December 2009
2 posts
Disappearing menhaden??? →
“The deal with fish oil, I found out, is that a considerable portion of it comes from a creature upon which the entire Atlantic coastal ecosystem relies, a big-headed, smelly, foot-long member of the herring family called menhaden, which a recent book identifies in its title as “The Most Important Fish in the Sea.”
The book’s author, H. Bruce Franklin, compares menhaden to the passenger...
November 2009
1 post
October 2009
4 posts
Fishing South Mosquito Lagoon, 10/18/2009
Cold. So cold. And windy. So windy. The fish didn’t like it any better than we did. We got undersized trout and snapper all day… And froze. Oh, and almost swamped the boat in the 2-3 foot waves. We resolutely refused to go home empty handed, and the old trick of fishing the rocks around the clinkers proved just the right trick… we went home with two nice keeper trout. But the day...
Broad fishing ban would be 'devastating,' captains... →
he National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration could announce by the end of the month whether to ban all red snapper fishing for six months, which could be extended up to a year. The large-scale closure, if approved, could take effect sometime next year, but it faces a potential lawsuit from fishing groups such as the Fishing Rights Alliance, which sued the government over a grouper closure...
September 2009
5 posts
fishing report, 9/12/2009, canaveral #5
ok, tell me when i shouda stopped…
when both my buddies cancelled on me, whining about rain
when on my VERY FIRST CAST my line broke (never happens) and i sent 5oz of lead into the ocean
the first horsefly bite
my first fish was an 8.5 inch pompano
my second fish was an 8.5 inch pompano
when, while i watch a tarpon or huge ladyfish tear into a bait pod just 100ft off shore, and cast,...
in human culture is the preservation of... →
More good news…
Longlines are miles of metal cable strung with thousands of baited hooks, which fishermen deploy along the ocean bottom, including on coral reefs and rocky “hardbottoms” where red and black grouper forage. Loggerhead sea turtles forage there, too, and if they are snagged on the hooks, they may drown before the lines are hauled back to the surface.
The council, which...
Turtle news...
Some good, some bad. Since dedicated conservation attempts are relatively new (within the past couple of decades) and turtles are so long-lived, and they begin to breed at 10-15 years, it makes sense that numbers of leatherbacks have continued to dwindle. The real effects of these efforts take time…
A slight increase in loggerhead turtle nests on Florida beaches last year had turtle...
August 2009
7 posts
Stimulus money marked for Canaveral visitor's... →
Stimulus money marked for Canaveral visitor’s center
By KELLY CUCULIANSKY Staff Writer
Canaveral National Seashore is going to receive federal stimulus money to replace its roughly 30-year-old visitor’s center, a deteriorated modular building that was originally intended for temporary use.
The $646,000 grant through the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act will fund a new block...
“So long at least as humans are in the world, in human culture is the...”
– Wendell Berry, “Getting Along with Nature”
Anglers Divided Over New Florida License Program →
I never really understood the exception…
But this year, the federal government forced Florida’s hand. Without the new licensing program, a new federal requirement that all anglers be registered would have cost people like Mr. Corea $15 to $25. Even worse, said Henry Cabbage, a spokesman for the state fish and wildlife agency, the money would have gone to Washington.
Now, all proceeds go...
Oysters Are on the Rebound in the Chesapeake Bay →
Researchers from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science at the College of William & Mary say that large experimental reefs created five years ago are now home to more than 180 million native oysters. That is still a far cry from the late 1880s, when the bay held billions of the oysters, Crassostrea virginica, and watermen harvested about 25 million bushels annually. But more larvae have been...
Study Finds Hope in Saving Saltwater Fish →
Dr. Hilborn said he and Dr. Worm now understood why the ecologists and the management scientists disagreed so sharply in the first place. For one thing, he said, as long as a fish species was sustaining itself, management scientists were relatively untroubled if its abundance fell to only 40 or 50 percent of what it might otherwise be. Yet to ecologists, he said, such a stock would be...
