DEPRESSED
by Robin

Last week, the vote went through to close fishing in a specially boxed off area (98 ft - 240 ft water depth, from Port Canaveral to Savannah). No boat is allowed to verticle fish (bottom fishing) in thousands of square feet of ocean. Trolling is allowed. You can't even travel through the "boxed" area unless your bottom fishing poles are stowed away. Supposedly, the coast guard is watching you on radar and your boat will then be inspected upon entering the port to make sure you didn't catch any fish off the bottom. THIS IS RIDICULOUS!! The Carolinas were included in this box as well, but their representatives fought the SAFMC recommendations with a promise to not enforce any of their regulations and so their area was removed. Florida representatives sold us out.... for what??

This is not a hoax y'all. This is the passage of Amendments 17A & 17B from the South Atlantic Fisheries Mgmt Council.

People from my coast are now heading over to the Gulf of Mexico to catch what they can before the oil hits over there. Scallop season was opened 2 wks early so people could harvest before the oil hits beds. Eventually, there will be little to no fishing on the West Coast. Friends going to the Keys for Mini-Lobster season in early August have said the rooms are not booked and they're offering 50% discounts for divers that will book & come down.

Florida's fishing & diving economy is officially sunk.

What is the fate of this blog?? Our family's favorite hobby?? Florida lifestyle on a boat??

I'm not trying to be mean but since nobody has read my blog in weeks, I can let my hair down and speak my mind. If liberals take over this world, we'd be sitting in the middle of knee-high grass (no gas for your car or lawnmowers), with tons of mosquitos surrounding us, stinky because we shouldn't use bug sprays nor certain bars of soap, unable to afford power & AC for our homes because the prices would necessarily skyrocket, unable to fish because the ocean is closed off to us, unable to hunt because they're taken away our guns and unable to go to our beaches since they're covered in oil. I'll be sickly because my doctors will have quit their practices, meds will be unaffordable because I'm taxed up to my eyeballs & my insurance company will have dissolved and Jack may not have a job because all of those evil-capitalists will be run out of their businesses.

Where in the world have all our freedoms gone? Where in the world is the America I grew up with??? Sheesh people, I just want to be able to fish. Don't mess with my fishing. It does weird things to me.

Hey all!!

I really have fished recently. I just haven't posted up anything yet. Pictures coming soon!!

Tourney Results
by Robin

Tourny 1
Dolphin1. Rigatoni, 29.5, Matt Ring2. Dirty Hooker, 27.4, Jason Shimpnaugh3. Sea Hopper, 26.75, Harold Cook

Tourny 2
Dolphin1. Watusi, 31.90, Bradley McGuire2. In The Salt, 31.85, Eric Johnson3. Triple 7's, 23.70, Ralph Turner4. Slam Time, 26.50, Jeff Brown



Why do I bother mentioning this??? Top tourny weights of dolphin were 31.9 lbs and 29.5 lbs. Those are very low weights in a fish that can easily top 70 lbs. Jacksonville is having large mahi and south of us are seeing large mahi.

I believe this heavy freeze, late spring run and now intense heat have done something so weird to the migration patterns. Fish that stayed with normal migration times, continued in the Gulf Stream until the inshore waters warmed up enough for them to cross over. That means they bypassed us. Fish that were late in migration stayed south and eventually hung there in the deeper waters off those shores.

Anyhow, that is my guess to such weird tourny results. Btw, no wahoo were caught in either tournament. Also strange.

Happy Fishing,
Robin

SNAPPER/GROUPER DECISION
by Robin

All this week SAFMC is meeting to discuss certain closures on different species each day. Yesterday was the day for Snapper/Grouper talks. Talks went late and today, the news is that the decision was 9-4 vote to close Snapper & Grouper fishing. They were still hammering out exactly where fishing was closed off. They have a box, but the sides of the box keep changing. If you catch the fish outside the box, it is rumored that the Coast Guard (your tax dollars at work) are going to watch you on radar to make sure you don't stop in that boxed area while coming in to port.

This is so crazy. What if you catch snapper outside the box and then find a school of mahi and stop to get one of them?? What if spearfishing is allowed in this area but you still have a rod & reel on your boat? How do they enforce that? Will it end up looking a bit like our open borders? Will they get lax and eventually 12 million red snapper will enter the country illegally?

I have no answers to any of my questions. Infact, the more I try to get informed on the issue, the more questions I have.

Happy Fishing, if they let us.......