Where to go within 3 hours of Boston?

[Basscatfrank]

Sorry, not giving up on this one. Your argument is based on suppositions and feelings. You feel that the fishery is deteriorating yet you have no numbers to buttress your claim. You say that the dead fish took a decade to reach their size yet you could not possibly have known the size of the dead fish.

The employees of F&G are dedicated professionals. I would expect them to inform us if a fishery was in danger. They say that we are in good shape and I believe them.

We take great care in the handling of fish at our weigh-ins. We employ a two piece bag that has a mesh liner. Fish are brought to the scales and anglers pull out the mesh liner and put them and their catch in a number of cooled and aerated tubs while processing through the weigh-in. After being weighed the fish go right back into the anglers water filled outer bag. The fish are then returned to the water at least 50 yards out per F&G instruction. While we all lament any fish that does not survive, how many fish are taken and never returned by non tournament anglers? I have nothing to be embarrassed about.

[Zpilot]

You should be embarrassed, the fact you are not speaks volumes. Your response and attitude is why nothing will ever change. Agree to disagree and move on is what I am doing. Hope at your next T you do not kill a bunch of fish. 22 dead is 22 too many.

[Capw]

Fish Squam for a day and then Winni. Squam will blow it away. Our last club T on Winni won with 6 lbs during the summer. The place sucks for what it should be.

[A Wood]

So not to put my feet in the middle of a squabble I would say your best bet would be squam... winni can be good but it is too much of a zoo most times of the year. I like peace and quiet while fishing and squam provides it for me. My tourney last weekend on winni was a joke. I fished one point and was less than 60 ft off a red marker and had at least 6 boats go between me and that marker at full steam. F that place.....
On a side note the rock bass do seem to be getting worse. I caught so many I could have filled a 50 gallon trash drum overflowing. BY LUNCH......

[jprovencher80]

I feel you on the Rock bass. They should hold T's just for those. Winner by rock bass qty caught. Donate them all to a group that would eat em.

[Reel Northern Bass]

I feel you on the Rock bass. They should hold T's just for those. Winner by rock bass qty caught. Donate them all to a group that would eat em.

Or find one ore more farms nearby that can take them to use them for fertilizer. This is really the only way you're going to get the problem solved, or at least helped. A concentrated effort, multiple times a year for as long as it takes to eradicate them. Not sure how hard it would be to find sponsors for an event like that to make the prizes and/or cash worthwhile enough to get a TON of people involved, but I believe it could be done. It would likely require a metric ton of volunteer effort to have lots of officials around with weigh in sites in every bay, that way you could make it easy for those with small boats that want to take part, but wouldn't be able to run across the lake to one weigh in site.

Don't know, thinking out loud about what it would take to improve the situation. Hey while we're at it, can someone bring in a thousand pounds of gobies so we can start fattening up our smallies?? (no idea if they're invasive and/or bad or not, just know they fatten up smallies really good)

[twitch]

Sean, you could also have a couple of mobil weigh in sites to pick the fish up from smaller boats just thinking out load bro

[jprovencher80]

I'd support a unit count vs weight. Every single one pulled out is a win. The more in the landfill the better.

[Reel Northern Bass]

I'd support a unit count vs weight. Every single one pulled out is a win. The more in the landfill the better.

Sean, you could also have a couple of mobil weigh in sites to pick the fish up from smaller boats just thinking out load bro

Both are excellent ideas, especially the unit count instead of overall weight. Hmm...I think I'll take it upon myself to see if I can get the ball rolling on such as thing over the winter. Bring the idea up to Fish and Game, see what they have to say. They've always been very responsive for the few emails I've sent to them.

[A Wood]

We just need to convince fish and game to make it legal to sell rock bass to our local Chinese restaurant. Then we get free crab rangoons for our fishing exploits.....

[JerryT]

I bet if you find a farm not to far away they would gladly send down a dump truck for free fertilizer pick up