
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you know.

1055
00:53:15,360 --> 00:53:18,000
Speaker 8: So then like we're getting the tools now that we'll

1056
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:19,879
Speaker 8: talk about that to like get a better.

1057
00:53:19,600 --> 00:53:20,399
Speaker 1: Handle on this.

1058
00:53:21,480 --> 00:53:24,359
Speaker 8: But what we didn't, what we can't have a really

1059
00:53:24,360 --> 00:53:27,160
Speaker 8: hard time controlling, is how often are people going to

1060
00:53:27,200 --> 00:53:29,000
Speaker 8: go out and fish and catch and release fish?

1061
00:53:29,280 --> 00:53:31,759
Speaker 3: And so, yeah, I mean what you're talking about, right,

1062
00:53:31,840 --> 00:53:32,840
Speaker 3: is a culture change.

1063
00:53:32,960 --> 00:53:33,960
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1064
00:53:34,000 --> 00:53:38,200
Speaker 8: I mean if if you want to have to lower

1065
00:53:38,239 --> 00:53:41,400
Speaker 8: post release mortality, you can either get like a voluntary

1066
00:53:41,719 --> 00:53:47,160
Speaker 8: culture change through education and hopefully conservation and stewardship, or

1067
00:53:47,680 --> 00:53:49,520
Speaker 8: you know what some people are starting to freak out

1068
00:53:49,560 --> 00:53:52,680
Speaker 8: about now. And again, I think that Bill said the

1069
00:53:52,680 --> 00:53:54,799
Speaker 8: house isn't burning down yet, so I think it's a

1070
00:53:54,840 --> 00:53:57,440
Speaker 8: little preempted to be talking about it is like a

1071
00:53:57,520 --> 00:54:00,520
Speaker 8: no target closure, like actually saying like now, not only

1072
00:54:01,520 --> 00:54:02,880
Speaker 8: are we not going to allow.

1073
00:54:02,680 --> 00:54:04,759
Speaker 1: Harvest, but you should not be out.

1074
00:54:04,960 --> 00:54:09,120
Speaker 3: You can't you should not be targeting straight bass right,

1075
00:54:09,160 --> 00:54:09,840
Speaker 3: which which.

1076
00:54:09,640 --> 00:54:10,919
Speaker 1: Is also impossible to enforce.

1077
00:54:11,080 --> 00:54:12,520
Speaker 3: It's impossible to enforce.

1078
00:54:13,080 --> 00:54:13,279
Speaker 6: You know.

1079
00:54:13,360 --> 00:54:18,200
Speaker 2: We do that for bull trout in Montana on the

1080
00:54:18,320 --> 00:54:23,279
Speaker 2: vast majority of waters, and you know, it's like, well,

1081
00:54:23,280 --> 00:54:27,040
Speaker 2: it's a pretty big fly. Rod coilers at the same time,

1082
00:54:27,200 --> 00:54:29,960
Speaker 2: cut throat eat everything. And if that's the only rod

1083
00:54:30,040 --> 00:54:32,840
Speaker 2: somebody's got in the closet, you know, it's like you

1084
00:54:32,880 --> 00:54:34,800
Speaker 2: can't tell them not to fish at all.

1085
00:54:34,880 --> 00:54:39,720
Speaker 3: Right, so what is how are you doing the study?

1086
00:54:39,920 --> 00:54:42,520
Speaker 8: Yeah, so we're so just to lay a little bit

1087
00:54:42,560 --> 00:54:45,600
Speaker 8: more groundwork. What all the numbers in the Stock Assessment

1088
00:54:45,640 --> 00:54:51,160
Speaker 8: point to now is that in a given year, eight

1089
00:54:51,239 --> 00:54:56,719
Speaker 8: to eleven, twelve percent of mortality is commercial. That all

1090
00:54:56,800 --> 00:55:00,560
Speaker 8: the rest of that ninety percent of mortality is creational,

1091
00:55:01,200 --> 00:55:03,680
Speaker 8: and sometimes as much as fifty or sixty percent of

1092
00:55:03,680 --> 00:55:06,400
Speaker 8: that could be post release mortality. So it's not harvest,

1093
00:55:06,480 --> 00:55:08,960
Speaker 8: it's people catching and releasing fish. And we have a

1094
00:55:09,080 --> 00:55:12,040
Speaker 8: there's a figure, there's a number we used or that

1095
00:55:12,080 --> 00:55:15,200
Speaker 8: the ASNFC uses to estimate post release mortality, and that's

1096
00:55:15,320 --> 00:55:17,600
Speaker 8: nine percent and that came from a DMF study that

1097
00:55:17,719 --> 00:55:21,040
Speaker 8: was done about twenty years ago. Before a lot of

1098
00:55:21,040 --> 00:55:23,360
Speaker 8: the tools that Bill and I use now all the

1099
00:55:23,400 --> 00:55:27,000
Speaker 8: time to do our studies. Came around where they got

1100
00:55:27,080 --> 00:55:30,520
Speaker 8: a bunch of small strap ass out of out of

1101
00:55:30,560 --> 00:55:32,920
Speaker 8: weirs in Rhode Island. We trucked him up here to

1102
00:55:32,920 --> 00:55:35,839
Speaker 8: sail a mass, put tags in them, and put him

1103
00:55:35,840 --> 00:55:38,480
Speaker 8: into a ti a tidal pond that we had a

1104
00:55:38,520 --> 00:55:41,480
Speaker 8: gate on. Kept him in there for a summer. People

1105
00:55:41,520 --> 00:55:45,160
Speaker 8: fished on them using fly rods, plugs, bait, all this

1106
00:55:45,200 --> 00:55:48,920
Speaker 8: other stuff. Saw like you know, recorded the numbers for

1107
00:55:49,000 --> 00:55:51,439
Speaker 8: everything they caught, and at the end of the year

1108
00:55:52,120 --> 00:55:55,480
Speaker 8: they drained the pond and sifted through all the mud

1109
00:55:55,520 --> 00:55:58,920
Speaker 8: to find bodies and tags and everything else, and came

1110
00:55:59,000 --> 00:55:59,600
Speaker 8: up with a number.

1111
00:55:59,640 --> 00:56:03,440
Speaker 1: This was like, okay, nine percent of these fish died afterwards.

1112
00:56:03,760 --> 00:56:04,399
Speaker 1: That was the number.

1113
00:56:04,440 --> 00:56:06,759
Speaker 8: And they were like, this is about small fish in

1114
00:56:06,840 --> 00:56:08,640
Speaker 8: this one thing, like, don't use this as a coast

1115
00:56:08,680 --> 00:56:12,360
Speaker 8: white estimate. No better number existed. So ASFC has been

1116
00:56:12,440 --> 00:56:14,480
Speaker 8: using this as a coast wide estimate for twenty years.

1117
00:56:15,440 --> 00:56:18,279
Speaker 8: So not only do we, I mean, we know that

1118
00:56:18,320 --> 00:56:20,799
Speaker 8: there's a lot of post release mortality, and like that's

1119
00:56:20,840 --> 00:56:22,960
Speaker 8: this big lever that we're trying to figure out. Can

1120
00:56:22,960 --> 00:56:25,799
Speaker 8: we can we even nudge it, you know, to try

1121
00:56:25,840 --> 00:56:30,120
Speaker 8: and help strip bass while maintaining as much opportunity as

1122
00:56:30,160 --> 00:56:32,719
Speaker 8: possible for people to fish for these things. But we

1123
00:56:32,760 --> 00:56:34,480
Speaker 8: need so the big the first step we are like,

1124
00:56:34,920 --> 00:56:36,160
Speaker 8: what's the actual number?

1125
00:56:36,520 --> 00:56:40,120
Speaker 1: Like, what's the real number? Is nine percent? Real? So

1126
00:56:40,719 --> 00:56:44,080
Speaker 1: it kind of started with circle hooks and jay.

1127
00:56:43,880 --> 00:56:48,280
Speaker 8: Hooks as we went down this road management wise, realizing

1128
00:56:48,360 --> 00:56:49,799
Speaker 8: recruitment was poor and we.

1129
00:56:49,800 --> 00:56:52,279
Speaker 1: Had spawning soccer biomass coming down. What can we do?

1130
00:56:52,680 --> 00:56:55,480
Speaker 8: They mandated, and really, I think a great proactive move.

1131
00:56:55,640 --> 00:56:57,480
Speaker 8: They said, circle hooks work for and a lot of

1132
00:56:57,520 --> 00:57:00,440
Speaker 8: fisheries we're gonna say if you're using live or dead, you.

1133
00:57:00,440 --> 00:57:01,600
Speaker 1: Have to use a circle hook.

1134
00:57:01,960 --> 00:57:04,720
Speaker 8: And the just without any real straight bas specific information,

1135
00:57:04,760 --> 00:57:07,320
Speaker 8: there were a couple of great papers with some findings.

1136
00:57:07,360 --> 00:57:08,839
Speaker 8: They were like, we're gonna do this because we think

1137
00:57:08,840 --> 00:57:11,120
Speaker 8: it's the right thing to do, and you know, so

1138
00:57:11,200 --> 00:57:13,480
Speaker 8: at the management board they all voted for it, all

1139
00:57:13,480 --> 00:57:14,600
Speaker 8: like the managers.

1140
00:57:14,200 --> 00:57:16,800
Speaker 1: Voted for it. And then Mike Armstrong came back the next.

1141
00:57:16,640 --> 00:57:20,320
Speaker 8: Day, flew back from DC, walk into Bill's office, got

1142
00:57:20,360 --> 00:57:22,520
Speaker 8: me in there and he's like, all right, tell me

1143
00:57:22,560 --> 00:57:26,280
Speaker 8: if it's gonna work. I got like Bill myself and

1144
00:57:26,320 --> 00:57:28,480
Speaker 8: Mike and Dean together, it's like, all right, guys, go

1145
00:57:28,560 --> 00:57:29,800
Speaker 8: figure out if this is actually.

1146
00:57:29,520 --> 00:57:31,040
Speaker 1: And we're going to make a difference at all.

1147
00:57:31,120 --> 00:57:34,360
Speaker 7: Right, yeah, right, So and we had our hunches based

1148
00:57:34,400 --> 00:57:35,240
Speaker 7: on our experience.

1149
00:57:35,280 --> 00:57:36,439
Speaker 6: But so that's what we did.

1150
00:57:36,520 --> 00:57:39,800
Speaker 7: And it was in twenty nineteen when we started designing

1151
00:57:39,880 --> 00:57:44,480
Speaker 7: the study and what we were evaluating at that point

1152
00:57:44,520 --> 00:57:47,520
Speaker 7: then was the conservation benefit between the use of a

1153
00:57:47,600 --> 00:57:52,000
Speaker 7: jayhook versus a circle hook. And so back in twenty twenty,

1154
00:57:52,040 --> 00:57:53,800
Speaker 7: when everybody was locked in their house is Ben and

1155
00:57:53,840 --> 00:57:55,960
Speaker 7: I and our small team of staff, we got to

1156
00:57:56,000 --> 00:57:59,560
Speaker 7: go out and implement this study. So how we did

1157
00:57:59,600 --> 00:58:03,720
Speaker 7: that was we used acoustic telemetry. This is the technology now,

1158
00:58:03,760 --> 00:58:05,840
Speaker 7: this step up from the tide pool.

1159
00:58:05,720 --> 00:58:08,240
Speaker 2: Which is just such a great answer to the how

1160
00:58:08,280 --> 00:58:12,720
Speaker 2: do you know right for all everybody yelling bullshit in

1161
00:58:12,760 --> 00:58:13,880
Speaker 2: the back of the line right now.

1162
00:58:14,440 --> 00:58:18,560
Speaker 7: This is built on good sound science and the cutting technology.

1163
00:58:18,920 --> 00:58:22,240
Speaker 7: So the way this acoustic telemetry works is that you

1164
00:58:22,360 --> 00:58:26,880
Speaker 7: have transmitters, which is the tag, and then receivers. Each

1165
00:58:26,960 --> 00:58:30,960
Speaker 7: transmitter has a unique ID to it that transmits to

1166
00:58:31,360 --> 00:58:35,760
Speaker 7: this passive acoustic array of receivers that you place in

1167
00:58:35,800 --> 00:58:39,240
Speaker 7: your study area. So when the fish has a tag

1168
00:58:39,320 --> 00:58:41,200
Speaker 7: in it or a transmitter and it swims by one

1169
00:58:41,240 --> 00:58:45,800
Speaker 7: of these receivers, it transmits unique information ID, and it

1170
00:58:45,880 --> 00:58:50,640
Speaker 7: can transmit other data elements like temperature or in our

1171
00:58:50,680 --> 00:58:54,480
Speaker 7: case it was accelerometer. So we were looking at tailbeat frequency.

