Isn't this the time of year we see Cobia (I'm an old man...they're still Ling to me) migrate past here? I haven't read any reports of people catching them yet. Did I just miss it or are they not doing their thing like they used to?
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Isn't this the time of year we see Cobia (I'm an old man...they're still Ling to me) migrate past here? I haven't read any reports of people catching them yet. Did I just miss it or are they not doing their thing like they used to?
I don't know where they migrate,
but it is definitely past here... ;-)
Cobia caught on GSSP per man hours invested figures out at roughly .000000000000000000000000000000000000000003 fish per fisherman.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pier#r
Full disclosure there is a fair chance I neglected a zero or two.
I hooked and fought one to the net a couple of weeks ago some thought it was legal some not. So instead of killing I wanted to net oh well it was fun and my first.
Thanks guys....is it fair to say the migration isn't what it was years ago? Maybe just too many people fishing for them now?
There are no doubt lots of factors in play as to the declining cobia fishery on our pier but people have become very efficient at catching them and they get picked at from North Carolina all the way to us from boats and piers. A reduced limit (especially per boat) plus an increase in the size restrictions could do nothing but help. We have seen those types of regs help out other fisheries and I'd like to see what four or five years of strictly controlled cobia fishing in both Florida and Alabama would do.
Delayed gratification..
We spent 7 hours looking for them yesterday in the boat and did not see the first one. I personally think a huge factor to us not seeing them on the beach much anymore is due to the increase in structure right offshore, and the fads that are being put out every spring. The fish can go to these structures and find shade and a food source. Something has got to be done before the population is completely decimated.
That's an alarming report. Are those FADS even legal? Could something be done about that....assuming they're not legal? Do you think that would help anything?
Back in the good old days of the late '60s thru the '80 (they really were good days for cobia) we never expected to see many cobia hanging around structure until after the end of April. The fish were more intent on making their migrations before turning offshore. After the end of April, they showed up more following leatherback turtles (really scarce now) manta rays and slow moving sharks, then on up into May they'd start popping up when we'd stop on snapper structure or occasionally grab a live bait intended for amberjack. That's all ancient history and fish tales now, but they probably haven't changed their behavior, there just aren't very many of them left. We got too good at catching them and a commercial market was developed for them. Bye-bye. Too bad. So sad. I don't boat fish any more, but it sure would be nice to see the cobia fishery shut down for a couple of seasons to see if they rebound. I believe they would.
I absolutely agree with the total shutdown approach with Cobia. If any fish needs a serious reboot, it's Cobia. We used to love fishing for them in the spring, but it is no longer worth the effort. After a couple year recovery period, reduce the limit to one fish per boat per day.
I absolutely agree. Something has got to be done soon or there will be no fishery left in a not so distant futureQuote:
Originally Posted by Green_Steel
That's so sad...I always thought that migration was a really neat thing. I recall years ago people saying the rough rule of thumb was they would start looking for them around St. Patricks Day and you'd see the boats up and down the beach with the big towers. I guess it was good back then.
Here's another thing that, for whatever reason, seems to be gone. My parents built a little cabin at Gulf Shores in 1959 and we'd live there in the summers. Needless to say, I spent much of my time on an old wooden pier called Pixtons Pier (I could walk there. Momma would give .50 and that was .25 cents to get on the pier, .15 for a coke and .10 for some chips for lunch). All of that to say there were times when the water would be black with schools of mullet. I never see that anymore. We had weighted treble hooks (we called them Snatch hooks) and you could throw them a country mile. We'd throw it past the schools and rip it thru there and foul hook them. I was like 10 and I'm sure I didn't exactly have state of the art tackle and, man, they were a challenge.
I wonder why you don't see that anymore? Netting?
Also...the other thing I loved was...like I said I was like 10 or so when I started going to the pier by myself...and those old men loved to teach me stuff. I say "old men"...looking back they were probably in their 30s and 40s. One of the neat things is they would tell me stories about the German U Boats coming along our beaches in During WW2. I remember a guy telling me he was walking along the beach at night...total darkness...and a UBoat surfaced just outside the first bar. He said he could hear them talking and they got out and swan and bathed, etc. I loved hearing that stuff when I was 10...then I could go home and make sand forts with my little green army men.
Sorry for the trip down memory lane but there were worse ways to spend a summer in your childhood.
Back to my question...I wonder what happened to the mullett schools?
I remember Pixton's. One time I took my grandfather's Pflueger star drag reel apart and couldn't get it back together properly. The guy who ran the place fixed it for me in a jiffy - much to my relief. That old reel was on a bamboo rod - sure wish I had it now.
"Sorry for the trip down memory lane but there were worse ways to spend a summer in your childhood."
Nice trip. Some things do come back, we had those schools of mullet in the past couple of years and the pompano fishing both last year and this year has been great. If we could better restrictions on the net boats I think that trend plus spanish and probably kings would follow suit.
