East Side your Limit drop is comming

["W"]

Originally Posted by mikedatiger

you are just mad your little dink ruler won't work here in TX

going sunday and have a spot open... just saying.

We going catch 45 Sunday .... Me reed and darren

[Montauk17]

I could care less what the limit is cause I only keep enough to eat fresh and give the rest away.

[calcutta37]

24 ft HO for sale lol

25 or bust......

["W"]

25 or Bust

I catch 7 trout in a bucket ,,,,,

[mikedatiger]

Originally Posted by "W"

25 or Bust

I catch 7 trout in a bucket_i.e. Big Lake ,,,,,

when you coming to fish TX??

[Super Spook]

Like Mathgeek said he didn't even mention the Spill or all the storms that have nailed the east side in the past 8 years. I find it real hard to believe that an estuary the size of Venice could be overfished with a rod and reel.

["W"]

I would also love to see some evidence that the oil spill hurt the trout ..... Because Venice , Cocodrie , V Bay were not effected at all and Lake P

[YellaBlazer]

Originally Posted by "W"

I would also love to see some evidence that the oil spill hurt the trout ..... Because Venice , Cocodrie , V Bay were not effected at all and Lake P

I don't know about hard evidence, but we've had one of the best trout years in a while this year.

Trout aren't stupid. All they did was move when all this was going on. They flooded Barataria with the diversions, and the trout and bait moved to higher salinities to the west.

No fish will stay in an area that won't support it.

["W"]

Originally Posted by YellaBlazer

I don't know about hard evidence, but we've had one of the best trout years in a while this year.

Trout aren't stupid. All they did was move when all this was going on. They flooded Barataria with the diversions, and the trout and bait moved to higher salinities to the west.

No fish will stay in an area that won't support it.

yep.... but its Bush's fault

And with closing the areas for months from fishing.... Should of stocked up for years

[Reefman]

We've become our own worst enemy. To say that trout fishing is as good as it was 20 years ago is not facing the reality of fishing success, or lack there of, today. The presure placed on our resources of trout is infinitely higher than it was back then. I beleive that fishing presure has indeed impacted the fisheries. BL looks like a parking lot on weekends with all the boats beatin the waters. T Butte can have over 50 boats in a small area on calm days. Diamond not much better. The rigs out of
vermilion looks like LaFonda; you need a number to wait in line to fish live bait. Cocodrie is overcrowded on any given day.There are far more people fishing today than there were in the 80-90s.

History will repeat itself in trout fishing just as it did in bass fishing. There are too many competing for an over fished and over stressed trout population. Again, only my personal observations fishing trout for over forty years. I do agree that 10% of the fishermen out there do catch the majority of the fish. However there are 20 times better fishermen now than there were 20 years ago.

We are the custodians of our resources today. Every effort should be made to acknowledge what problems face our natural resources and act accordingly. Responsibilities lay with us to protect them. We need factual information by our WLF along with coastal scientific studies specific to trout populations made public. I just can't see our trout fishing taking the pounding it has over the past ten years continue without a colapse in this fisheries. Just MHO.....

[Montauk17]

Originally Posted by Reefman

We've become our own worst enemy. To say that trout fishing is as good as it was 20 years ago is not facing the reality of fishing success, or lack there of, today. The presure placed on our resources of trout is infinitely higher than it was back then. I beleive that fishing presure has indeed impacted the fisheries. BL looks like a parking lot on weekends with all the boats beatin the waters. T Butte can have over 50 boats in a small area on calm days. Diamond not much better. The rigs out of
vermilion looks like LaFonda; you need a number to wait in line to fish live bait. Cocodrie is overcrowded on any given day.There are far more people fishing today than there were in the 80-90s.

History will repeat itself in trout fishing just as it did in bass fishing. There are too many competing for an over fished and over stressed trout population. Again, only my personal observations fishing trout for over forty years. I do agree that 10% of the fishermen out there do catch the majority of the fish. However there are 20 times better fishermen now than there were 20 years ago.

We are the custodians of our resources today. Every effort should be made to acknowledge what problems face our natural resources and act accordingly. Responsibilities lay with us to protect them. We need factual information by our WLF along with coastal scientific studies specific to trout populations made public. I just can't see our trout fishing taking the pounding it has over the past ten years continue without a colapse in this fisheries. Just MHO.....

Well said

[Bluechip]

Originally Posted by Montauk17

Well said

X 2 ...

