Just a little fishing report. The family needed our ocean fix and managed to rent a few cabins up by the store.
Fished Saturday and Sunday. Struggled Saturday, only landed 4 small perch and one tiny halibut but at low tide Saturday found a little structure just south of the day beach. Went back Sunday morning at high tide and had a blast. Non stop action and lots of dinner plate size perch. " So they do exist.
The probable clam pump ban will be decided on February 10. The topic on the agenda is this : "Recreational clam, sand crab, and shrimp gear emergency Discuss and consider adopting emergency regulations to prohibit use of hydraulic pump gear for recreational take of clams, including clarifying amendments to apply the same gear restriction for sand crab and shrimp. (Amend sections 29.20 and 29.80, Title 14, CCR)" So they're looking at banning pumps for ghost shrimp as well. Ghost shrimp, as you well know, make great bait and it would suck to have to dig them up with shovels. Since the water pumps being used too effectively for clamming are a two-man (or more) operation, I think that asking for one-man pumps to be acceptable is reasonable. Public input is being accepted and can be sent here: fgc@fgc.ca.gov On your subject line include that your email is about item 20 for the Feb. 10 meeting of the Fish and Game Commission. It may not help but it sure can't hurt.
UPDATE: This was noticed by someone and I have it on the QT that shrimp/clam guns (one man operation without a hose attached) are not being targeted. A note in support of this probably still helps.
And a side benefit of requiring pumps to be operated by a single person will be watching the frantic evolution of new single person clam pumps. Someone needs to go out to the clam bar to film the blooper reel.
ReplyDeleteWrybread makes an excellent point, that is the way of the world. For what it's worth, I've seen a few different state and federal resource agencies deal with implementing take regulation restrictions and each time I've seen staff involved in the process that are of the "restrict everything" and "reasonable harvest" types. I don't have a dog in this fight, but for those that do I suggest appealing to the "reasonable harvest" types. If you can make suggestions for reg language that accomplishes a middle ground, taking Wrybread's point into account, then do so. Some staff are hook-and-bullet types and they want to help species and sportsman. Help them help you.
ReplyDeleteThinking about getting into clamming while Salmon and Rockfish is closed. Will the tube/clam gun still be legal? Guessing a clam pump is different than the standard clam tube/gun?
ReplyDeleteThanks for any info on this.
What is going on with our noaa bouy?
ReplyDeleteShe got tired of waiting for us and left.
DeleteSo it says hydrolic, arent the manual pumps we use as in, "push down and raise the handle to suck up sand" gonna be safe, isn't hydrolic a diff type of pump or are they referring to our normal manual shrimp pump guns as hydrolic ?
ReplyDeleteClam tubes and clam guns are not in question here. Shrimp pumps that fill a tube with mud, then deposit that mud onto the sand so a fisherman can sort through the mud and claim his shrimp and crabs are. These are not hydraulic pumps, do not produce water steams under pressure and require only one person to use. In addition, these shrimp guns cannot be successfully implemented in anything other than minus or very low tides. The difference is the hydraulic pumps that most folks including myself want banned allow people to harvest clams in up to a foot or so of water, and produce a stream of water under pressure to blow away the mud. Think strip mining, because that is what is happening here. To those sending emails be sure to differentiate between the two types of pumps here. One produces a water stream under pressure, and the other doesn't. There is a very specific type of poacher using the hydraulic pumps and they need to be stopped.
ReplyDeleteOutlaw
Sorry just want to clarify, so the pumps we use to pump ghost shrimp are safe or are possibly going to be outlawed ?? Thanks for any feedback
DeleteI hear that they are safe but haven't seen it in writing. I believe the expression is "trust but verify"
ReplyDeleteThank you sir, please let us know if you hear any clarification on the ghost pumps would really appreciate, thanks again for your time.
DeleteBack by popular demand, fried chicken night @Coastal Kitchen.
ReplyDeleteI sent an email to FGC re clam pumps. Thanks for alerting me. I have used the method twice but in each case I did not break any clams. When i was digging with a shovel I broke almost everything.
ReplyDelete@voxman69: it's easily possible to break none or very few clams with the digging method, it just takes a little finesse. The trick is to dig by hand frequently for the last few inches and feel for the neck, then pull the clam up by the neck. With a little practice the digging and the pump method are about equal in speed and results, the big difference is that the pump method works on much higher tides. And is in my opinion much easier. Too easy!
ReplyDeletehey willy, what kind of fish do you expect to find in Tomales bay right now? Stripers and stingrays?
ReplyDeleteMostly the latter. There's a few herring in the bay so I'd think there'd be a few hungry stripers around but what I think and what I catch are generally different.
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