Florida Fish Busters September 2006 FRESHWATER FISHING REGULATIONSWhats best for your area?

By: Bob Wattendorf, Biologist, Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission More rules or less rules, stricter rules or more lenient rules, how do you weigh the benefits while ensuring safe and sustainable use of Floridas superlative recreational fishing resources? Why is it that Lady Justice" is often portrayed with the scales of justice in one hand, a sword in the other and a blindfold covering her eyes? The common answer is that although not blind herself, the blindfold ensures her impartiality to all but the facts, and the sword reflects her commitment to enforce the laws. The image represents the Greek goddess Themis and/or the Roman goddess Justia, perhaps because there are times when it seems you need divine powers to properly regulate even a simple fishery. The Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commissions (FWC) Division of Freshwater Fisheries Managements overall mission is To Manage, Enhance and Preserve Floridas Freshwater Aquatic Life for Public Benefit. Our day-to-day objective is to provide optimumsustained use of these resources. The balancing act begins because "optimum" means different things to different people, so we try to find out what the local public wants from the resource and provide it to them in appropriate locations. For instance, in some places people may want a trophy bass fishery-even if all the fish have to be released. In others, they may be more interested in a bream and catfish fishery that provides lots of fish to take home for dinner.

Inherent among these choices, we must ensure that we manage the resource not only for current optimization but always with an eye to the future so the resource can be sustained over the long haul. Use recognizes other values than just harvest; for instance the catch-and-release ethic and the importance of aquatic habitats to land owners, boaters and others. So . . . our challenge is to balance the future of the resource based on best available science, with letting anglers and other citizens enjoy the resource, while at the same time balancing the goal of optimizing public use in local areas and keeping regulations simple. One case in point is spider rigs. These are boats with multiple fishing rods, sometimes more than 20 per angler that often target black crappie (speckled perch) or other schooling fish. Similarly, some shoreline anglers like to put out multiple poles, sit back and wait for the action to unfold. Although these anglers may increase their odds, they are still restricted to the same bag limit as an angler with a single rod or pole. Many issues come to mind here, but our first concern is the resource. Our biologists examine the population number, size and growth rates of fish and evaluate their habitat and available forage to get a good idea of the health of a fishery (for instance, the crappie fishery in Lake Kissimmee). They also examine the use of the fishery via creels (surveys of anglers to determine how many fish they are catching and how many anglers are using the resource how often). From that we determine if the population is being over-fished or remaining stable. Remember that native freshwater fish species have relatively short life spans and natural mortality often exceeds angling mortality, so allowing some harvest is often good for the resource and does not adversely affect its sustainability. If harvest needs to be regulated, this is normally handled by creel limits, while size limits can help ensure fish have an opportunity to

spawn at least once before they are caught, or help create higher quality fisheries, with more large fish. The second issue is public use and social perception. In the case of spider rigs or multiple poles being used, as long as creel limits prevent anglers from taking more fish than other anglers and still protects the fishery, should the State regulate how an angler takes them? This is a quandary that fishery biologists and administrators frequently deal with and applies to many other techniques, such as use of electronic fish finders, elevated platforms on boats for spotting fish, use of live versus artificial bait, underwater cameras for spotting fish, fish scents, flashing lights and more. As recreational fishing technology continues to improve and some anglers revert back to what they consider to be more purist techniques, such as fly fishing from a kayak, this question is bound to come up more frequently. So as we weigh the options, we are interested in knowing whats best for your area? The FWC wants to hear from our stakeholders, and one way you can provide feedback is to participate in online surveys. The question of spider rigs is currently featured at MyFWC.com/Fishing (scroll down in the right hand column and click Quick Input Survey to let us know what you think. ________
Each year FWC staff evaluates proposed changes to hunting and freshwater fishing regulations. Changes that are supported by staff are submitted for consideration at the September Commission meeting. 2006 was is an off-year, and criteria for changes were conservative. Proposed rule changes were posted on our Web site (MyFWC.com/commission/Final2007-2008InternetCommentVersion.pdf) and mailed to identified stakeholders for review and comment. Any changes that are approved will be adopted in February 2007 and become effective on July 1, 2007. The public input process for 2007 will be an on-year and allow more options to be considered, watch this column or MyFWC.com for how and when to make your suggestions.