[YellaBlazer]

Originally Posted by Reefman

We've become our own worst enemy. To say that trout fishing is as good as it was 20 years ago is not facing the reality of fishing success, or lack there of, today. The presure placed on our resources of trout is infinitely higher than it was back then. I beleive that fishing presure has indeed impacted the fisheries. BL looks like a parking lot on weekends with all the boats beatin the waters. T Butte can have over 50 boats in a small area on calm days. Diamond not much better. The rigs out of
vermilion looks like LaFonda; you need a number to wait in line to fish live bait. Cocodrie is overcrowded on any given day.There are far more people fishing today than there were in the 80-90s.

History will repeat itself in trout fishing just as it did in bass fishing. There are too many competing for an over fished and over stressed trout population. Again, only my personal observations fishing trout for over forty years. I do agree that 10% of the fishermen out there do catch the majority of the fish. However there are 20 times better fishermen now than there were 20 years ago.

We are the custodians of our resources today. Every effort should be made to acknowledge what problems face our natural resources and act accordingly. Responsibilities lay with us to protect them. We need factual information by our WLF along with coastal scientific studies specific to trout populations made public. I just can't see our trout fishing taking the pounding it has over the past ten years continue without a colapse in this fisheries. Just MHO.....

I don't disagree that things aren't what they used to be 20 years ago. That's a painful reality. But over on our end, the decline is more environmental than anything. 20 years ago, there were nice, pretty islands dotting the bay. They all held trout. A combination of storms and a choked off river have cost us a lot of essential trout habitat. Big Island, Cat Island, Manilla Village... the list goes on. Trout will not stay in an environment that will not support them.

As far as having 20x better fishermen now, I highly doubt that when the average guy catches less than 10 trout per trip. The same 10% will catch all the fish.

Also, there are no guides over in Lafitte that use live bait. All of the trout are caught on artificial.

[Reefman]

Originally Posted by YellaBlazer

I don't disagree that things aren't what they used to be 20 years ago. That's a painful reality. But over on our end, the decline is more environmental than anything. 20 years ago, there were nice, pretty islands dotting the bay. They all held trout. A combination of storms and a choked off river have cost us a lot of essential trout habitat. Big Island, Cat Island, Manilla Village... the list goes on. Trout will not stay in an environment that will not support them.

As far as having 20x better fishermen now, I highly doubt that when the average guy catches less than 10 trout per trip. The same 10% will catch all the fish.

Also, there are no guides over in Lafitte that use live bait. All of the trout are caught on artificial.

I think this applies to most of our coastal waters. Check out Montauk's post...scarey. Enviromental issues have played an ever increasing role in fish dynamics. Our waters cannot support what was once thriving estuaries that were growing until we started building levees everywhere.

Its all relative Blazer...there are 20 times more fishermen out here now which also raises the number to 20 times good fishermen.

[MathGeek]

Originally Posted by Reefman

We've become our own worst enemy. To say that trout fishing is as good as it was 20 years ago is not facing the reality of fishing success, or lack there of, today. The presure placed on our resources of trout is infinitely higher than it was back then. I beleive that fishing presure has indeed impacted the fisheries. BL looks like a parking lot on weekends with all the boats beatin the waters. T Butte can have over 50 boats in a small area on calm days. Diamond not much better. The rigs out of
vermilion looks like LaFonda; you need a number to wait in line to fish live bait. Cocodrie is overcrowded on any given day.There are far more people fishing today than there were in the 80-90s.

We are the custodians of our resources today. Every effort should be made to acknowledge what problems face our natural resources and act accordingly. Responsibilities lay with us to protect them. We need factual information by our WLF along with coastal scientific studies specific to trout populations made public. I just can't see our trout fishing taking the pounding it has over the past ten years continue without a colapse in this fisheries. Just MHO.....

We are our own worst enemies if we insist on managing wildlife with anecdotal opinions of anglers rather than comprehensive and sound scientific data and valid stock assessments.

Human pressure on spotted seatrout has increased, but pressure from all other natural predators on seatrout has decreased substantially. Most prey species tend to move to areas where there is more food and less threat from predators. The expansion of oil platforms in the Gulf provides more open water habitat than ever, and the nutrient loading from the Mississippi river has increased the biomass of their prey between four and sixfold. Combined with the decrease in sharks in open water and the increase in anglers inshore suggest that significant fractions of the seatrout populations are simply spending more time in the open Gulf where there are fewer predators and more prey.

The spotted seatrout is much more flexible than other inshore species with respect to acceptable habitat, and it is unlikely that human harvest provide the most significant life history bottleneck. Habitat use does not necessarily imply habitat dependence. Concluding that a wildife population is threatened because they are not in the same place where they used to be has been proven to be bad science time and again. Whitetail deer populations have shifted over the decades from wild woodlands to prefer farmland and suburbia. Red Snapper have shifted their population from the eastern Gulf of Mexico to the northern and western Gulf of Mexico. Spotted seatrout may have simply learned to avoid the inshore predators in favor of safer habitat with more abundant food.