1172
00:58:55,160 --> 00:58:56,720
Speaker 7: So it's kind of like which you.

1173
00:58:56,720 --> 00:59:00,160
Speaker 3: Could say directly, it relates to health of the fish.

1174
00:59:00,200 --> 00:59:02,040
Speaker 6: And that's why was allowed or not.

1175
00:59:02,360 --> 00:59:05,520
Speaker 7: Yeah, So it's like kind of driving down the highway

1176
00:59:05,680 --> 00:59:08,120
Speaker 7: and going through the toll booth and your transponder pings

1177
00:59:08,160 --> 00:59:14,200
Speaker 7: to the to the toll gate. So the accelerometer measured

1178
00:59:14,240 --> 00:59:17,520
Speaker 7: the tailbeat frequency and so, and it could measure it

1179
00:59:17,640 --> 00:59:19,720
Speaker 7: for as long as within the array. So some of

1180
00:59:19,760 --> 00:59:23,680
Speaker 7: the post release mortalities say like you catch a fish,

1181
00:59:23,840 --> 00:59:26,200
Speaker 7: you let it go, and you see it swim way strong.

1182
00:59:26,680 --> 00:59:28,400
Speaker 7: You maybe didn't even notice it was puffing a little

1183
00:59:28,400 --> 00:59:30,400
Speaker 7: bit of blood out of its skills or something like that.

1184
00:59:30,680 --> 00:59:31,400
Speaker 6: Up to a day or.

1185
00:59:31,360 --> 00:59:35,040
Speaker 7: Two later, that fish dies and we can actually capture

1186
00:59:35,080 --> 00:59:38,720
Speaker 7: that through the tailbreat frequency. So it's a really powerful

1187
00:59:38,760 --> 00:59:42,640
Speaker 7: tool for predicting mortality. But what else is really cool

1188
00:59:42,680 --> 00:59:46,120
Speaker 7: about the technology we use is so not only can

1189
00:59:46,160 --> 00:59:48,720
Speaker 7: you cover a large area like where we worked was

1190
00:59:48,760 --> 00:59:52,040
Speaker 7: all in the Beverly Salem marble Head Sound area up

1191
00:59:52,040 --> 00:59:55,480
Speaker 7: and off of north shore Massachusetts. But if that fish

1192
00:59:55,640 --> 00:59:59,760
Speaker 7: leaves our array as it migrates south, if any other

1193
00:59:59,800 --> 01:00:02,760
Speaker 7: re searcher is using the same technology which most people

1194
01:00:02,760 --> 01:00:04,560
Speaker 7: are up and down the coast.

1195
01:00:04,440 --> 01:00:09,760
Speaker 1: It will whales in, Great whites and sturgeon, literally thousands

1196
01:00:09,880 --> 01:00:14,560
Speaker 1: of receivers. I'm winter flounder, I've done River Harry and Chad.

1197
01:00:15,360 --> 01:00:19,040
Speaker 8: I mean just almost any fish you talked about weakfish

1198
01:00:19,040 --> 01:00:22,800
Speaker 8: at some point want to catch. The people are tagging weakfish, like, yeah,

1199
01:00:22,840 --> 01:00:24,920
Speaker 8: almost any species you would think of.

1200
01:00:24,880 --> 01:00:27,160
Speaker 7: They're they're out there, and there's receivers out there. And

1201
01:00:27,200 --> 01:00:30,360
Speaker 7: even with the offshore window, all that was offshore wind

1202
01:00:30,400 --> 01:00:34,360
Speaker 7: areas now are starting to have acoustic receivers really expanding

1203
01:00:34,640 --> 01:00:36,880
Speaker 7: east where we've ever been able to look before.

1204
01:00:37,320 --> 01:00:41,120
Speaker 2: And it's it's you know, every agency has a certain

1205
01:00:41,160 --> 01:00:45,560
Speaker 2: amount of resources, so this is pretty awesome because you

1206
01:00:45,560 --> 01:00:49,000
Speaker 2: get to run your study and it can get picked

1207
01:00:49,080 --> 01:00:52,360
Speaker 2: up on other spread out resources.

1208
01:00:52,680 --> 01:00:56,160
Speaker 7: And we're all a member of a network and uh

1209
01:00:56,400 --> 01:01:01,480
Speaker 7: Atlantic Coast Telemetry Network and so there's like agreements we

1210
01:01:01,520 --> 01:01:04,480
Speaker 7: all go in as researchers and we're like, okay, this

1211
01:01:04,680 --> 01:01:05,560
Speaker 7: is here's the data.

1212
01:01:05,600 --> 01:01:06,840
Speaker 6: And if you use.

1213
01:01:06,680 --> 01:01:08,840
Speaker 7: That data and you're going to publish from it, then

1214
01:01:08,920 --> 01:01:11,640
Speaker 7: you first want to have to contact us. We will

1215
01:01:11,640 --> 01:01:14,840
Speaker 7: share that detection information from our receivers with you, and

1216
01:01:14,880 --> 01:01:17,560
Speaker 7: then you work out if if we'd be co authorship

1217
01:01:17,720 --> 01:01:18,600
Speaker 7: on that or whatever.

1218
01:01:18,680 --> 01:01:20,560
Speaker 1: It depends what's going on. But if that is that

1219
01:01:20,640 --> 01:01:22,400
Speaker 1: the tag, the tag.

1220
01:01:22,200 --> 01:01:25,000
Speaker 8: Belongs to the researcher, yes, and we all cooperate and

1221
01:01:25,080 --> 01:01:26,400
Speaker 8: share our receiver data.

1222
01:01:26,560 --> 01:01:30,400
Speaker 1: So like we can't if we get like somebody tags fifty.

1223
01:01:30,160 --> 01:01:33,200
Speaker 8: Surgeon in the Merrimack River and they spend all summer

1224
01:01:33,240 --> 01:01:34,800
Speaker 8: on gift, which may we have a bunch of receivers

1225
01:01:34,840 --> 01:01:38,120
Speaker 8: out there. Like we just basically can just say here's

1226
01:01:38,120 --> 01:01:40,600
Speaker 8: your data, happy to do it, thanks, But I mean,

1227
01:01:40,600 --> 01:01:42,480
Speaker 8: if that's your old studies, you probably make us co authors.

1228
01:01:44,120 --> 01:01:46,680
Speaker 8: If half of your detections are us, please make us

1229
01:01:46,720 --> 01:01:49,000
Speaker 8: co authors. But we can't do anything with that information,

1230
01:01:49,080 --> 01:01:50,360
Speaker 8: like we're not going to publish off of it.

1231
01:01:50,640 --> 01:01:52,840
Speaker 7: And then this this way, everybody kind of plays nice

1232
01:01:52,840 --> 01:01:54,560
Speaker 7: and we all get to share information, and there's some

1233
01:01:54,600 --> 01:01:57,160
Speaker 7: people that don't play nice and then shure out. So

1234
01:01:57,440 --> 01:01:59,640
Speaker 7: it's a really good system that's been developed over the

1235
01:01:59,720 --> 01:02:02,160
Speaker 7: last like ten years or so that we've been a

1236
01:02:02,160 --> 01:02:03,320
Speaker 7: really large part of.

1237
01:02:04,080 --> 01:02:08,400
Speaker 2: But for yeah, for your your study, how many fish

1238
01:02:08,400 --> 01:02:10,400
Speaker 2: did you put your transit?

1239
01:02:11,040 --> 01:02:11,280
Speaker 6: Yep?

1240
01:02:11,720 --> 01:02:14,840
Speaker 7: So over two years we tagged three hundred and fifty

1241
01:02:14,840 --> 01:02:19,320
Speaker 7: fish and we caught well over seven hundred fish within

1242
01:02:19,640 --> 01:02:22,880
Speaker 7: that array. And so when we caught the fish, then

1243
01:02:22,920 --> 01:02:28,360
Speaker 7: we would collect different parameters data elements from it, fight time,

1244
01:02:29,200 --> 01:02:32,680
Speaker 7: handling time, release time, where that fish was hooked, what

1245
01:02:32,760 --> 01:02:36,480
Speaker 7: type of hook you were you using, trauma associated with

1246
01:02:36,640 --> 01:02:38,800
Speaker 7: that so was it bleeding or not, and then like

1247
01:02:38,920 --> 01:02:41,680
Speaker 7: vitality once you released it, how well it swam away.

1248
01:02:42,400 --> 01:02:44,440
Speaker 6: And so we collected all these information.

1249
01:02:44,160 --> 01:02:48,920
Speaker 8: Fine scale of water temperature, in water temperature, environmental information.

1250
01:02:50,000 --> 01:02:52,040
Speaker 7: And so then as we collected all this information, we

1251
01:02:52,080 --> 01:02:54,640
Speaker 7: really didn't know what was going to be a predictor

1252
01:02:54,720 --> 01:02:57,240
Speaker 7: of mortality, but we just collected everything that we could

1253
01:02:57,280 --> 01:02:59,320
Speaker 7: at that time. And then at the end of those

1254
01:02:59,360 --> 01:03:03,360
Speaker 7: two years, we followed those fish and then we had

1255
01:03:03,400 --> 01:03:05,800
Speaker 7: our data set. And then the person that's not at

1256
01:03:05,800 --> 01:03:08,720
Speaker 7: this table that's ezequally as important is Mike a dean,

1257
01:03:08,800 --> 01:03:12,320
Speaker 7: and he's the analyst, and he created a model based

1258
01:03:12,320 --> 01:03:15,920
Speaker 7: on all these DIFP parameters that could predict mortality, and

1259
01:03:16,000 --> 01:03:20,360
Speaker 7: so what came to the top was fight time, handling time,

1260
01:03:20,640 --> 01:03:26,760
Speaker 7: water temperature, air temperature, vitality, and hook location. Yeah, and

1261
01:03:26,800 --> 01:03:30,360
Speaker 7: hook location is the big one. So for that, the.

1262
01:03:30,240 --> 01:03:33,320
Speaker 3: Hook location rose to the top of we.

1263
01:03:33,360 --> 01:03:37,080
Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean the the day like we had we

1264
01:03:37,080 --> 01:03:39,960
Speaker 8: had we collected all these individual data points and then.

1265
01:03:41,440 --> 01:03:44,640
Speaker 1: Of these their hunderd fifty fish Billa or I did

1266
01:03:44,640 --> 01:03:46,600
Speaker 1: all the tagging. One of the two of us did everything.

1267
01:03:46,600 --> 01:03:49,080
Speaker 8: So we were like in very close condition close communication

1268
01:03:49,120 --> 01:03:52,160
Speaker 8: throughout everything, and we would assign what was called the

1269
01:03:52,160 --> 01:03:56,680
Speaker 8: conditioned score, and that really became like not surprisingly, when

1270
01:03:56,680 --> 01:03:58,680
Speaker 8: we did the modeling, the condition score was the most

1271
01:03:58,680 --> 01:04:01,280
Speaker 8: important predictor because it brought several.

1272
01:04:00,960 --> 01:04:02,600
Speaker 1: Of these really important things together.

1273
01:04:03,000 --> 01:04:05,840
Speaker 8: And so then once we created the model, you say, okay,

1274
01:04:05,840 --> 01:04:08,040
Speaker 8: what does conditions score really and break it out into

1275
01:04:08,080 --> 01:04:10,200
Speaker 8: its components. But yeah, it really is like cook location,

1276
01:04:10,440 --> 01:04:14,120
Speaker 8: blood handling, and fight time. Those are like big ones.

1277
01:04:14,160 --> 01:04:15,760
Speaker 8: And then there seems to be here some water.

1278
01:04:16,080 --> 01:04:17,400
Speaker 6: Water temperature is a big one.

1279
01:04:17,440 --> 01:04:21,200
Speaker 7: We don't have really warm water here up in Massachusetts,

1280
01:04:21,320 --> 01:04:25,800
Speaker 7: but northern yeah, Northern Buzzer's Bay does get pretty toasty.

1281
01:04:26,840 --> 01:04:30,080
Speaker 7: But through the modeling process, we can actually predict mortality

1282
01:04:30,080 --> 01:04:34,480
Speaker 7: on and that is a significant has a significant stress

1283
01:04:34,640 --> 01:04:37,520
Speaker 7: on release stripe bass, and could they lead to mortality.