I understand people making a living and the tradition of commercial fishing but the sheer economics of the recreational vs commercial is so obvious it hurts. What is a spanish mackerel or a pompano worth at the fish market and how much do you think people spend to catch those fish with hook and line? The recreational value of fish in Alabama alone is staggering-truly a golden goose to the economy here. Why short sell that for less than a dollar a pound for spanish mackerel?
Politics aside, this makes no sense what so ever. Simple math that's not so simple
I remember that old man....at least I guess he was the same one. Again...at that age everybody else was an old man to me.
Another bit of trivia: The barber down there was a guy named Sid. He used to catch a lot of tarpon off that pier and when you'd go get your hair cut instead of giving you bubble gum he'd give you a tarpon scale. I had a ton of them but lost them in Fredrick in 79.
Man...I was afraid of that guy. When I was five or six I heard my parents say that he was an atheist. I was too little to understand the term but thought it meant cannibal. I was afraid he was going to fry me up every time I had to get my hair cut. My childhood was a lot happier once I figured out the difference between a cannibal and an atheist. :bang
LOL Sid Bakkal was a hoot!Quote:
he was an atheist. I was too little to understand the term but thought it meant cannibal. I was afraid he was going to fry me up every time I had to get my hair cut. My childhood was a lot happier once I figured out the difference between a cannibal and an atheist.
The BEST king mackerel fisherman I EVER saw. He had a tale for every occasion.
He claimed to have caught a 70# king mackerel off the old Sun-N-Fun pier in the late 1960s.
And I believe him!
He had two Alcedo reels with manual bails on 9 foot rods. One with 20# line to 'free cork' LYs for kings, and the other with 30# line for tarpon. He was amazing to watch. And he correctly predicted the collapse of king mackerel stocks in the middle to late 1970s before anyone else realized what was going on.
Joe Leonard and I rented an old trailer behind Sid's house down the street from the post office during the summer of 1975.
He told us because he was paying for the water to just get wet in the shower, turn the water off to lather up, and then turn it back on to rinse off. I am not kidding! lol
Sorry, I digress.
I remember in the early to mid 1970s during May we could count on "ling" of all sizes being under huge manta rays or turtles (like Haywire described).
They, like the football field-sized mullet schools are just memories now :-(
Don’t forget about Mr. Tidwell, Mr. Woolley and Marvin Landers-Sid was my favorite though He was the best ling fisherman for sure.
I was on Pixton,s pier one night in the mid 1950,s with my dad and there were so many speckled trout around the pier we caught one on every cast and quickly filled up our ice chest. It was one of those times when something was in the water that caused a streak of luminescence every time a fish moved. We stayed and just watched for a while after we quit fishing.
Great story! Keep them coming everyone. I was throwing a cast net inside the jetty at Destin one predawn morning. It was very dark, as the net sank it would trap small box jellies that would light up as the net touched them. It was like an underwater fireworks show. I'm partial to things that glow like that.Quote:
Originally Posted by oldfisherman
What’s cool is that all those old piers kept producing long after they were gone. The pilings from Sun n Fun, Young’s , Ashwanders, Pink Pony, Doctors (quality inn) were all still there til 99. I used to hit them every morning on my way to the rigs. That was the good ol days part 3!
Yep...In my college days I did a lot of night diving for flounder. I guess we all did things in college that we wouldn't do now...but we had underwater lights, snorkel gear and pole guns. It was really effective because a lot of times if they were in five or six feet of water they're just laying there completely exposed...easy to find and easy to shoot. Anyway...back in the 70s the pilings from Pixton, Ashwanders etc were great for that, Not everybody remembered those piers so they didn't get a lot of pressure. Today....if you find me swimming around at night with a bunch of bloody flounders flopping around on a pole gun PLEASE INTERVENE. Like I said I guess we all did things when we were younger that we wouldn't do today...and that's one of them.
You’re right about that! People used to tell me I was crazy heading offshore in my little skiff Thanks for the Sid story man That was one of my earliest memories of him as well- giving me one of those big arse tarpon scales
I wonder when he passed away? I sure was scared of him!
Floridians sold them to Yankees, then started to eat them too. As a boy fisherman in lower Laguna madre the rumor was they were good for cut bait. Dad and I fished sprites and bomber sticks.Coyotes wouldn't eat mullets. When as a wayward youth of 21 I came to bama, I remarked to dad there's mullet in the grocery . he related how people here came to eat them! Haven't and won't.!!!! Lol
I've been fishing in this area since 2012. The first six months almost daily as in 6 out of 7 days, daylight or dark it didn't matter. Big Lagoon, canal, Ft Pickens, GSSP, & Pensacola Pier was my safe places & allowed me to heal from a nasty divorce. I've caught a lot of the fish edible & not available inshore and have always been thankful for the advice given. But the one fish I have not caught is a cobia. I've had them chewing on a hardtail only to have an ass throw his jig and hit the fish scaring it off. I've even seen a few free swimming. But in all honesty I think its time to place a moratorium on cobia. The #'s are unsustainable for the fish and sport. Granted I don't have a wizzbang degree to back it up but it's plain to see. Longer it goes the worst it will be on the stock.