fish tagging

[Danny]

I was e-mailing with a guy at the littoral society about fish tagging. He told me that only 4.5% of stripers tagged are recaptured and reported. This seems extremely low to me. It seems to me, that unless there is a pretty high catch and release mortality, this number implies that only 4.5% of stripers that reach a 12 inch length (the minimum tagging length) will ever be caught.

If only 4.5% of the fish population get caught (and less kept) do we as recreational fishermen really have a significant impact on the population?

I worry that it is more a sign that many of the ones released die.

I was thinking about getting into the tagging. It seems to me that the tagging is more of an instrument for the littoral society to gain members and money then it is for research, but it would be fun to get a card in the mail telling you were and when one of your fish was recaught.

Any thoughts?

[fish4life]

You raise a valid point about fish mortality and our impact as recreational fisherman.

About a week ago some neighbors were on our boat in Sunapee lake. There is a popular sand bar where people swim and feed bread to ducks. Huge SMB will swim around the people and boats feeding on bits of bread before the ducks get them. We decided to try and catch a few with our kids. The first fish was probably 4lbs the second was about 1.5lbs, after that we couldn't buy a bite. The fish were still there but they were not biting anything with a hook.

My point is the ocean is huge and fish may be smarter than we give them credit for.