1284
01:04:37,600 --> 01:04:39,280
Speaker 8: Yeah, it's cool, like some of these other things are

1285
01:04:39,280 --> 01:04:41,520
Speaker 8: more linear, like time can be more linear. Like so

1286
01:04:41,600 --> 01:04:44,160
Speaker 8: if you think like longer time, higher chans of mortality.

1287
01:04:44,200 --> 01:04:47,040
Speaker 8: But it's really like a step wise thing for temperature

1288
01:04:47,040 --> 01:04:49,040
Speaker 8: where I think that's one of the recommendations we could

1289
01:04:49,040 --> 01:04:51,680
Speaker 8: make out of everything. It's like, if your water temperature

1290
01:04:51,760 --> 01:04:54,920
Speaker 8: is starting to get north is seventy seventy two seventy three,

1291
01:04:55,360 --> 01:04:57,560
Speaker 8: it is not a great time to fishes, right bass,

1292
01:04:57,560 --> 01:05:00,560
Speaker 8: Like you see it just a sudden up tick mortality

1293
01:05:00,560 --> 01:05:02,080
Speaker 8: post release mortality.

1294
01:05:01,760 --> 01:05:03,960
Speaker 1: Once you get up to seventy four to seventy five degrees.

1295
01:05:04,800 --> 01:05:04,960
Speaker 3: Right.

1296
01:05:05,000 --> 01:05:07,640
Speaker 2: So there you're you are finding some things that, like

1297
01:05:08,240 --> 01:05:13,200
Speaker 2: anybody not related to the science field can.

1298
01:05:13,160 --> 01:05:17,040
Speaker 3: Affect what what happens to the fish that they interact. Yeah,

1299
01:05:17,320 --> 01:05:18,680
Speaker 3: by doing or not doing.

1300
01:05:18,800 --> 01:05:20,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I'm jumping up for it a little bit.

1301
01:05:20,880 --> 01:05:22,440
Speaker 8: But yeah, so we did this just for Circle and

1302
01:05:22,520 --> 01:05:25,800
Speaker 8: Jay Hooks, And I mean I think you probably have

1303
01:05:25,920 --> 01:05:28,560
Speaker 8: seen and noticed that Bill and Micah wasn't here, but

1304
01:05:28,640 --> 01:05:30,520
Speaker 8: Bill and I are the mica had two are kind

1305
01:05:30,520 --> 01:05:31,840
Speaker 8: of gluttons for punishment and.

1306
01:05:31,800 --> 01:05:33,240
Speaker 1: Grind grind a little bit.

1307
01:05:34,360 --> 01:05:36,480
Speaker 8: So I think from day one, Mike arms Trunk came in,

1308
01:05:36,800 --> 01:05:39,000
Speaker 8: you know, go figure this circle and jay hook thing out,

1309
01:05:39,000 --> 01:05:40,520
Speaker 8: walked out the door, and we all look at each

1310
01:05:40,520 --> 01:05:44,920
Speaker 8: other like let's do it all, like we're gonna do this,

1311
01:05:45,000 --> 01:05:48,560
Speaker 8: but that means that we could also do that. So

1312
01:05:48,720 --> 01:05:51,280
Speaker 8: I think the three of us had, like from day one,

1313
01:05:51,320 --> 01:05:53,360
Speaker 8: had an interest in taking it to where we're taking

1314
01:05:53,360 --> 01:05:56,200
Speaker 8: it now, which is trying to completely redo that put

1315
01:05:56,480 --> 01:05:58,880
Speaker 8: that post release mortality estimately.

1316
01:05:58,680 --> 01:05:59,960
Speaker 6: But closure on the first one.

1317
01:06:00,280 --> 01:06:03,680
Speaker 7: So the big answer is like, we'll do circle hooks work,

1318
01:06:04,160 --> 01:06:08,040
Speaker 7: And the answer was statistically way ones the way we

1319
01:06:08,080 --> 01:06:10,440
Speaker 7: fished and the hooks that we tested, and we tested

1320
01:06:11,640 --> 01:06:13,200
Speaker 7: the hooks we tested were ones that.

1321
01:06:13,160 --> 01:06:14,760
Speaker 6: Were most commonly used in the fishery.

1322
01:06:14,840 --> 01:06:19,040
Speaker 7: We talked to captains and anglers and shops and that's

1323
01:06:19,040 --> 01:06:20,960
Speaker 7: how we came up with our hook list and it

1324
01:06:21,000 --> 01:06:23,160
Speaker 7: was a six to so goami and eight oh gomi

1325
01:06:23,960 --> 01:06:28,720
Speaker 7: ten eagle claw, and then the six gomi octopus was

1326
01:06:28,760 --> 01:06:31,000
Speaker 7: a jay hook that we used. So when we compared

1327
01:06:31,040 --> 01:06:34,480
Speaker 7: those two hooks and compared to them side by side,

1328
01:06:34,920 --> 01:06:37,880
Speaker 7: there was no significant difference where they hooked and post

1329
01:06:37,920 --> 01:06:38,760
Speaker 7: release mortality.

1330
01:06:39,320 --> 01:06:42,600
Speaker 3: But and then with that, right, and the circle hook

1331
01:06:42,720 --> 01:06:46,480
Speaker 3: is like the thing that's supposed to be safer for

1332
01:06:46,560 --> 01:06:47,240
Speaker 3: catch and release.

1333
01:06:47,360 --> 01:06:49,439
Speaker 1: Yeah, right, I mean it is.

1334
01:06:49,560 --> 01:06:52,040
Speaker 8: And again I think that this is why were some

1335
01:06:52,040 --> 01:06:55,120
Speaker 8: of those personal observations come in. It is like Bill,

1336
01:06:55,920 --> 01:06:57,680
Speaker 8: you know, we had our ideas. Like Bill was like,

1337
01:06:57,920 --> 01:06:59,400
Speaker 8: we're never I don't think this is going to work.

1338
01:06:59,400 --> 01:07:02,640
Speaker 8: From the start, was a little bit more optimistic. And

1339
01:07:02,720 --> 01:07:05,800
Speaker 8: I think anecdotally we've talked to some people and especially

1340
01:07:05,840 --> 01:07:08,320
Speaker 8: different regions who have had what they feel like is

1341
01:07:08,680 --> 01:07:11,120
Speaker 8: higher success with the circle hooks. And I used to

1342
01:07:11,400 --> 01:07:13,040
Speaker 8: when I was fishing along on sound it was a

1343
01:07:13,040 --> 01:07:15,680
Speaker 8: lot of you saw, like a lot of what we

1344
01:07:15,720 --> 01:07:16,760
Speaker 8: did the last couple of days is.

1345
01:07:16,760 --> 01:07:17,800
Speaker 1: Like no tension on the bait.

1346
01:07:18,000 --> 01:07:19,280
Speaker 8: Don't have you like you want that like a free

1347
01:07:19,280 --> 01:07:22,280
Speaker 8: swimming beat or a free floating bait, and like, And

1348
01:07:22,760 --> 01:07:24,760
Speaker 8: we found that the jay hooks and the circles weren't

1349
01:07:24,800 --> 01:07:28,920
Speaker 8: the same. I used to drag baits at a knot,

1350
01:07:29,000 --> 01:07:31,160
Speaker 8: you know, anyway, from zero point eight knots to a

1351
01:07:31,200 --> 01:07:33,480
Speaker 8: knot and a half two knots with a three way

1352
01:07:33,560 --> 01:07:36,440
Speaker 8: rig sixty feet down and I felt like when I

1353
01:07:36,480 --> 01:07:39,880
Speaker 8: switched from j's and trebles to a circle hook, I

1354
01:07:39,920 --> 01:07:41,479
Speaker 8: felt like they did way way better.

1355
01:07:41,520 --> 01:07:44,360
Speaker 1: We've talked to this guy we talked to who's caught.

1356
01:07:44,160 --> 01:07:48,080
Speaker 8: All these huge fasts. He's dragging eels at like a knot,

1357
01:07:48,280 --> 01:07:50,480
Speaker 8: a little over a knot, and he was like, I

1358
01:07:50,480 --> 01:07:52,320
Speaker 8: love the circle hooks, like I hinge.

1359
01:07:52,120 --> 01:07:56,520
Speaker 1: Him all the time, like I feel like in then.

1360
01:07:56,280 --> 01:07:58,280
Speaker 8: The mouth, he felt like, So that's something that like

1361
01:07:58,320 --> 01:08:00,280
Speaker 8: maybe eventually we'll be able to catch up to. But

1362
01:08:00,440 --> 01:08:02,280
Speaker 8: so that's why I say, like the way we fished

1363
01:08:02,560 --> 01:08:04,400
Speaker 8: what we did, we didn't see a difference, and that

1364
01:08:04,440 --> 01:08:07,720
Speaker 8: could be important because, like I said, Massachusetts is a

1365
01:08:07,880 --> 01:08:10,920
Speaker 8: lot of fish caught and released all summer long, and

1366
01:08:11,000 --> 01:08:14,520
Speaker 8: a lot of people in Massachusetts do exactly what we

1367
01:08:14,520 --> 01:08:15,160
Speaker 8: were doing.

1368
01:08:15,000 --> 01:08:18,360
Speaker 3: Which is chunk and bait and liveline.

1369
01:08:18,520 --> 01:08:20,640
Speaker 8: Yeah, you saw when we're trolling the fish, like, we

1370
01:08:20,640 --> 01:08:23,000
Speaker 8: didn't catch as many fish, but when we were trolling

1371
01:08:23,080 --> 01:08:25,599
Speaker 8: stuff and kind of like doing the open water.

1372
01:08:25,400 --> 01:08:28,599
Speaker 1: Stuff, we did better without not devoting fish.

1373
01:08:28,520 --> 01:08:30,640
Speaker 6: Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

1374
01:08:30,160 --> 01:08:33,800
Speaker 2: Because there's a certain size of fish that is going

1375
01:08:33,920 --> 01:08:38,080
Speaker 2: to always be able to inhale a certain size of hook.

1376
01:08:38,280 --> 01:08:40,479
Speaker 3: Yeah, and doesn't really matter what that hook looks like.

1377
01:08:40,600 --> 01:08:43,320
Speaker 7: Yeeah, yeah, and I mean circle. I mean it wasn't

1378
01:08:43,680 --> 01:08:46,960
Speaker 7: like I give them credit, the managers when they implemented

1379
01:08:46,960 --> 01:08:49,479
Speaker 7: this circle hook well, because it has worked successfully in

1380
01:08:49,520 --> 01:08:52,559
Speaker 7: other fisheries, Like the bill Fish Foundation requires in their

1381
01:08:52,560 --> 01:08:55,400
Speaker 7: tournaments and stuff to use a very approved you know,

1382
01:08:56,160 --> 01:08:59,280
Speaker 7: bill Fish Foundation circle hook, and so down in Florida

1383
01:08:59,320 --> 01:09:02,920
Speaker 7: they've had some success with circle hooks and like snappers

1384
01:09:02,960 --> 01:09:03,599
Speaker 7: and stuff like that.

1385
01:09:03,640 --> 01:09:04,559
Speaker 6: So it makes sense.

1386
01:09:04,560 --> 01:09:08,679
Speaker 7: But I think our opinion, it's the behavior straight backs

1387
01:09:08,720 --> 01:09:10,960
Speaker 7: when they feed. It's like a large mouths baths or

1388
01:09:10,960 --> 01:09:12,800
Speaker 7: anything like that. They come and they open their mouth

1389
01:09:12,800 --> 01:09:16,320
Speaker 7: and they just inhale baits, especially if like if they're

1390
01:09:16,360 --> 01:09:19,120
Speaker 7: swimming away and being pulled away from them, maybe they can't,

1391
01:09:19,120 --> 01:09:22,559
Speaker 7: but just their motion and how they're you know, how

1392
01:09:22,600 --> 01:09:24,679
Speaker 7: they feed, they're just gonna inhale that. And so lots

1393
01:09:24,680 --> 01:09:27,959
Speaker 7: of times that hook goes right back and if it catches,

1394
01:09:28,120 --> 01:09:31,760
Speaker 7: say the gill, that is probably the worst place you

1395
01:09:31,800 --> 01:09:33,120
Speaker 7: can hook the bats.

1396
01:09:33,160 --> 01:09:35,320
Speaker 8: So yeah, so it's interesting, like to dive a little

1397
01:09:35,320 --> 01:09:37,200
Speaker 8: deeper into the circle jay hook stuff.

1398
01:09:37,479 --> 01:09:42,120
Speaker 1: Since we're hanging out here hook location.

