somebassguy

MDNR BASS SEASON STATEMENT Here is the introductory language from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources from their public online bass season regulations survey regarding Michigan largemouth and smallmouth bass populations and management. If you have not taken the survey yet please do so. Quote from: MDNR Survey

BASS SEASON OPTIONS Here are the 4 bass season options as described from the survey the MDNR is asking for public input on (the order and language may be different from various sources including the online survey, a mailed survey and what will be presented at the public meetings - colored text is from survey, the plain text at the end of each are my comments only): Catch-and-immediate-release fishing from the last Saturday in April (Lower Peninsula) or May 15 (Upper Peninsula) to the Friday before Memorial Day. Harvest season from the Saturday before Memorial Day to December 31. Harvest season for Lake St. Clair and the St. Clair and Detroit rivers from the third Saturday in June to December 31 (current regulations). (NO CHANGE - Seasons would stay the same as they are now. No additional bass fishing opportunity.) Maintain current harvest seasons for Lower Peninsula, Upper Peninsula, Lake St. Clair and the St. Clair and Detroit rivers, but allow catch-and-immediate-release fishing for bass at all other times of the year. (ADD Catch-and-immediate-release (CIR) REST OF YEAR ONLY, St. Clair River-Lake St. Clair-Detroit River (LSC System) STAYS the 3rd Saturday in June - No additional angler choice fishing.) Maintain current harvest seasons for Lower Peninsula and Upper Peninsula, but change the harvest opening date for Lake St. Clair and the St. Clair and Detroit rivers to the Saturday before Memorial Day. Allow catch-and-immediate-release fishing for bass at all other times of the year. (This is the Michigan B.A.S.S. Nation (MBN) PROPOSAL - Add CIR rest of the year and move the LSC System in line with the rest of the Lower Peninsula Michigan waters regular opener of the Saturday of Memorial weekend.) Change the harvest opening dates to match the respective opening dates for walleye, northern pike, and muskellunge in the Lower Peninsula (last Saturday in April) and Upper Peninsula (May 15). Bass seasons would still close December 31. Allow catch-and-immediate-release fishing for bass at all other times of the year. (NEW OPTION - ALIGN the regular bass season openers, including the LSC System, forward with the inland pike/walleye/muskellunge regular angler choice openers, ADD CIR the rest of the year - Bass anglers have an additional month with the option to fish their preferred method of bass fishing.)

In order to get public input on proposed regulations to expand Michigan's bass fishing seasons, the Department of Natural Resources has announced an online survey and public meetings throughout the state in July. For the past year the DNR's Fisheries Division has been working with the Warmwater Resources Steering Committee (a public advisory group) to discuss possible expansion of bass seasons. The regulation expansion options being discussed would increase fishing and harvest seasons. Under all options, bass populations would still be protected and include a winter no-harvest season, 14-inch minimum size limit and daily possession limit. To gauge public opinion, both anglers and non-anglers are encouraged to complete the DNR's bass regulations survey, available here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BassRegs. The goal of this survey is to determine the level of support for increasing angling opportunities for largemouth and smallmouth bass through changes to existing fishing seasons. Additional public input will be gathered via a series of public meetings. Dates, times and locations include: Monday, July 14, 6-7:30 p.m. (CDT), Dickinson County Library, 401 Iron Mountain St., Iron Mountain Tuesday, July 15, 6-8 p.m. (EDT), Carl T. Johnson Hunt & Fish Center, 6093 M-115, Cadillac Tuesday, July 15, 6:30-8 p.m. (EDT), Oshtemo Branch Library, 7265 W. Main St., Kalamazoo Tuesday, July 15, 6-8 p.m. (EDT), Saginaw Bay Visitor Center (in Bay City State Recreation Area), 3582 State Park Drive, Bay City Tuesday, July 15, 6-7 p.m. (EDT), Tahquamenon Area Public Library, 700 Newberry Ave., Newberry Wednesday, July 16, 7-8:30 p.m. (EDT), DNR Customer Service Center, 1801 Atwater St., Detroit Wednesday, July 23, from 7-9 p.m. (EDT), Ishpeming Town Hall, 1575 U.S. 41 West, Ishpeming. Wednesday, July 23, 6-7:30 p.m. (EDT), DNR Field Office, 1732 W. M-32, Gaylord Thursday, July 24, 7-9 p.m. (EDT), Portage Lake District Library, 58 Huron St., Houghton A random selection of licensed anglers also will receive a survey in the mail. For more information on these meetings, visit www.michigan.gov/fishing. The Michigan Department of Natural Resources is committed to the conservation, protection, management, use and enjoyment of the state's natural and cultural resources for current and future generations. For more information, go to www.michigan.gov/dnr.

Whoops. I took to long eating a snack and didn't see someone had already answered in between the time I started to write and remembered to hit Post. This gives me the idea that I should talk to some bass biologists to see what information is available on how quick bass or other fish can produce slime. I have dealt with some species of fish that seem able to produce and excess of very messy, slimy slime. The clean up can be involved sometimes.

It is a coating between the fish and the outside environment. It helps keep things like infections - bacteria, virus, fungus and parasites from getting on to their body. It may help regulate their body chemistry too by controlling how much interaction their internal systems have with their outside environment. I try not to touch their body. I don't net them if I don't have to. I don't drop them on the carpet or other dry surface if I can avoid it. I like to use soft nets when I do. I wet my hand before I touch their body if I need to do that for some reason. Sometimes I release fish without bringing them in the boat but I do lots of photography and video so I minimize what I can. If I put fish in the livewell that I'm not going to eat I like to put a little treatment of some type. You can use one of the commercial chemicals following directions or use non-iodized salt which may work just as good or better. It is said these will encourage their body to produce more slime in reaction. Not sure how fast that can happen.

