Think we will see Whiting in our lifetime?

[dfish28]

Amen cuz! And Paul...

Hey cuz if you could email me a pic of the pier it would be awesome my wife used to go there fishing from the pier along w "frost fishing", I'd appreciate that mucho

[bulletbob]

Originally Posted by Cuz

You are an old salt like me and probably fished on the Long Branch Pier. Pm me if you would like a picture of the pier. I took it from my 16' boat the day before it was to be demolished.

I did indeed fish the pier.. I am older than some here, but not others[58].. I appreciate the offer for the pic, but it would only bring sadness I'm afraid..bob

[bulletbob]

Originally Posted by Cuz

Just look in the fish cases at any fish store and CRY over the size of the whiting that they bring in to sell the public. Ten (10) inches at best. How the hell can the stock reproduce when the regulations let the trawlers keep such small fish. Has a whiting that size even had a chance to reproduce once? I've told seafood owners and managers not to buy these undersize whiting. How much meat is on them? You would need a dozen to make one meal. Ridiculous! The government worries about a healthy fish stock like seabass but doesn't put their foot down in other places. Don't they go into stores and see what I see? It's pitiful to look at such small fish being sold. Unless there is a moritorium on whiting I honestly feel we will never see them in numbers again where they will be a targeted fish. And that is so sad. Don't get me started on the whiting (silver hake) depletion.

You know its funny, I still see those whiting you speak of at big huge stores here in NY state [Wegmans}.. They have big , incredibly well stocked seafood sections.. They are indeed pretty small, a one footer being a good one... Sad to see.. The average one we caught was probably 15 inches, with some bats up to 22-24 inches now and then...The NMFS is regulating everything.. How about clamping down real hard on Silver Hake for a year or three for the draggers??. Maybe then we'll see some come inshore mixed in with Ling... In my opinion though. I doubt I'll ever catch another, especially living where I do, and not getting to the shore but a few times a year... bob

[Reel Class]

Not bursting anybody's bubbles here but there were a good amount of whiting in the deeper reaches of the mud hole and up on the north side this past spring and early summer. These were not the baseball bat sized fish nor where they all spikes, but they were there. Yes totally different fishery than that of 25 + years ago but there were more around this year than there have been in 20 years.

I'm a big believer in most "fisheries" being cyclical - some species have good spurts while others have spurts where they are hard to come by. The most notorious example of this would be our weakfish fishery - where we have wild cycles where they are thick as fleas and others where there are virtually no fish around.

I also read somewhere once that a couple of generations in the 1800's never SAW a bluefish in NJ waters, only to have them return later on in droves and people who saw/caugth them had no idea what they were. Hard to believe right?

On a similar note, I read somewhere that fishermen/scientists hypothesized that those whiting seen offshore were migrators from the stocks out east - not from a localized stock (mud hole) which we used to have before it was completely wiped out.

They taste great, are easy to catch, and will basically eat anything so if they come back in any #'s it will be great for all of us.

Although I never set foot on the Long Branch Pier, I remember several occasions in the 80's where the old Casino Pier in SSH (the one that Sandy took w/ her) was the site of some "wild" early spring evenings where jumbo breeder ling and whiting were flying over the rails and into the sinks and buckets 2-3 at a time. Great times - let's hope the stock gets rebuilt and we can enjoy them again!

[italianfisherman]

Originally Posted by nancy corigan

The whiting stock is not down, it's that the trawlers get them before they can even get to us.

These whiting we used to catch are Hudson Canyon stock and just like cod do these fish migrated inshore over the winter months.

It's simple, get rid of the Trawlers or at least cut the fleet in half and they will get a chance to come inshore.

Corporate Commercial fleets are what has ruined the whiting fishery, not hook and line.

AGREE...

Remember the Long Branch pier very well as a kid. Anyone who never fished it can ever imagine the amount of fish that were landed by everyone during the course of a night in the fall / winter when the ling and whiting moved in. It was insane fishing! The northeast corner of the pier was furthest out and produced the best but most nights anywhere on the pier you could catch fish. They used to have an old chum grinder inshore a little bit that they would grind left over carcasses and drop chum into the water. Not sure it made a difference especially with the ling and whiting but it was pretty cool. One helluva a fluke pier as well. Remember one September day when the fluke were schooling up getting ready for their easterly migration there were about a dozen and a half fluke caught over 8 lbs on that pier with at least half over 10 lbs. The biggest that day was 13.8 lbs. They'd drop a mesh basket down and you would have to work the fluke into the basket and then have the guy working the basket for you raise it when you positioned the fluke above it and then hoist it 50 feet or so to the deck. It was crazy but fluke fishing on the LB pier was phenomenal.

Back to whiting and ling, don't think those days will ever rebound. This October was headed to the Hudson on our boat and ran across literally acres of spike whiting floating on the surface. Thousands of them. I hear what Reel Class is saying but in my opinion there's no way a fishery can sustain itself with the commercial pressure on it that whiting have. The draggers are killing the stock....period. I understand cyclical but if a certain stock doesn't come back for about 40 years, I don't think that qualifies as cyclical. Can almost guarantee if the fishery was regulated and the killing of thousands if not millions of juvenile fish was prohibited, that fishery would bounce back in a few years. How could it not.

Dakota

[parker pete sportfishing]

I loved working the magic hour trips off the ocean grove pipe.. good times... who here can remember or has ever seen a frost fish.....there is one from the past

[shtriton207]

i too remember the long branch pier , 3-9 magic trips, buckets of whiting and made a tradition every friday after thanksgiving going out on the paramount ii for the afternoon 1/2 day trip it was the first party boat i went on that had heated rails

[Inishmore3]

About four years ago on the Voyager offshore sea bass trip I caught two nice size whiting. I had forgotten what they looked like.

For those who fish Long Beach Island you would remember the whiting trips on the DM out of Barnegat Light. Folks would get off the boat and drop them off in Tucketon to get them smoked. The next weekend they would drop off a fresh batch of whiting and pick up their catch from the week before.

The Norma K did those trips as well? I forget.

[Reel Class]

I remember the NK doing 2 half days and a half night trip even during whiting season - the only boats in Manasquan Inlet that did magic hours (that I remember!) were the Dauntless and jamaica... I could be wrong!