1399
01:09:43,439 --> 01:09:46,639
Speaker 8: The circles ended up in the corner of the mouth

1400
01:09:46,840 --> 01:09:50,920
Speaker 8: more than the jay hooks did, but damage trauma.

1401
01:09:50,560 --> 01:09:52,080
Speaker 1: And bleeding they did more.

1402
01:09:52,200 --> 01:09:54,400
Speaker 8: And what we found frequently, and we've talked to a

1403
01:09:54,439 --> 01:09:56,680
Speaker 8: lot of captains that have noticed the same thing, is

1404
01:09:56,720 --> 01:09:58,439
Speaker 8: that you'd be fighting a fish on the circle hook

1405
01:09:58,520 --> 01:10:00,040
Speaker 8: and all of a sudden you thought you lost it,

1406
01:10:00,280 --> 01:10:02,560
Speaker 8: like you cat like grab and then and then you

1407
01:10:02,640 --> 01:10:04,600
Speaker 8: come tight again. And what was probably happened is that

1408
01:10:04,640 --> 01:10:06,840
Speaker 8: circle hooker grab something deep in the mouth and the

1409
01:10:06,840 --> 01:10:09,240
Speaker 8: stomach tore out, and then as it was coming out,

1410
01:10:10,040 --> 01:10:14,200
Speaker 8: hit the gills, then grabbed the jaw and we'd get that.

1411
01:10:14,240 --> 01:10:16,760
Speaker 8: We would get fish where we'd be like like hinge

1412
01:10:16,840 --> 01:10:19,320
Speaker 8: lashed like awesome. You see the boat fish coming to

1413
01:10:19,560 --> 01:10:20,559
Speaker 8: like awesome, and then you see.

1414
01:10:20,360 --> 01:10:22,240
Speaker 6: Like a little little blood.

1415
01:10:22,280 --> 01:10:24,599
Speaker 1: You get up and you yeah, yeah.

1416
01:10:24,680 --> 01:10:29,560
Speaker 8: And so so that actually brought the mortality equal is

1417
01:10:29,640 --> 01:10:31,880
Speaker 8: we had more hooks than when we got the fish

1418
01:10:32,000 --> 01:10:33,880
Speaker 8: was in the hinge, but probably started in the stomach

1419
01:10:34,280 --> 01:10:35,519
Speaker 8: and did damage pubbling out.

1420
01:10:35,560 --> 01:10:38,479
Speaker 1: So it was interesting like just to dive deeper into

1421
01:10:38,520 --> 01:10:39,280
Speaker 1: those Oh.

1422
01:10:39,200 --> 01:10:42,519
Speaker 2: No, absolutely, I mean I think that's A huge, huge

1423
01:10:43,000 --> 01:10:44,800
Speaker 2: takeaway for for people is.

1424
01:10:47,439 --> 01:10:49,639
Speaker 3: And you know, I think it's just important for all.

1425
01:10:49,600 --> 01:10:52,800
Speaker 2: The stuff that we've covered it, fishing is so anecdotal,

1426
01:10:52,880 --> 01:10:58,519
Speaker 2: it's so personal, it's it's culture embedded for you fish

1427
01:10:58,520 --> 01:11:04,320
Speaker 2: certain things, certain ways, as in certain areas, and this

1428
01:11:04,439 --> 01:11:08,040
Speaker 2: study is just kind of a great foundation out there

1429
01:11:08,080 --> 01:11:12,080
Speaker 2: for people to be like, well, here's some folks who

1430
01:11:12,120 --> 01:11:15,639
Speaker 2: had a lot more tools to actually know, right versus

1431
01:11:15,680 --> 01:11:18,160
Speaker 2: guess what happens to that fish when it gets released?

1432
01:11:18,880 --> 01:11:27,880
Speaker 2: And if you switch this method and use a different hook,

1433
01:11:28,240 --> 01:11:31,160
Speaker 2: you can have a different result. If you move away

1434
01:11:31,200 --> 01:11:34,559
Speaker 2: from this method and fish that same fish in that

1435
01:11:34,600 --> 01:11:39,000
Speaker 2: same spot with a different method, you can have a

1436
01:11:39,000 --> 01:11:42,200
Speaker 2: better result, as in the fish is going to is

1437
01:11:42,280 --> 01:11:44,160
Speaker 2: more than likely going to swim away and be healthy

1438
01:11:44,200 --> 01:11:47,240
Speaker 2: when you release it, or like you said, avoid that

1439
01:11:47,320 --> 01:11:48,160
Speaker 2: water temperature.

1440
01:11:48,320 --> 01:11:50,720
Speaker 8: Right, Yeah, yeah, So I mean what we did is

1441
01:11:50,720 --> 01:11:52,639
Speaker 8: we had this the cool upside that we didn't see

1442
01:11:52,640 --> 01:11:55,320
Speaker 8: the big difference in circles and jays like we'd hope

1443
01:11:55,360 --> 01:11:59,920
Speaker 8: to when we started, but we now had this predictive

1444
01:12:00,080 --> 01:12:02,679
Speaker 8: model where we could apply it to any gear type,

1445
01:12:02,760 --> 01:12:05,960
Speaker 8: any type of lure that we wanted to. So we

1446
01:12:06,400 --> 01:12:08,400
Speaker 8: that's what brought you out here? As we transitioned to

1447
01:12:08,439 --> 01:12:12,519
Speaker 8: doing the citizen science project for the last year and

1448
01:12:12,560 --> 01:12:15,960
Speaker 8: a half, we're continuing it through twenty twenty four where

1449
01:12:16,080 --> 01:12:17,880
Speaker 8: instead of Bill and I and some of our other

1450
01:12:17,920 --> 01:12:20,360
Speaker 8: staff and friends going out and fit catching fish, which

1451
01:12:20,560 --> 01:12:21,360
Speaker 8: I mean, I'm proud of.

1452
01:12:21,280 --> 01:12:22,760
Speaker 1: What we did, we caught a lot of fish over

1453
01:12:22,800 --> 01:12:23,360
Speaker 1: two years.

1454
01:12:24,120 --> 01:12:26,160
Speaker 8: We put it kind of in the hands of anglers

1455
01:12:26,560 --> 01:12:30,160
Speaker 8: and said, tell us what you're using, Record these core

1456
01:12:30,240 --> 01:12:33,200
Speaker 8: data elements that we think are important, and give us

1457
01:12:33,200 --> 01:12:36,439
Speaker 8: the data so we can estimate mortality for swimming plugs,

1458
01:12:36,720 --> 01:12:40,200
Speaker 8: for soft plastics, you know, for all these different gear types,

1459
01:12:40,240 --> 01:12:43,640
Speaker 8: tube and worm, whatever you're using. We can cut out flutterspoon,

1460
01:12:43,720 --> 01:12:45,599
Speaker 8: we can we can come up with a post release

1461
01:12:45,640 --> 01:12:48,120
Speaker 8: our estimate for all these different things.

1462
01:12:48,160 --> 01:12:50,000
Speaker 1: And so again, like seven hundred fish, I think we

1463
01:12:50,040 --> 01:12:50,519
Speaker 1: did well.

1464
01:12:51,200 --> 01:12:55,519
Speaker 8: One year of citizen science data brought thirty six hundred fish.

1465
01:12:55,520 --> 01:12:58,680
Speaker 7: In fact, I looked just today anticipating this and we

1466
01:12:58,760 --> 01:13:01,719
Speaker 7: have now five thousand and fish that have been reported

1467
01:13:01,760 --> 01:13:05,960
Speaker 7: to the Division being fisheries by citizens scientists with observation associated.

1468
01:13:06,120 --> 01:13:08,200
Speaker 6: That's out of we've had over.

1469
01:13:08,240 --> 01:13:11,200
Speaker 7: Almost a thousand people sign up now for our study

1470
01:13:11,240 --> 01:13:12,639
Speaker 7: to help to be assistant science.

1471
01:13:12,800 --> 01:13:15,720
Speaker 2: Yeah, and what what makes you a citizen scientist?

1472
01:13:16,080 --> 01:13:18,240
Speaker 7: So if you want to help out division Une fisheries,

1473
01:13:19,080 --> 01:13:23,400
Speaker 7: you can go to our website and you can register. Basically,

1474
01:13:23,400 --> 01:13:26,240
Speaker 7: we have an online form. You fill out your information.

1475
01:13:27,320 --> 01:13:32,120
Speaker 7: It's mass dot gov backslash striper spelled with one P,

1476
01:13:32,800 --> 01:13:37,959
Speaker 7: and then we will send you a package data collection package.

1477
01:13:38,240 --> 01:13:43,200
Speaker 7: It includes a measuring tape, data logues, a thermometer so

1478
01:13:43,240 --> 01:13:46,720
Speaker 7: you can do air and water temperature and if you

1479
01:13:46,800 --> 01:13:49,000
Speaker 7: collect that information, and a stop wise.

1480
01:13:49,680 --> 01:13:54,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's some muscle memory in your kids especial fishing.

1481
01:13:55,560 --> 01:13:59,559
Speaker 2: So yeah, you'll you'll see this on the YouTube channel

1482
01:13:59,560 --> 01:14:01,400
Speaker 2: and elsewhere in the future.

1483
01:14:01,439 --> 01:14:02,439
Speaker 6: But we.

1484
01:14:03,800 --> 01:14:06,640
Speaker 2: The intent here was to follow the last couple of

1485
01:14:06,720 --> 01:14:11,800
Speaker 2: days this this method right, which is record the fight time,

1486
01:14:12,320 --> 01:14:16,280
Speaker 2: record the handling time, record the location of the hook

1487
01:14:16,800 --> 01:14:19,200
Speaker 2: and and the type of fishing.

1488
01:14:19,680 --> 01:14:24,080
Speaker 7: Yeah, where the hook was blood present and was located.

1489
01:14:24,080 --> 01:14:25,360
Speaker 7: And then what did it do when you let it

1490
01:14:25,400 --> 01:14:28,280
Speaker 7: go right fast, slow or not at all?

1491
01:14:28,680 --> 01:14:31,000
Speaker 8: Like you noticed with the slugo that had two hooks

1492
01:14:31,040 --> 01:14:33,160
Speaker 8: rigged into it, So that would like be a difference

1493
01:14:33,240 --> 01:14:35,080
Speaker 8: in a lure type like almost everything else we're doing

1494
01:14:35,120 --> 01:14:37,280
Speaker 8: with live and dead baits. So we had what what

1495
01:14:37,439 --> 01:14:38,920
Speaker 8: hook did we catch it on? Was the six O

1496
01:14:39,080 --> 01:14:42,439
Speaker 8: commie they hate O COMMI, you know, whatever other hook

1497
01:14:42,439 --> 01:14:44,759
Speaker 8: we're using. But then when you started casting site casting

1498
01:14:44,800 --> 01:14:46,160
Speaker 8: to those fishes with that slugo bill.

1499
01:14:46,120 --> 01:14:48,160
Speaker 1: Was like how many how many hooks did you have

1500
01:14:48,240 --> 01:14:48,559
Speaker 1: in there?

1501
01:14:49,360 --> 01:14:51,679
Speaker 8: Like that would be like in the lure information, which

1502
01:14:51,680 --> 01:14:53,360
Speaker 8: we want to know because we can talk about different

1503
01:14:53,360 --> 01:14:55,639
Speaker 8: types of lures and different number of hook points. There's

1504
01:14:55,680 --> 01:14:58,200
Speaker 8: two hook points. There's two singles on that. Now did

1505
01:14:58,200 --> 01:15:00,320
Speaker 8: one get in it? Or did both get in? And

1506
01:15:00,360 --> 01:15:01,920
Speaker 8: what were the injuries with those two?

1507
01:15:02,960 --> 01:15:05,200
Speaker 6: Yeah?

1508
01:15:06,160 --> 01:15:09,439
Speaker 2: I say there's muscle memory here too, because uh, if

1509
01:15:09,439 --> 01:15:12,040
Speaker 2: you're like me, you get super excited about fishing, right

1510
01:15:12,160 --> 01:15:15,280
Speaker 2: and and this is would be a way for you

1511
01:15:15,360 --> 01:15:19,840
Speaker 2: to become a next level angler is to have the

1512
01:15:19,880 --> 01:15:23,639
Speaker 2: presence of mind to get that hook set, come tight

1513
01:15:23,680 --> 01:15:27,920
Speaker 2: on the fish and then start a stopwatch, which is insanely.

1514
01:15:27,360 --> 01:15:31,240
Speaker 6: Different it is, or just remember to do yeah especial.

1515
01:15:32,400 --> 01:15:33,919
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly's weird.