July 2009
2 posts
“give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day… teach a man to fish, and...”
Wired Science News for Your Neurons Tuna Ranch... →
Swimming in a McMansion-sized tank in a nondescript warehouse in Port Lincoln, Australia, are 60 bluefin tuna. They’re about four months old, a foot long, and might represent the salvation — albeit an uncertain, ambiguous salvation — of that magnificent, desperately threatened creature.
The fish belong to Clean Seas Tuna, an Australian company that for the last decade has pursued the elusive task...
June 2009
6 posts
Fathers Day Fishing
My report from the Florida Surf Fishing board…
fished canaveral #1. late afternoon, incoming tide. water was clearer than i’ve ever seen it, very calm. sand fleas EVERYWHERE. crazy bait pods, lots of large mullets cruising up and down the shore. saw some big monsters out there, but only caught one decent whiting and a 14 inch pompano. any day with a pomp is good fishing in my book,...
Very good news...
I’m happy to see Obama taking an interest in the issue so early in his presidency.The appointment of Lubchenco, a marine biologist and an advocate for sustainable sea harvest, also bodes well.
He recently ordered a new task force to develop a national oceans policy. He said he wants a more unified federal approach to ocean issues, now spread across 20 different agencies operating under 140...
EarthNc has mapped the boat ramps in Florida. Very... →
We’ve put together a comprehensive map of Florida Boat ramps using base data and photos provided by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Ramps were individually verified, geolocated, and photographed. The Google Earth map includes full ramp information for each ramp and ramp photos (usually 5-15 per ramp) are viewable directly in Google Earth. Full information at...
Long time, no tumbl.
Been fishing a lot. Surf casting has finally turned on again after a windy windy miserable spring…
March 2009
1 post
oh, no! →
Flagler Beach Pier a danger
Foundation problems caused by washed-away pilings
By KENYA WOODARD Staff Writer
FLAGLER BEACH — The city’s most iconic symbol — the Flagler Beach Pier — was closed Tuesday afternoon after an engineer determined the structure poses a danger to the public.
Some of the pier’s pilings — which make up its foundation — washed...
February 2009
3 posts
a good day fishing
had a good day in mosquito lagoon in my friend, don’s, new boat. took us a while to break it in, and we spent much of the day just tooling around and tinkering. caught some trout in the cuts between islands in the clinkers around noon. but mostly just tooling around. but around 3, when we got stuck in the sand, i jumped out and started to push us out. noticed scores of fish all around us,...
Lake Woodruff, Beginning of February
Friends, refugees from the cold, were down this weekend, and we went for a quick walk through Lake Woodruff. The bass were feeding pretty heavily—I saw a number of them in the canals, and some young kids were reeling nice-sized ones in at the tower. We saw a family of river otters cavorting in the first impoundment, and even found their nest in the waist-high saw grass near the bank. You...
Fish Shares and Sharing Fish
A thorough and interesting article on fish shares and marine reserves from the Times’ “Wild Side” blog:
A broader management strategy, which many marine ecologists favor, is to set aside parts of the ocean and protect them from fishing altogether. Fishermen sometimes resist this idea, since it threatens to exclude them from profitable waters. However, recent work suggests that...
January 2009
6 posts
Family outing...
They let me bring the fishing pole. No fish, but a great day cruising Mosquito Lagoon off of El Dora.
Kayak fishing, 1/19/2009
I launched from an old abandoned dock, just off Bill’s Hill Road in Oakhill. It’s such an ideal place to launch from—easy paddle through the Clinkers, the Wall and George’s Bar. It’s directly across Mosquito Lagoon from the dirt launch west of the last parking lot in Canavarel National Seashore. The entire trip sketched up there is about two and a half miles, which...
Ron was generous enough to invite t-dogg and me out for a day fishing on his honkin’ flats boat. Totally the shizzle—this thing ran fast in six inches of water, and for the first time, I fished off a platform. What.A.Fuckin’.Blast.