[Reefman]

Originally Posted by MathGeek

We are our own worst enemies if we insist on managing wildlife with anecdotal opinions of anglers rather than comprehensive and sound scientific data and valid stock assessments.

Human pressure on spotted seatrout has increased, but pressure from all other natural predators on seatrout has decreased substantially. Most prey species tend to move to areas where there is more food and less threat from predators. The expansion of oil platforms in the Gulf provides more open water habitat than ever, and the nutrient loading from the Mississippi river has increased the biomass of their prey between four and sixfold. Combined with the decrease in sharks in open water and the increase in anglers inshore suggest that significant fractions of the seatrout populations are simply spending more time in the open Gulf where there are fewer predators and more prey.

The spotted seatrout is much more flexible than other inshore species with respect to acceptable habitat, and it is unlikely that human harvest provide the most significant life history bottleneck. Habitat use does not necessarily imply habitat dependence. Concluding that a wildife population is threatened because they are not in the same place where they used to be has been proven to be bad science time and again. Whitetail deer populations have shifted over the decades from wild woodlands to prefer farmland and suburbia. Red Snapper have shifted their population from the eastern Gulf of Mexico to the northern and western Gulf of Mexico. Spotted seatrout may have simply learned to avoid the inshore predators in favor of safer habitat with more abundant food.

I always look forward to your posts on these topics MathGeek. Emotional and personal opinions have no weight in proper mangement of a fisheries. Most here feel that there are problems facing the future of trout fishing. To address this issue we must gather any and all information to make sound judgements towards solutions based on scientific data and studies geared towards the trout species....and no, I don't think it is just a matter of fishing pressure but rather multiple issues involving habitat destruction, errosion and loss of coastal estuaries along with the technological advances made recently in fishing gear (electronics).

["W"]

Originally Posted by MathGeek

We are our own worst enemies if we insist on managing wildlife with anecdotal opinions of anglers rather than comprehensive and sound scientific data and valid stock assessments.

Human pressure on spotted seatrout has increased, but pressure from all other natural predators on seatrout has decreased substantially. Most prey species tend to move to areas where there is more food and less threat from predators. The expansion of oil platforms in the Gulf provides more open water habitat than ever, and the nutrient loading from the Mississippi river has increased the biomass of their prey between four and sixfold. Combined with the decrease in sharks in open water and the increase in anglers inshore suggest that significant fractions of the seatrout populations are simply spending more time in the open Gulf where there are fewer predators and more prey.

The spotted seatrout is much more flexible than other inshore species with respect to acceptable habitat, and it is unlikely that human harvest provide the most significant life history bottleneck. Habitat use does not necessarily imply habitat dependence. Concluding that a wildife population is threatened because they are not in the same place where they used to be has been proven to be bad science time and again. Whitetail deer populations have shifted over the decades from wild woodlands to prefer farmland and suburbia. Red Snapper have shifted their population from the eastern Gulf of Mexico to the northern and western Gulf of Mexico. Spotted seatrout may have simply learned to avoid the inshore predators in favor of safer habitat with more abundant food.

I kind of agree with this about trout moving to less pressure areas like offshore. I stated above that lots of trout never come inland just make offshore and beaches there habitat
On another note our trout study showed our trout seldom left the estuary. Also as Jeff Poe stated about big lake, we don't have the pressure like we did 8-10 years ago. Anglers have become more spread out and no longer see 50 -70 boats on long point , commissary or wash out like before. Trout do get resting time more now than before .

[rustyb]

I think everyone agrees that most of what they base al there numbers on is fuzzy at best.

["W"]

I have servers guide services on my facebook from the east side and during the summer,fall and spring months , they are posting limits of 100-125 trout by 9am almost everyday

No shortage in those locations

[Reefman]

Originally Posted by "W"

I have servers guide services on my facebook from the east side and during the summer,fall and spring months , they are posting limits of 100-125 trout by 9am almost everyday

No shortage in those locations

Right you are W; however, look at what they're catching and how they're catching. Juvenile to maybe 14 inch fish. Guides reluctant to leave landing without live shrimp. Trout that haven't reached spawning age. It's a numbers game as you well know. I'll take 10 fish from BL or VB anyday over what the 25 they catch east of here. Do we really need to be catching 100 trout a day to call it a successful trip. Those guides might be catching a bunch now but look at the other 99.99% of fishermen in those same waters. They're not catching those numbers today like they did years ago.