1516
01:15:33,800 --> 01:15:37,200
Speaker 2: But I think that's a good way for folks listening

1517
01:15:37,680 --> 01:15:40,719
Speaker 2: to differentiate themselves from other anglers.

1518
01:15:41,280 --> 01:15:43,120
Speaker 5: I can do some coach out there in the water.

1519
01:15:43,560 --> 01:15:46,400
Speaker 8: Yeah, I mean, we recognize it is not like an

1520
01:15:46,400 --> 01:15:48,599
Speaker 8: easy thing, especially if there's like a wide open bike

1521
01:15:48,600 --> 01:15:51,040
Speaker 8: you're gonna stop and record information and all that. So

1522
01:15:51,240 --> 01:15:53,280
Speaker 8: Bill and I've always said, like, you don't have to

1523
01:15:53,520 --> 01:15:55,880
Speaker 8: record every single fish you catch on the trip. You know,

1524
01:15:55,920 --> 01:15:57,560
Speaker 8: if you can if you catch five fish on a

1525
01:15:57,560 --> 01:16:02,719
Speaker 8: trip and you get two or three of them, great, Yeah.

1526
01:16:01,080 --> 01:16:03,760
Speaker 1: Don't feel like it's all or nothing proposition. Just get

1527
01:16:03,840 --> 01:16:04,559
Speaker 1: us whatever you get.

1528
01:16:04,720 --> 01:16:08,080
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, And I think it's just a way that

1529
01:16:09,160 --> 01:16:12,040
Speaker 2: you know, as we know, like stripers are are a

1530
01:16:12,200 --> 01:16:16,880
Speaker 2: big part of these communities there, there's something that that

1531
01:16:16,960 --> 01:16:23,200
Speaker 2: anglers like myself, you know, like you from shows and

1532
01:16:23,400 --> 01:16:26,320
Speaker 2: magazines and stuff like you're like, I don't want to

1533
01:16:26,320 --> 01:16:28,320
Speaker 2: make it out there and do that one day, right,

1534
01:16:28,479 --> 01:16:32,439
Speaker 2: Like it's it's a big draw for anglers to travel

1535
01:16:32,479 --> 01:16:37,320
Speaker 2: and come do and this is a way for everybody

1536
01:16:37,360 --> 01:16:40,240
Speaker 2: to participate in the health of the fishery.

1537
01:16:40,520 --> 01:16:42,960
Speaker 3: Like the longevity of those opportunities, right.

1538
01:16:43,080 --> 01:16:45,760
Speaker 4: So, And I think one of the coolest parts of

1539
01:16:45,800 --> 01:16:48,559
Speaker 4: this whole study because there's there's a lot of sense

1540
01:16:48,560 --> 01:16:53,160
Speaker 4: in science opportunities out there across like wildlife biology.

1541
01:16:53,320 --> 01:16:54,320
Speaker 5: Fishing and things like that.

1542
01:16:54,360 --> 01:16:57,880
Speaker 4: But what I like about this and and and you know,

1543
01:16:57,960 --> 01:17:01,040
Speaker 4: we went to the these guys and said, like, how

1544
01:17:01,040 --> 01:17:03,320
Speaker 4: can we help, like what can we do to support

1545
01:17:03,320 --> 01:17:04,879
Speaker 4: this and make sure this stuff happens.

1546
01:17:06,160 --> 01:17:08,719
Speaker 5: They came back to us and said, like, there's this great.

1547
01:17:08,560 --> 01:17:11,080
Speaker 4: Opportunity to do a data viewer viewer, Like we're gonna

1548
01:17:11,120 --> 01:17:13,240
Speaker 4: upload this data and we can present this data to

1549
01:17:13,280 --> 01:17:16,040
Speaker 4: the public, so it's not like you're just throwing it

1550
01:17:16,080 --> 01:17:20,000
Speaker 4: into some database. You can actually go and see how

1551
01:17:20,120 --> 01:17:24,280
Speaker 4: your data and everybody else's data is is like how

1552
01:17:24,640 --> 01:17:26,880
Speaker 4: what it's, what it means, what it's looking like at

1553
01:17:26,880 --> 01:17:29,080
Speaker 4: this point in time, and you guys are updating it

1554
01:17:29,120 --> 01:17:32,000
Speaker 4: a couple of times a week almost real time.

1555
01:17:32,120 --> 01:17:32,360
Speaker 6: Yeah.

1556
01:17:32,439 --> 01:17:37,560
Speaker 4: So, and already I've heard stories of some tackle manufacturers

1557
01:17:37,560 --> 01:17:40,600
Speaker 4: looking at this data and making tweaks to their to

1558
01:17:40,720 --> 01:17:44,200
Speaker 4: their gear and so that's been pretty cool to be

1559
01:17:44,479 --> 01:17:47,479
Speaker 4: to be involved with that, to help you contribute to

1560
01:17:47,680 --> 01:17:51,120
Speaker 4: as an organization, help contribute to that that data portal.

1561
01:17:50,880 --> 01:17:53,679
Speaker 5: So you know, people can learn from it in real time.

1562
01:17:54,240 --> 01:17:57,439
Speaker 7: So I'd say it's a significant contribution that BHA has

1563
01:17:57,479 --> 01:18:01,320
Speaker 7: given DMF the ability to do that because a lot

1564
01:18:01,400 --> 01:18:05,760
Speaker 7: of people are are motivated by you know, the citizen scientists.

1565
01:18:05,800 --> 01:18:08,840
Speaker 7: The angler that's going out because we have we have

1566
01:18:09,000 --> 01:18:13,439
Speaker 7: i mean covers all every you know, covers suspect and

1567
01:18:13,520 --> 01:18:15,000
Speaker 7: the type of anglers, what you have, but we have

1568
01:18:15,120 --> 01:18:18,760
Speaker 7: some really dedicated hardcore anglers and they're the guys that

1569
01:18:18,920 --> 01:18:22,160
Speaker 7: love to read that stuff. And you know, thanks to

1570
01:18:22,200 --> 01:18:25,640
Speaker 7: these guys, we've been able to create this this informative

1571
01:18:26,760 --> 01:18:31,280
Speaker 7: data portal and it's very informative and really break its

1572
01:18:31,439 --> 01:18:34,400
Speaker 7: down like every aspect of fishing between the fight time

1573
01:18:34,439 --> 01:18:36,679
Speaker 7: and the impacts. Like if you got if you're a

1574
01:18:36,680 --> 01:18:39,479
Speaker 7: fly fisherman, right, you want to know what the impacts

1575
01:18:39,520 --> 01:18:42,559
Speaker 7: of that single hook before we even put publish anything.

1576
01:18:42,640 --> 01:18:44,400
Speaker 6: Put this out. You can go right now and click

1577
01:18:44,439 --> 01:18:45,120
Speaker 6: on that and you can.

1578
01:18:45,040 --> 01:18:46,680
Speaker 7: Look up what a fly does and the impact on

1579
01:18:47,200 --> 01:18:48,439
Speaker 7: step bass when you release that.

1580
01:18:48,680 --> 01:18:52,720
Speaker 8: Yeah, it's been really amazing, a big off for us

1581
01:18:52,760 --> 01:18:54,960
Speaker 8: do and we hope it cuts down on that bullshit

1582
01:18:55,040 --> 01:18:58,200
Speaker 8: factor people sitting there like like we're showing you the data.

1583
01:18:57,920 --> 01:18:59,840
Speaker 3: What does mass fisheries actually do?

1584
01:19:00,200 --> 01:19:02,559
Speaker 8: Yeah? What are these guys actually doing? And like you,

1585
01:19:02,600 --> 01:19:03,840
Speaker 8: they're saying stuff, but is it real?

1586
01:19:03,960 --> 01:19:06,200
Speaker 3: Is you can give them a whole ten dollars.

1587
01:19:09,280 --> 01:19:11,160
Speaker 8: They can really see the data coming in and hopefully

1588
01:19:11,160 --> 01:19:12,080
Speaker 8: I think it has helped.

1589
01:19:12,080 --> 01:19:13,760
Speaker 1: Like a Chris was saying, there's people.

1590
01:19:13,479 --> 01:19:17,080
Speaker 8: Who are already not only are the tackle manufacturers who

1591
01:19:17,080 --> 01:19:21,400
Speaker 8: are making changes, but there are plenty of anglers who

1592
01:19:21,400 --> 01:19:24,519
Speaker 8: are taking upon themselves to go out and buy single

1593
01:19:24,520 --> 01:19:27,320
Speaker 8: hooks and replace their treble hooks with singles and figure

1594
01:19:27,320 --> 01:19:29,479
Speaker 8: out how to fish stuff and with that are going

1595
01:19:29,560 --> 01:19:33,160
Speaker 8: to have less impact. Somebody printed this out and brought

1596
01:19:33,200 --> 01:19:35,400
Speaker 8: it here, so this is like we just was really cool.

1597
01:19:35,439 --> 01:19:39,439
Speaker 8: So the last year where PHA has been sponsoring this

1598
01:19:39,720 --> 01:19:42,240
Speaker 8: data portal, we've had just the raw data that comes in.

1599
01:19:42,880 --> 01:19:45,800
Speaker 8: We haven't put direct mortality estimates out of that data

1600
01:19:45,800 --> 01:19:47,960
Speaker 8: that we're calculating on the website because we had to

1601
01:19:47,960 --> 01:19:50,280
Speaker 8: get our model through peer review kind of get that

1602
01:19:50,400 --> 01:19:52,240
Speaker 8: stamp of approval on it.

1603
01:19:52,320 --> 01:19:53,920
Speaker 1: We just got that a couple of weeks ago.

1604
01:19:54,160 --> 01:19:56,080
Speaker 8: So we're going to be changing the data portal so

1605
01:19:56,200 --> 01:19:58,519
Speaker 8: not only will it show the raw data, but it

1606
01:19:58,520 --> 01:20:02,519
Speaker 8: will show mortality estimate associated from all these different gear

1607
01:20:02,560 --> 01:20:05,160
Speaker 8: types with it, so people can actually look and say,

1608
01:20:05,160 --> 01:20:08,040
Speaker 8: like you know, like all right, today I'm gonna go

1609
01:20:08,120 --> 01:20:11,200
Speaker 8: target straight bass. I have some macro in the freezer.

1610
01:20:11,200 --> 01:20:13,040
Speaker 8: I could chunk them up and throw it. Like, that's

1611
01:20:13,080 --> 01:20:15,920
Speaker 8: an eight point three percent mortality. Well I could also

1612
01:20:15,920 --> 01:20:18,160
Speaker 8: go use soft plastics and that's like a two point

1613
01:20:18,200 --> 01:20:20,479
Speaker 8: two maybe, yeah, go do the soft plastics or like

1614
01:20:20,680 --> 01:20:23,599
Speaker 8: you know, I love fishing top water like Zara Spook

1615
01:20:23,680 --> 01:20:27,120
Speaker 8: walking the dog type lures holy Craft. A surface lure

1616
01:20:27,160 --> 01:20:30,639
Speaker 8: with double trebles is like also an eight percent mortality rate,

1617
01:20:30,680 --> 01:20:32,880
Speaker 8: but if you swap that out to a single jay hook,

1618
01:20:33,200 --> 01:20:35,960
Speaker 8: it goes down to like a four point one you know, Like, yeah,

1619
01:20:36,000 --> 01:20:37,880
Speaker 8: these numbers are going to I'm saying, I'm throwing like

1620
01:20:37,960 --> 01:20:41,120
Speaker 8: right where they are right now. Like we've gotten almost

1621
01:20:41,160 --> 01:20:44,280
Speaker 8: fifteen hundred data points added to our our our set

1622
01:20:44,280 --> 01:20:46,439
Speaker 8: this year, so they're going to be just like everything else,

1623
01:20:46,439 --> 01:20:49,000
Speaker 8: they'll be updated throughout this project. But we're gonna be

1624
01:20:49,000 --> 01:20:50,759
Speaker 8: able to put the direct mortality estimates.

1625
01:20:50,760 --> 01:20:54,120
Speaker 2: And if if your goal is the keeper fish, yeah

1626
01:20:54,160 --> 01:20:58,280
Speaker 2: you can fish one thing. If your goal or if

1627
01:20:58,280 --> 01:21:01,639
Speaker 2: your spot that you like to go to like never

1628
01:21:01,720 --> 01:21:05,040
Speaker 2: has a keeper fish and you're just there to catch fish,

1629
01:21:05,120 --> 01:21:06,840
Speaker 2: you can adjust your game for that.

