From: johnf@Auspex.COM (John Fereira)
Newsgroups: rec.outdoors.fishing
Subject: Re: Salt Water Fishing Licenses
Date: 12 Aug 92 23:29:49 GMT
Organization: Auspex Systems, Inc.

In article <1992Aug11.201034.21030@ucsu.Colorado.EDU| dixon@spot.Colorado.EDU (Life is real?) writes:
|In article <1992Aug11.124101@ratchet.Prime.COM> kosicki@ratchet.Prime.COM (Bernie Kosicki) writes:
|>
|>Eric Bjorkstedt writes:
|>
|> [stuff about saltwater licenses deleted]
|>
|>I personally would be opposed to having to buy a salt water license unless:
|>
|>1) I could purchase 1 license that allowed me to fish all coastal
|>waters, ie no separate liceses per state.
|>
|
|I like that idea, but what about the overhead costs and political crap about
|who, i.e. which state, gets how much money from the license sales?
 
How about spliting it up based on the number of miles of coastline.  I could
see how the national saltwater license would be of benefit for a resident
of a state which had a short coastline but for Californians there's a lot
of coastline to fish.

|>2) A dual Salt/Fresh water license could be created, and distributed
|>through federal government.  I have already paid $60.50 for fresh water
|>fishing liceses this year, and I'm sure that many people out there pay
|>much more.
|
|Why not just use stamps for fishing different areas?  In the state of 
|Washington, you can buy a salmon/ocean stamp for $7 that allows you to
|fish for salmon or any ocean fish other than steelhead...and you don't
|have to have a separate license.  If you're fishing for trout or steelhead,
|then you have to buy the regular license PLUS the salmon license if you
|intend to fish for salmon.  This plan allows you to just pay for the
|species you wish to keep...all others must be released.

California has "species" stamps as well.  A separate striper license must
be purchased for keeping stripped bass.  I always get all the stamps anyway
because you never know.  As an example, suppose we had a sturgeon stamp.
several years ago a local reservoir (San Pablo) was stocked with sturgeon.    
A couple of years ago a guy was fishing for trout and caught the first
legal size sturgeon from a lake in California.  Suppose you were fishing
for steelhead in Washington and caught a 45 pound salmon.  How many people
would keep the fish anyway.

How about a separate catch and release vs. catch and keep license?  The
holder of a catch and release license (purchased at a much lower price) would
not be allowed to have any fish in possession of any species.  They'd still
be able to fish any waters.  If the fisherman knew that they'd want to keep
some fish they could just get a specific species single/three day license.
Something like this could promote C&R, or at least make those purchasing
licenses more aware of it.

|>3) That all fishermen would have to get them, ie people going out on
|>sportfishing charters, and commercial fishermen (although I bet the
|>commercial guys are taking it on the chin as it is).
|>
|Right and wrong.  Salmon fishermen tend to make the bucks.  Charter
|operators struggle to pay for the boat!  Plus, commercial fishermen
|have to have a, I believe, federal permit which cost many mucho thousands
|of dollars, and they're not making anymore, i.e. you have to wait for
|someone to die or to decide to retire from the business...then they or
|their family sells the permit.

My uncle is a retired commercial fisherman.  My cousin is now running the 
business.  The federal permit is the least of their worries.  My uncle 
used to primarily fish for salmon but the population had dropped so much
over the years that he couldn't make a living fishing for salmon anymore.
He used to fish out of Noyo Harbor (Ft. Bragg, Ca., the town in which I
was born) but moved to a little town on the Olympic peninsula of Washington
where the fish were more plentiful.  Even there, he gave up on Salmon and
now my cousin primarily fishes for black cod.  He also fishes for Halibut
during it's extremely short season.  When my uncle started fishing for 
black cod he almost paid for his new boat in the first two years.  It's
a 65' aluminum boat.

-- 
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| John Fereira            "Is that all you ever think about?"                |
| johnf@auspex.com                                                           |
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