Ron taught us some tricks for free-lining live Oak Hill Reds, and we dug some serious red fish between shore and the Clinkers. Just dropped the...
Fishing Calallisa Creek
We kayaked Callalisa Creek (putting in under the South Causeway at the little park there) and came away empty handed… the water was too cold, i guess. but the best kayak run in the area for birding. we threw the yaks on the truck and tooled over to the Visitors Center at Canaveral to see if our luck would turn… no luck. Fished the area around Moeller camp (28.923877, -80.823680) (north...
Surf casting reports...
I’ve been posting my surf reports in the Northeast region fishing report section of the Florida Surf Fishing board:
http://floridasurffishing.net/forum/dcboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=108
I’m michaela there. I’ve also been posting sometimes to the Central East Coast Fishing Forum:
http://cfecf.proboards40.com/index.cgi?board=fris
I’m chummy there.
Both of these...
December 2008
5 posts
Carp quiver for surf fishing...
I got this carp quiver from Big Carp Tackle (http://www.bigcarptackle.com/store/home.php?cat=285)… For under $50 delivered, I think it’s a pretty good deal. Very well made with double stitching, reinforced zippers, piping, etc. It could hold four or five sandspikes in the center pocket. This, plus cooler, and I’m ready to go. And it can strap down to the top of the MINI.
From...
Fishing Oak Hill, August 19, 2008
T-dogg and I got a late start after discovering that the trailer taillights had burned out. (Walmart’s pretty empty at 6:45am!) The dogg was in a foul mood after losing at poker the night before, and coaxing out corroded bolts before dawn didn’t help. But we sill managed to get the boat into the water off the public dock at Canaveral a little after 8am. We fished the area behind JBs...
November 2008
3 posts
A Seafood Snob Ponders the Future of Fish →
Bittman’s article is one of the best I’ve read on the overfishing problem.
The result of this demand for wild fish, according to the United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organization, is that “the maximum wild-capture fisheries potential from the world’s oceans has probably been reached.”
One study, in 2006, concluded that if current fishing practices continue, the world’s major...
FIshing Canaveral 11/09
Fished the third beach, a bit of the incoming and all the outgoing tide yesterday, from about 2:30 until 6. For the first time in weeks, no weed in the surf and the water was pretty calm: two-foot waves. Lots of crabs in the water, and not much action. I caught whiting and blues. Beautiful way to spend the day.
Fishing Canaveral Beach 5 on November 5, 2008
working this weekend, so cut out on wed and got to canaveral around 11. high tide at noon. much rougher surf than i expected, and stronger winds. not a lot of weed out there, but it was an issue sometimes. bite wasn’t very good—lots and lots of blues, tore up my rigs but i didn’t have any wire, so just kept making them. the surf was really rough and i’ve never lost so many...
October 2008
6 posts
Fishing Canaveral 10/29
Since I’m working the next couple of weekends, I took today off and headed to Canaveral. Pretty cold this morning—mid-40s when I was setting up at the beach. Living in Florida the past eight years, I’d forgotten how much clumsier you are in wind and cold. the fifth beach was closed for a rocket launch—I would have caught a LOT more if I’d been able to fish the deep...
Fishing Canaveral
For the first time in a few weeks the wind was blowing at a pleasant 7 knots from the west instead of dragging Sargasso onto the coast from the northeast. T-Dogg and I fished the first parking lot in Canaveral, mostly in the close trough, late morning, incoming tide. There was still a fair amount of seaweed, but not enough to dissuade me from fishing. It was the first day of the dry...
Fishing the Clinkers, October 10
Had the day off on Friday.
T-Dog got his boat running again, and we made a run into the Clinkers south of Oak Hill. We put the boat in at the last parking lot in Canaveral NS around 7:30, a little later than we’d hoped. Tooled out a bit to the sandholes and started throwing out topwater plugs. I hooked a 14 1/2 inch trout pretty quickly using a Gulp Shad on a Cajun Thunder rig....