1630
01:21:07,160 --> 01:21:08,920
Speaker 7: Or if you're going out and you grinding, you know,

1631
01:21:09,040 --> 01:21:11,400
Speaker 7: you might want to just catch one or two fish

1632
01:21:11,439 --> 01:21:13,240
Speaker 7: a day, keep grinding with the trouble. But if you're

1633
01:21:13,240 --> 01:21:15,679
Speaker 7: out there and you got fumers and they're just blitz

1634
01:21:15,720 --> 01:21:17,880
Speaker 7: them all over the place, and you're just throwing that

1635
01:21:18,040 --> 01:21:20,800
Speaker 7: Zara spook with those two double troubles, maybe switch it

1636
01:21:20,840 --> 01:21:24,000
Speaker 7: out to a single change your technique and.

1637
01:21:23,920 --> 01:21:27,479
Speaker 2: Then, Chris, what is hit us with what's happening on

1638
01:21:27,840 --> 01:21:29,160
Speaker 2: the policy side of things?

1639
01:21:29,320 --> 01:21:31,719
Speaker 3: Since you got called out as the policy got so.

1640
01:21:33,040 --> 01:21:34,839
Speaker 4: Right now a lot I think a lot of people

1641
01:21:35,040 --> 01:21:39,080
Speaker 4: are kind of anxious to sort of see the next

1642
01:21:39,320 --> 01:21:42,800
Speaker 4: stock assessment and also what are probably a few weeks

1643
01:21:42,800 --> 01:21:49,880
Speaker 4: out from the the Young Year report. Okay, so I

1644
01:21:49,920 --> 01:21:51,519
Speaker 4: think a lot of people are interested in that we

1645
01:21:51,880 --> 01:21:55,880
Speaker 4: did come off what seems like a pretty good winter

1646
01:21:56,040 --> 01:21:58,920
Speaker 4: spring in terms of like the environmental condition, so hopefully

1647
01:21:59,000 --> 01:22:04,920
Speaker 4: this particular season will produce. But the next big meeting

1648
01:22:05,000 --> 01:22:07,639
Speaker 4: for the stripe pass board is in October, I believe.

1649
01:22:08,439 --> 01:22:11,679
Speaker 4: So I think we're gonna sort of have We're gonna

1650
01:22:11,680 --> 01:22:13,840
Speaker 4: sort of get some figures to see sort of see

1651
01:22:13,880 --> 01:22:18,000
Speaker 4: like how this this narrowing of the slot has impacted

1652
01:22:18,960 --> 01:22:21,439
Speaker 4: will Like what's the future of the like of this

1653
01:22:21,479 --> 01:22:22,360
Speaker 4: emergency action?

1654
01:22:22,520 --> 01:22:23,679
Speaker 5: Is that going to get changed?

1655
01:22:24,720 --> 01:22:31,160
Speaker 4: So you know, policy advocates are always waiting to sort

1656
01:22:31,160 --> 01:22:35,920
Speaker 4: of sort of gauge the responsiveness and like how willing

1657
01:22:37,600 --> 01:22:43,880
Speaker 4: the board is to listening to the science and the

1658
01:22:43,920 --> 01:22:47,200
Speaker 4: participants in the in the space and you know, and

1659
01:22:47,240 --> 01:22:52,960
Speaker 4: so you know, obviously b h A, we're primarily representing

1660
01:22:53,000 --> 01:22:55,559
Speaker 4: the recreational angler angler, and I think we're in a

1661
01:22:55,640 --> 01:22:59,240
Speaker 4: unique position where we have a broad swath of recreational anglers.

1662
01:22:59,280 --> 01:23:02,400
Speaker 4: We're not like a single niche kind of angler. We've

1663
01:23:02,400 --> 01:23:04,559
Speaker 4: got people who are going to go out and want

1664
01:23:04,560 --> 01:23:05,599
Speaker 4: to take that fish home.

1665
01:23:06,200 --> 01:23:07,880
Speaker 5: And we're just start here.

1666
01:23:07,920 --> 01:23:10,160
Speaker 3: If you fish more than two days a week, you're

1667
01:23:10,200 --> 01:23:13,960
Speaker 3: a recreational angler, right so yeah, yeah, yeah, so.

1668
01:23:13,920 --> 01:23:17,800
Speaker 5: For this particular species, yeah so yeah.

1669
01:23:17,560 --> 01:23:19,920
Speaker 4: So you know, I think we're just gonna wait and

1670
01:23:20,040 --> 01:23:24,640
Speaker 4: sort of see. Like I said earlier in the conversation,

1671
01:23:24,880 --> 01:23:28,400
Speaker 4: I think the board has turned in a direction that

1672
01:23:29,120 --> 01:23:33,040
Speaker 4: we're pretty happy with being more responsive want recognizing the

1673
01:23:33,400 --> 01:23:36,679
Speaker 4: status of the fishery. But the real thing is right now,

1674
01:23:36,960 --> 01:23:40,000
Speaker 4: because we've been in an overfish state, the stripe pass

1675
01:23:40,080 --> 01:23:43,720
Speaker 4: Board is mandated by law to recover this population by

1676
01:23:43,920 --> 01:23:49,280
Speaker 4: the deadline is twenty nine. So that's what we're kind

1677
01:23:49,280 --> 01:23:51,160
Speaker 4: of waiting and seeing like are we going to get there,

1678
01:23:51,200 --> 01:23:53,640
Speaker 4: are we going to hit that that that point in

1679
01:23:53,720 --> 01:23:56,720
Speaker 4: time where we can say, yep, the actions that they

1680
01:23:56,720 --> 01:24:00,320
Speaker 4: were compelled to take have made a difference and we

1681
01:24:00,360 --> 01:24:04,880
Speaker 4: can classify this stock as not overfished.

1682
01:24:04,640 --> 01:24:06,599
Speaker 3: And then how does BHA way in here?

1683
01:24:07,080 --> 01:24:11,640
Speaker 4: So typically, well, for the longest period of time, I

1684
01:24:11,680 --> 01:24:13,960
Speaker 4: would say since twenty eighteen twenty nineteen, we've been more

1685
01:24:14,040 --> 01:24:17,439
Speaker 4: engaged in the policy side, getting our membership to speak up,

1686
01:24:17,520 --> 01:24:20,160
Speaker 4: to reach out to the Stripe Basketboard, to reach out

1687
01:24:20,160 --> 01:24:24,559
Speaker 4: to their individual fishing representatives or manager state representatives on

1688
01:24:24,560 --> 01:24:29,439
Speaker 4: the ASMFC board, we provide lots of information our take,

1689
01:24:30,120 --> 01:24:31,960
Speaker 4: and our take is we want to manage this fish

1690
01:24:31,960 --> 01:24:35,840
Speaker 4: for future abundance, like we want our kids, our grandkids

1691
01:24:36,479 --> 01:24:39,519
Speaker 4: to fish for this these fish and have that connection

1692
01:24:39,680 --> 01:24:43,839
Speaker 4: to this resource. So we are advocating for future abundance

1693
01:24:43,840 --> 01:24:48,400
Speaker 4: and recovery. So we've had people do actional arts, We've

1694
01:24:48,400 --> 01:24:51,040
Speaker 4: had people testify up and down the Striper coast, and

1695
01:24:51,040 --> 01:24:54,120
Speaker 4: that's one of the cool things. We have every chapter

1696
01:24:54,920 --> 01:24:57,519
Speaker 4: up and down the Eastern Sea Board engaged in this

1697
01:24:57,800 --> 01:25:01,360
Speaker 4: on the same page. You know, even though we represent

1698
01:25:01,680 --> 01:25:03,720
Speaker 4: different fishing cultures and stuff.

1699
01:25:03,400 --> 01:25:03,720
Speaker 1: Like that.

1700
01:25:03,720 --> 01:25:05,800
Speaker 4: That BHA community up and down the coast has been

1701
01:25:05,840 --> 01:25:07,800
Speaker 4: great and when we do when there's a call of

1702
01:25:07,840 --> 01:25:13,559
Speaker 4: act called action, the response has been tremendous. And when

1703
01:25:13,560 --> 01:25:17,440
Speaker 4: you look at the breakdown of the public the public information,

1704
01:25:18,000 --> 01:25:21,400
Speaker 4: you know, in terms of phishing organizations, we've been pretty

1705
01:25:21,400 --> 01:25:23,679
Speaker 4: consistently at the top.

1706
01:25:23,560 --> 01:25:27,960
Speaker 5: Of outreach from our from our community, which is awesome.

1707
01:25:28,080 --> 01:25:30,120
Speaker 5: We hope that to hope that continues.

1708
01:25:30,439 --> 01:25:32,840
Speaker 3: Folks want to get involved with that. Where do they

1709
01:25:32,880 --> 01:25:33,200
Speaker 3: find you?

1710
01:25:33,600 --> 01:25:37,040
Speaker 4: So best thing to do is to check out the

1711
01:25:37,080 --> 01:25:40,639
Speaker 4: b h A website. We're all of our Stripe Bass

1712
01:25:40,680 --> 01:25:43,920
Speaker 4: information we put there to search stripe Bass and you'll

1713
01:25:43,960 --> 01:25:49,880
Speaker 4: see the most recent the most recent blog posts. New

1714
01:25:49,880 --> 01:25:52,800
Speaker 4: England and New York chapters are kind of leading the way,

1715
01:25:53,120 --> 01:25:57,320
Speaker 4: so on their social media accounts you'll regularly see information

1716
01:25:57,400 --> 01:25:58,880
Speaker 4: related to Stripe Bass, this.

1717
01:25:58,840 --> 01:26:00,799
Speaker 5: Project right here that we've been talking about.

1718
01:26:01,439 --> 01:26:04,080
Speaker 4: So that's the easiest way to sort of just plug

1719
01:26:04,120 --> 01:26:07,080
Speaker 4: it into your feed and monitor what we're doing.

1720
01:26:07,439 --> 01:26:10,439
Speaker 3: And maybe jump in and show up one night.

1721
01:26:11,479 --> 01:26:15,120
Speaker 4: Yeah, when we put out the call action like that's

1722
01:26:15,520 --> 01:26:19,879
Speaker 4: that is like your invitation, but you don't need that invitation.

1723
01:26:20,040 --> 01:26:24,839
Speaker 4: Like we've we've talked about like the personal experience fishery managers.

1724
01:26:24,880 --> 01:26:28,400
Speaker 4: Though there's like there's periods of like open comment periods

1725
01:26:29,120 --> 01:26:32,640
Speaker 4: each state's fishery managers. They want to hear from their constituents.

1726
01:26:32,640 --> 01:26:34,720
Speaker 4: And I've you know, I've spoken to the to the

1727
01:26:34,720 --> 01:26:37,320
Speaker 4: fisheries managers and a lot of the different states, and

1728
01:26:37,680 --> 01:26:41,240
Speaker 4: you know, I can speak too recently to the to

1729
01:26:41,560 --> 01:26:44,200
Speaker 4: here in Massachusetts. They want to hear, they want to

1730
01:26:44,240 --> 01:26:46,240
Speaker 4: hear from the anglers, they want to hear from the constituents.

1731
01:26:46,600 --> 01:26:48,040
Speaker 5: So just because there.

1732
01:26:47,960 --> 01:26:51,280
Speaker 4: Isn't necessarily a public comment period, if you have you know,

1733
01:26:51,360 --> 01:26:55,000
Speaker 4: if you've had experience insights, like if you want to

1734
01:26:55,000 --> 01:26:58,680
Speaker 4: provide feedback by all means you can, you can do that.

1735
01:26:58,720 --> 01:27:01,479
Speaker 4: And like I said on our on our web site,

1736
01:27:01,880 --> 01:27:05,160
Speaker 4: backcountry hunters dot org, type strike bass and you'll find

1737
01:27:05,200 --> 01:27:06,000
Speaker 4: those resources.

1738
01:27:06,040 --> 01:27:07,559
Speaker 5: You'll find links to the research.

1739
01:27:07,600 --> 01:27:10,519
Speaker 4: And I'm looking forward to this getting peer reviewed and

1740
01:27:10,560 --> 01:27:12,160
Speaker 4: getting links to that up there.

1741
01:27:12,880 --> 01:27:13,639
Speaker 5: You'll have there's.

