My Biggest Fear!!!

[joshimoto son]

http://www.mlive.com/news/grpress/index.ssf?/base/news-7/114597653750510.xml&coll=6

My biggest fear is that people are going to read the attached article and blame the fishermen.
I really hope that people read it and try to understand it intelligently.

I am writing this post so that we can be somewhat proactive and try to get the word out that us bass fisherman are not the cause of everything on the lake.

I do not want to write a post that is going to seem like an "attack" on the lake property owners.

I am writing this post to ask for help from as many members on this board to discuss this and throw out as many educated and civil comments as possible.

It is far to easy to assume and apply blame than it is to ask the appropriate questions and put in the hard work it takes to find out what the real cause of the fish die-off is.

The big picture! (My opinion only)

Ultimately, property owners are going to want to seek out some form of action.
So what is it that they can do?

Well... they may try to ask the MDNR to find out what is, in their opinion the "excessive" fish kill this year, and wait for an answer. But I doubt it.

I think property owners are going to want an immediate response to what they feel is the "real" problem.
and they may make the correlation with the increase in fishing with the increase in fish kill.

What does that mean?

I think every lake association is going to try to regulate the amount of fishing that is done on their lakes, therefore; I feel they will try to restrict the amount of fishing and tournaments on their lakes, because it is something that they feel is in their power and want an immediate cure for their "pain and suffering".

Since I've been on this board with all you fine people, you have taught me just how important it is for all of us to protect our sport.

Every little incident could lead to the degradation of our sport, that is, if we sit idle and take no interest in the issues at hand.

I would really like to get a good discussion going and talk about good ways to approach this as a group.

So what do you think?

joshimoto son

[djkimmel]

Some people do just sit around waiting for any excuse, but I'm not seeing an increase in fishing from past years. I actually saw less boats this weekend than I normally do at the same time on the same lakes. Maybe it is up in a few of the really popular places. You'll have to tell me about that.

I think a lot of this is always driven by a general distrust of our government bodies (I know, no one is surprised by that), which often leads to conspiracy theories.

They would have an incredibly hard time pointing the finger at anglers. Many of the fish probably died during the winter and the warming water brought them up. Fish die every winter due to stress. A lot of the dead fish are never seen because they are on the bottom, but fast warming water may bring more up than is normally seen. All of this activity, just like fish spawning success, is variable having low years and high years.

I still plan on trying to see if there is anything in particular that could have contributed to a few key places, but I don't expect any one 'culprit' to be a proven candidate.

I understand your concern Josh. We bass boat anglers in particular, are visible and easy targets and most people prefer easy targets to blame rather than the complex mix of variables that is usually the real reason. Partly why we have poor voter turnout. 'I can't make a difference, so why bother?'

All I know is things do get accomplished with some knowledge and a little effort by everyone.

If I find out anything, I'll post it on the forum.

We will always have to be vigilant about our behavior and to watch for incidents of people who don't like us trying to trump up nonsense to 'do something about us.' As long as there are people, some will be that way. We can all help to keep them in the category of whacko conspiracy theorists rather than actually allowing them to harm our outdoor enjoyment by watching our personal behavior, sharing information and showing some willingness to do something when something needs getting done.