1742
01:27:13,520 --> 01:27:17,400
Speaker 4: Links to joining this citizen science project, and we're looking

1743
01:27:17,439 --> 01:27:19,880
Speaker 4: forward to finding ways so we can support this the

1744
01:27:19,920 --> 01:27:24,120
Speaker 4: next phase of this study because you know, from my perspective,

1745
01:27:24,720 --> 01:27:27,120
Speaker 4: this study is going to be really really neat because

1746
01:27:27,160 --> 01:27:28,760
Speaker 4: it's going to be able to answer, and they've kind

1747
01:27:28,760 --> 01:27:32,320
Speaker 4: of I mean they've talked about it like a good

1748
01:27:33,479 --> 01:27:36,599
Speaker 4: indication of like high quality science is the fact that

1749
01:27:36,640 --> 01:27:39,120
Speaker 4: it leads to more questions. And you can already hear

1750
01:27:39,240 --> 01:27:41,600
Speaker 4: like they already have more questions, which is going to

1751
01:27:41,720 --> 01:27:45,200
Speaker 4: lead them to more research. So we're going to continue

1752
01:27:45,240 --> 01:27:47,320
Speaker 4: to encourage that and try to support that any way

1753
01:27:47,360 --> 01:27:47,760
Speaker 4: we can.

1754
01:27:48,280 --> 01:27:50,439
Speaker 8: You know, it was great when I can still remember

1755
01:27:50,520 --> 01:27:55,519
Speaker 8: for BHA, like I've been a bhmaa member since twenty thirteen,

1756
01:27:55,720 --> 01:27:58,800
Speaker 8: maybe like before there was a new England chapter or

1757
01:27:58,880 --> 01:28:00,120
Speaker 8: any East Coast chapter.

1758
01:28:00,080 --> 01:28:01,400
Speaker 1: Like doing bh just because I thought it was a

1759
01:28:01,439 --> 01:28:03,000
Speaker 1: cool organization what they were.

1760
01:28:02,920 --> 01:28:07,160
Speaker 8: Doing, and you know, the new England chapters come along everything,

1761
01:28:07,160 --> 01:28:08,720
Speaker 8: but I can still remember I trying to remember what

1762
01:28:08,800 --> 01:28:12,120
Speaker 8: y're the that first ASGA Science symposium was that you

1763
01:28:12,160 --> 01:28:15,120
Speaker 8: and I went and talked and when Chris was there

1764
01:28:15,160 --> 01:28:17,360
Speaker 8: with Mike Woods, and like Bill and I looked at

1765
01:28:17,360 --> 01:28:18,080
Speaker 8: each other and we're.

1766
01:28:17,920 --> 01:28:20,240
Speaker 1: Like, why is BHA here?

1767
01:28:20,439 --> 01:28:22,960
Speaker 9: Like what was here?

1768
01:28:23,840 --> 01:28:25,559
Speaker 1: But he let us talk too.

1769
01:28:27,840 --> 01:28:30,360
Speaker 8: But also I think it's like Mike Woods is like

1770
01:28:30,400 --> 01:28:32,960
Speaker 8: the most fantastic dude, but he's got like this big,

1771
01:28:33,120 --> 01:28:36,559
Speaker 8: long grizzly beard and like Piercey did, like long hair,

1772
01:28:36,760 --> 01:28:38,280
Speaker 8: and he just looks like he rolled out of a

1773
01:28:38,320 --> 01:28:41,280
Speaker 8: biker club or something. It's just like like a small dude,

1774
01:28:41,320 --> 01:28:42,679
Speaker 8: but it looks like you rolled out of his biker glove.

1775
01:28:42,720 --> 01:28:45,040
Speaker 1: So it's just like what is going on here?

1776
01:28:45,080 --> 01:28:47,559
Speaker 8: But like he's the awesomest But I mean, so I went.

1777
01:28:47,920 --> 01:28:50,519
Speaker 8: It's been like that initial reaction like I love BHA,

1778
01:28:50,600 --> 01:28:52,760
Speaker 8: but what are they doing here? Like to being like,

1779
01:28:53,080 --> 01:28:54,879
Speaker 8: you know, a couple of years into working with BHA,

1780
01:28:54,960 --> 01:28:59,040
Speaker 8: it's been so meaningful and awesome what they've done and

1781
01:28:59,120 --> 01:29:01,960
Speaker 8: are continuing to do and to work as partners because

1782
01:29:02,040 --> 01:29:04,840
Speaker 8: I think that anybody who has worked with and our

1783
01:29:04,840 --> 01:29:09,400
Speaker 8: alongside State Agency knows we have difficulties. We have limited budgets,

1784
01:29:09,640 --> 01:29:13,080
Speaker 8: limited staff, So having a group like BHA there to

1785
01:29:13,200 --> 01:29:16,479
Speaker 8: amplify and assist us is just vital to.

1786
01:29:16,400 --> 01:29:17,880
Speaker 1: Getting the word out to everybody.

1787
01:29:18,760 --> 01:29:20,360
Speaker 8: And I think, you know, just as a testament to

1788
01:29:20,400 --> 01:29:24,080
Speaker 8: how important and culture like what a cultural touchstones straight

1789
01:29:24,120 --> 01:29:27,040
Speaker 8: Bassar is that we've had tons of interest up and

1790
01:29:27,040 --> 01:29:29,720
Speaker 8: down the coast, and we've have great project partners that

1791
01:29:30,000 --> 01:29:33,759
Speaker 8: range from like a national brand like Coast donating stuff

1792
01:29:33,760 --> 01:29:36,200
Speaker 8: that we can give out to prize and prize packs

1793
01:29:36,240 --> 01:29:43,160
Speaker 8: pen fishing prize stuff. Then local tackle manufacturers like Hogi Lures,

1794
01:29:44,000 --> 01:29:47,960
Speaker 8: local tackle shops helping us procure stuff surf land, BAP tackle.

1795
01:29:49,720 --> 01:29:51,280
Speaker 8: If you if you don't want to do the you know,

1796
01:29:51,320 --> 01:29:53,120
Speaker 8: everything we've been doing was on paper. If you don't

1797
01:29:53,320 --> 01:29:56,839
Speaker 8: know a paper type of person, we like just totally

1798
01:29:57,360 --> 01:29:59,000
Speaker 8: with some funding assistants.

1799
01:29:58,560 --> 01:30:00,880
Speaker 1: From a s g A. But like I'm putting.

1800
01:30:00,600 --> 01:30:02,560
Speaker 8: A ton of money in of their own time, of

1801
01:30:02,600 --> 01:30:05,600
Speaker 8: their own they got one fishing app has created a

1802
01:30:05,600 --> 01:30:07,479
Speaker 8: whole way to do if you wanted, if you're an

1803
01:30:07,520 --> 01:30:09,560
Speaker 8: app person, like they've built it into their app so

1804
01:30:09,720 --> 01:30:10,000
Speaker 8: you can.

1805
01:30:09,880 --> 01:30:11,320
Speaker 1: Submit data straight into the study.

1806
01:30:11,400 --> 01:30:15,240
Speaker 8: So it's been fantastic to have like see the support

1807
01:30:15,280 --> 01:30:18,599
Speaker 8: from the community and get that help getting the word

1808
01:30:18,640 --> 01:30:22,160
Speaker 8: out and getting data coming in. We've run you know,

1809
01:30:22,360 --> 01:30:25,240
Speaker 8: three prizes a month for people who submit data. When

1810
01:30:25,280 --> 01:30:27,519
Speaker 8: you first submit a data, when you first submit any data,

1811
01:30:27,560 --> 01:30:29,519
Speaker 8: you get a free pair of flyers, and then your

1812
01:30:29,680 --> 01:30:32,160
Speaker 8: every time you submit data you get entered into that

1813
01:30:32,760 --> 01:30:34,240
Speaker 8: monthly Raffle drawing.

1814
01:30:34,000 --> 01:30:36,880
Speaker 1: Where we have a bunch of hogy Lures Coast to

1815
01:30:37,040 --> 01:30:42,479
Speaker 1: Hats rods and reels. So it's been really really consentives. Yeah.

1816
01:30:43,800 --> 01:30:46,360
Speaker 8: Yeah, and like any you can find us on the

1817
01:30:46,400 --> 01:30:50,440
Speaker 8: Internet or on social media. Mass Marine Fisheries on Instagram,

1818
01:30:51,160 --> 01:30:55,800
Speaker 8: Masters Division Marine Fisheries on Facebook and anything related to

1819
01:30:55,840 --> 01:30:56,320
Speaker 8: the study.

1820
01:30:56,720 --> 01:30:59,120
Speaker 3: Like Bill said, do you have to be fishing in

1821
01:30:59,200 --> 01:30:59,840
Speaker 3: mass waters?

1822
01:31:01,120 --> 01:31:02,479
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a great question, thank you.

1823
01:31:02,560 --> 01:31:04,679
Speaker 8: Yeah. So, like a big part of what we're doing

1824
01:31:04,720 --> 01:31:06,880
Speaker 8: is trying to get people from anywhere on this Riper

1825
01:31:06,880 --> 01:31:09,000
Speaker 8: coast some data. We do not need to be a

1826
01:31:09,040 --> 01:31:12,720
Speaker 8: Massachusetts resident to do this great and we've built I

1827
01:31:12,760 --> 01:31:15,280
Speaker 8: spent a lot of time this winter talking to other

1828
01:31:15,360 --> 01:31:17,800
Speaker 8: agencies in the mid Atlantic and we went down to

1829
01:31:17,840 --> 01:31:20,559
Speaker 8: the New Jersey Fishing Expo, which was really cool time

1830
01:31:20,680 --> 01:31:23,320
Speaker 8: that was great, and talked to We signed up a

1831
01:31:23,320 --> 01:31:25,840
Speaker 8: bunch of anglers there and talked to a bunch of anglers.

1832
01:31:25,439 --> 01:31:28,519
Speaker 7: There here in angler's perspectives from other areas. I think

1833
01:31:28,520 --> 01:31:30,960
Speaker 7: that was one of the most interesting things. People just

1834
01:31:31,200 --> 01:31:33,560
Speaker 7: love this fish. And the other thing I want to

1835
01:31:33,560 --> 01:31:35,160
Speaker 7: fallo up was I just want to say thanks to

1836
01:31:35,439 --> 01:31:38,880
Speaker 7: Meat Eat and Crew because it's been alluded to no one.

1837
01:31:39,360 --> 01:31:41,200
Speaker 7: It's tough for us to get outreach out. We have

1838
01:31:41,240 --> 01:31:44,200
Speaker 7: a really good social media guy. But we're the government

1839
01:31:44,400 --> 01:31:48,000
Speaker 7: and to come from the Meat Eater Crew and your

1840
01:31:48,080 --> 01:31:53,080
Speaker 7: organization is it's it's really beneficial to us and what

1841
01:31:53,120 --> 01:31:54,920
Speaker 7: we're really appreciative of the opportunity to talk to you

1842
01:31:54,960 --> 01:31:55,479
Speaker 7: guys today.

1843
01:31:55,680 --> 01:31:58,599
Speaker 3: Thank you for letting me suck some fishing knowledge out

1844
01:31:58,600 --> 01:32:03,679
Speaker 3: of you. Guess I mean that's uh, I mean yeah.

1845
01:32:04,280 --> 01:32:06,519
Speaker 2: To tie back into what we said at the very beginning,

1846
01:32:06,560 --> 01:32:10,080
Speaker 2: these guys know what they're doing and part of that

1847
01:32:10,200 --> 01:32:12,920
Speaker 2: state sponsored like you guys took the study on you

1848
01:32:12,920 --> 01:32:13,320
Speaker 2: had to go.

1849
01:32:13,320 --> 01:32:17,479
Speaker 3: Catch fish rights to catch them, to let them go

1850
01:32:17,520 --> 01:32:18,200
Speaker 3: and see how they do.

1851
01:32:19,240 --> 01:32:21,320
Speaker 8: It's we have to do a lot for our jobs.

1852
01:32:21,320 --> 01:32:23,280
Speaker 8: There's a lot of hoops, there's a lot of restrictions.

1853
01:32:23,280 --> 01:32:25,640
Speaker 8: But at the end of the like you do, there's a.

1854
01:32:25,640 --> 01:32:27,080
Speaker 1: Lot of days we get paid to go fishing.

1855
01:32:27,720 --> 01:32:29,439
Speaker 8: We have to do a certain way and it's important,

1856
01:32:29,520 --> 01:32:31,240
Speaker 8: but it's pretty awesome.

1857
01:32:31,400 --> 01:32:33,320
Speaker 6: Yeah, in the end of the day, it's worked.

1858
01:32:33,360 --> 01:32:35,120
Speaker 7: But I think I got the best job in the

1859
01:32:35,160 --> 01:32:36,920
Speaker 7: world and.

1860
01:32:37,040 --> 01:32:40,439
Speaker 2: I get I asked a lot on the show, what's

1861
01:32:40,479 --> 01:32:42,560
Speaker 2: a good way to like just just get involved or

1862
01:32:42,600 --> 01:32:44,000
Speaker 2: their careers and conservation.

1863
01:32:45,520 --> 01:32:49,640
Speaker 1: There are careers in conservation you want to go for

1864
01:32:49,680 --> 01:32:50,280
Speaker 1: I'll go first.

1865
01:32:50,800 --> 01:32:53,320
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, if there's a lot of different ways

1866
01:32:53,320 --> 01:32:55,200
Speaker 7: you can follow my path, which is really hands on.

1867
01:32:55,280 --> 01:32:58,040
Speaker 7: After I got out of college, I came to the observer,

1868
01:32:58,280 --> 01:33:00,400
Speaker 7: get that baseline. I mean, that's the best way to

1869
01:33:00,439 --> 01:33:04,960
Speaker 7: learn about fishers and then stay active volunteer if you

1870
01:33:05,000 --> 01:33:08,160
Speaker 7: have to, and get that lower level job and just

1871
01:33:08,160 --> 01:33:09,280
Speaker 7: work your way up through the chain.

1872
01:33:09,400 --> 01:33:10,640
Speaker 6: That's what worked for me.

1873
01:33:11,479 --> 01:33:12,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, it works for Bill.

1874
01:33:12,439 --> 01:33:15,640
Speaker 8: Like I'm coming slightly younger than Bill and be like

1875
01:33:16,400 --> 01:33:20,040
Speaker 8: there are ways forward through that path now, but it's

1876
01:33:20,080 --> 01:33:24,640
Speaker 8: increasingly becoming like a really expertise driven field. So like

1877
01:33:25,040 --> 01:33:27,479
Speaker 8: when you know, there are these seasonal positions which are

1878
01:33:27,520 --> 01:33:31,720
Speaker 8: great entryways, right, and there's nothing better than having the

1879
01:33:32,680 --> 01:33:34,760
Speaker 8: staff at an agency know who you are and like

1880
01:33:34,800 --> 01:33:36,840
Speaker 8: being a known quantity coming in and working hard and

1881
01:33:36,880 --> 01:33:40,559
Speaker 8: doing well. But I think that for most people in

1882
01:33:40,600 --> 01:33:42,719
Speaker 8: an agency now you're going to need like a minimum

1883
01:33:43,040 --> 01:33:45,360
Speaker 8: master's degree if you really want to move forward with

1884
01:33:45,479 --> 01:33:46,000
Speaker 8: your career.

1885
01:33:46,360 --> 01:33:49,280
Speaker 1: Bill's like got a practical masters or.

1886
01:33:49,240 --> 01:33:52,280
Speaker 8: PhD means like he gets it all, which is awesome,

1887
01:33:52,280 --> 01:33:54,840
Speaker 8: but like it sometimes that's not going to be available,

1888
01:33:55,640 --> 01:33:57,679
Speaker 8: And I mean I think you know I higher seasonals.

1889
01:33:57,680 --> 01:33:59,800
Speaker 8: Now I have PhD's applying, I have masters applying to

1890
01:33:59,840 --> 01:34:02,920
Speaker 8: be like a three month seasonal position. But if you

1891
01:34:02,960 --> 01:34:04,479
Speaker 8: want to do this job, I think that the three

1892
01:34:04,520 --> 01:34:08,560
Speaker 8: pieces of advice I would give are that you recognize

1893
01:34:08,560 --> 01:34:10,559
Speaker 8: they're going to have to get an advanced degree if

1894
01:34:10,600 --> 01:34:12,559
Speaker 8: you really want that job and to move forward with it.

1895
01:34:13,439 --> 01:34:16,280
Speaker 8: Recognize that you might think you're smart, but you're not

1896
01:34:16,760 --> 01:34:19,280
Speaker 8: by any means the smartest person in the room, so

1897
01:34:19,320 --> 01:34:21,360
Speaker 8: that they don't you're going to have to work harder,

1898
01:34:21,760 --> 01:34:24,400
Speaker 8: like you're gonna just like I think what you probably

1899
01:34:24,439 --> 01:34:26,040
Speaker 8: did see is that Bill and I were like playing

1900
01:34:26,040 --> 01:34:27,680
Speaker 8: ABCD and like what do.

1901
01:34:27,640 --> 01:34:28,320
Speaker 1: We have to do to that?

1902
01:34:28,360 --> 01:34:29,920
Speaker 8: We'll pick that up, We'll move this, we'll do that,

1903
01:34:30,439 --> 01:34:32,040
Speaker 8: let's three rig this whole rod. But you know it's

1904
01:34:32,040 --> 01:34:34,960
Speaker 8: think it's like that's just this microcosm of like you're

1905
01:34:34,960 --> 01:34:37,040
Speaker 8: gonna have to work your way through every little problem.

1906
01:34:37,080 --> 01:34:39,280
Speaker 8: You saw it in the fishing aspect, that we're doing

1907
01:34:39,320 --> 01:34:40,920
Speaker 8: that for everything. So you're just gonna have to work

1908
01:34:40,960 --> 01:34:43,240
Speaker 8: harder than everybody else if you want to be successful,

1909
01:34:43,600 --> 01:34:45,760
Speaker 8: and especially when you're young. The final thing I would

1910
01:34:45,760 --> 01:34:48,439
Speaker 8: say is be willing to move you know like that

1911
01:34:48,600 --> 01:34:51,919
Speaker 8: is that there are fisheries jobs. There's always a fisheries

1912
01:34:52,000 --> 01:34:55,479
Speaker 8: job open somewhere, and you just got to be willing

1913
01:34:55,520 --> 01:34:57,040
Speaker 8: to move. Even if you really want to be that

1914
01:34:57,120 --> 01:34:58,480
Speaker 8: place based person.

1915
01:34:58,720 --> 01:35:01,200
Speaker 1: And come back to where you were. Sometimes the actual

1916
01:35:01,280 --> 01:35:01,800
Speaker 1: route is.

1917
01:35:01,800 --> 01:35:04,000
Speaker 8: Going to be a little bit more cecut to, you know,

1918
01:35:04,040 --> 01:35:06,960
Speaker 8: coming around and moving to Alaska and be an observer

1919
01:35:07,040 --> 01:35:10,439
Speaker 8: in Alaska for six months, you get a job somewhere else.

1920
01:35:10,280 --> 01:35:11,040
Speaker 1: And then you may end it.

1921
01:35:11,120 --> 01:35:13,000
Speaker 8: You're gonna you know, because if Bill sees somebody apply

1922
01:35:13,040 --> 01:35:15,080
Speaker 8: for his job who has six months of Alaska fisheries

1923
01:35:15,080 --> 01:35:17,720
Speaker 8: observing time and like a year in Rhode Island or something,

1924
01:35:17,720 --> 01:35:20,080
Speaker 8: He's like, I'm pretty sure you're going to be my person.

1925
01:35:20,600 --> 01:35:22,880
Speaker 3: Like I'm like, I'm pretty sure.

1926
01:35:22,920 --> 01:35:25,200
Speaker 1: Like if you could, you could hack it in the Baring.

1927
01:35:24,920 --> 01:35:27,720
Speaker 8: Sea for you know, six months with the like you know,

1928
01:35:27,760 --> 01:35:29,680
Speaker 8: the three week four week cruises and.

1929
01:35:29,640 --> 01:35:31,320
Speaker 6: All this stuff, you might be able to mate of

1930
01:35:31,400 --> 01:35:31,720
Speaker 6: my boat.

1931
01:35:31,760 --> 01:35:32,840
Speaker 1: You might be able to.

1932
01:35:34,120 --> 01:35:38,160
Speaker 8: So yeah, it's like like and it's a very small community,

1933
01:35:38,720 --> 01:35:40,440
Speaker 8: all these fisheries and wildlife agencies.

1934
01:35:40,520 --> 01:35:43,320
Speaker 1: You know, people all over the place. So go out.

1935
01:35:43,439 --> 01:35:45,400
Speaker 8: You're not hurting yourself by traveling because if you go

1936
01:35:45,479 --> 01:35:47,360
Speaker 8: out and work for somebody.

1937
01:35:47,000 --> 01:35:48,719
Speaker 1: In Colorado, it's bizarre.

1938
01:35:48,800 --> 01:35:51,559
Speaker 8: But I probably like by either directly or like one

1939
01:35:51,560 --> 01:35:52,880
Speaker 8: degree of separation, but I know.

1940
01:35:52,840 --> 01:35:53,280
Speaker 1: Who that is.

1941
01:35:53,280 --> 01:35:55,920
Speaker 8: I can call them to find out about you, so

1942
01:35:56,320 --> 01:35:57,920
Speaker 8: that I think those would be the big things I

1943
01:35:57,920 --> 01:35:58,439
Speaker 8: would say.

1944
01:35:58,760 --> 01:36:00,080
Speaker 1: I don't think the stander pieces.

1945
01:35:59,800 --> 01:36:02,920
Speaker 4: Of sort of observing some of the staff that you

1946
01:36:02,960 --> 01:36:05,879
Speaker 4: guys have. And I was at the Gloucester headquarters yesterday

1947
01:36:05,880 --> 01:36:09,599
Speaker 4: with Matt those X actor skills, being able to back

1948
01:36:09,640 --> 01:36:13,360
Speaker 4: a trailer down ramp, you know, having good instincts on

1949
01:36:13,400 --> 01:36:16,200
Speaker 4: the boat, on the deck, like all those things. Like

1950
01:36:16,320 --> 01:36:19,680
Speaker 4: it's not just you know, crushing it academically.

1951
01:36:19,720 --> 01:36:25,120
Speaker 5: I think you gotta have got to you know, problem solved,

1952
01:36:25,160 --> 01:36:26,240
Speaker 5: like all those things are.

1953
01:36:26,360 --> 01:36:31,080
Speaker 4: Like that's like a consistent characteristic I see in the

1954
01:36:31,120 --> 01:36:35,040
Speaker 4: State Agency, like top like contributing people.

1955
01:36:36,040 --> 01:36:39,479
Speaker 1: So yeah, you guys, definitely, you know, it is.

1956
01:36:39,800 --> 01:36:42,360
Speaker 3: Hard put yourself out there from the cow school.

1957
01:36:42,720 --> 01:36:43,559
Speaker 5: Like the skill set.

1958
01:36:43,600 --> 01:36:46,080
Speaker 8: It's like my interview for him, I have like academic

1959
01:36:46,080 --> 01:36:48,439
Speaker 8: stuff side stuff and it's like how are your power

1960
01:36:48,479 --> 01:36:50,120
Speaker 8: tools right.

1961
01:36:51,560 --> 01:36:53,280
Speaker 1: There is like how many times have you used the

1962
01:36:53,320 --> 01:36:53,760
Speaker 1: table saw?

1963
01:36:53,880 --> 01:36:56,960
Speaker 8: Like back trailer, Like I mean like build you know

1964
01:36:57,120 --> 01:36:59,000
Speaker 8: all right, that's all we got for you this week.

1965
01:36:59,439 --> 01:37:01,599
Speaker 2: Thank you so much much for listening, guys, Thank you

1966
01:37:01,640 --> 01:37:02,960
Speaker 2: so much, super filling.

1967
01:37:04,200 --> 01:37:05,800
Speaker 3: Can't wait to see how the video turns out.

1968
01:37:06,000 --> 01:37:09,080
Speaker 6: Yeah, me too, stuck in our beer bellies.

1969
01:37:09,120 --> 01:37:14,960
Speaker 2: Deep enough fish, Yeah yeah, thanks again. We'll talk to

1970
01:37:15,000 --> 01:37:18,120
Speaker 2: you next week. Always right in to A s K

1971
01:37:18,320 --> 01:37:20,799
Speaker 2: C A L. It's ask Heal a meeater dot com.

1972
01:37:20,880 --> 01:37:23,600
Speaker 2: If you have questions for Chris at B A j

1973
01:37:23,640 --> 01:37:29,400
Speaker 2: A or Bill and Ben and Mass Fisheries, send him in.

1974
01:37:29,880 --> 01:37:32,120
Speaker 2: We can always get these guys back on and get

1975
01:37:32,160 --> 01:37:34,760
Speaker 2: them answered, or I can pick them up for you

1976
01:37:35,160 --> 01:37:37,080
Speaker 2: and get them get them back to you.

1977
01:37:37,200 --> 01:37:39,000
Speaker 3: So thanks again. We'll talk to you next week.