Weeds = Largemouth Bass. Outside edge of weeds or nice holes in weeds = Smallmouth Bass.

The source is from various Michigan DNR surveys and studies of bass anglers throughout Michigan over a number of years. Those are averages that started at about 60% back in 1988 when we created the first test catch-and-release season, and have risen to a statewide average of 80%. The highest rate is 93% on Lake St. Clair from annual surveys, questioning anglers public access sites and from the fishing results reports guides and charters are required to keep and turn in. I never make up numbers - I get them from published sources. I never share what someone else told me unless that someone is a research or fisheries biologist who is quoting from data available to them from their own work or other biologists' work. You can find a lot of this information published on the MDNR Fishing website at michigan.gov/fishing - use the link on the left menu: Managing Michigan's Fisheries. You may see people catching and keeping fish more on this lake or that lake, maybe at specific times of the year. It is okay for people to keep legally caught bass of legal size. There's nothing wrong with that. Our 14 inch size limits gives any bass the chance to spawn once or twice before it could be kept. People can only keep 5 per day, and on average, most anglers rarely catch a limit of bass. When looking at population level effects you need to look at lots of anglers over time, not just a day or two here or there during a few hours we may be on the water. We are not able to manage every lake individually due to the wide range of waters bass successfully inhabit. Luckily, bass are very, very good at making more bass. It takes very few bass to hatch enough new bass to keep population numbers up, and bass generally produce an excess of fry. Anglers are generally not able to catch every bass. That is also from studies done in Michigan on Michigan bass.

Option 2 (order and exact language may change on all of them) would provide a few more weeks to have catch-and-delayed-release bass tournaments on Lake St. Clair - our best and most popular bass lake. Lake St. Clair has our largest bass population but is limited the most. When the rest of our lakes moved earlier to a Memorial weekend bass opener in 1970, Lake St. Clair stayed at the later 3rd Friday in June date because some local anglers didn't want it to change. Option 4 would provide more catch-and-delayed-release bass tournaments statewide from the last Saturday in April for all Lower Peninsula waters - about an extra month except and extra ~7 weeks for St. Clair, and a couple weeks for all Upper Peninsula waters opening May 15. The primary gain overall to options 2-4 would be simplifying anglers opportunity to target all panfish including largemouth and smallmouth bass - the largest members of the panfish family - on most waters so someone who catches a bluegill, crappie and bass from the same lake on the same day is no longer breaking the law as long as they don't keep a fish that is out of harvest season. 80 to 93% of Michigan bass anglers voluntarily release most of their keepers anyway so talk about restrictions, and worrying about to many people keeping bass of beds doesn't accomplish very much except talk and restriction.

6-12 on a spinnerbait from Mullett Lake in the fall. The smallie had a bigger belly than me! I lost its twin on the very next cast to the same spot! Jumped off though how a bass that looks like it swallowed a large nerf football can clear the water is beyond me!?! Fattest smallie I've ever caught though not as big a belly as the one Kim Stricker caught on his Green Bay show.

Provide more information about the lake - how deep on average, type of cover/weeds, average water clarity? And any changes in any of those over the past few years might help people give better suggestions.

Four options to go to the public through meetings and surveys The Michigan Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) is preparing public meeting schedules and locations for comment on proposed changes to the Michigan bass season. Michigan B.A.S.S. Nation (MBN) submitted a Michigan Bass Season Change Proposal (PDF of full document) to the MDNR Warmwater Resources Steering Committee (WRSC), a Fisheries Division citizens' advisory group, on June 17, 2013 to start this latest effort to provide more bass fishing opportunity in Michigan. The original MBN proposal calls for the following changes to Michigan Fisheries Orders: "1 – Largemouth and Smallmouth Bass Catch-and-Immediate-release statewide on all waters including Great Lakes and Great Lakes Connecting Waters - January 1 through the Friday before Memorial Day. And 2 – Largemouth and Smallmouth Bass Catch-and-Keep (harvest option) statewide on all waters including Great Lakes and Great Lakes Connecting Waters - Saturday before Memorial Day through the December 31." Exceptions are also spelled out for a few special regulations waters such as inland trout and salmon waters where fishing is closed to all species, Michigan-Wisconsin Boundary Waters, the Sylvania Wilderness area and those defined Exceptions to General Regulations by County in the Michigan fishing guide. After more discussion on the Michigan bass season at various citizens' advisory groups, at the additional WRSC meetings, MUCC and with other major Michigan anglers groups we received a response from the internal MDNR bass season work group at the latest WRSC meeting on April 28, 2014. The MDNR proposed five (5) bass season options to the WRSC angler group representatives and each option was discussed. You can view the minutes of the April 28, 2014 WRSC meeting (PDF) online. MDNR Fisheries Division Chief Jim Dexter took all of the WRSC discussion to MDNR Director Keith Creagh to make a final decision on which options they will take to the public through public meetings, an online survey and possibly a random mailed survey. WRSC chair Patrick Hanchin and Fisheries Chief Jim Dexter have shared the outcome of their discussions with GreatLakesBass.com. The following are the four (4) options we expect to go to the public very soon at meetings scheduled at various locations around Michigan. Note the exact language will probably be different and the order the options are presented in may be different. Please make sure you check the actual information that comes out from the MDNR. We will share meetings times and locations, and actual bass season options languages as soon as they are released. Michigan Bass Season Change Options No change. Leave the bass seasons as they are now. Michigan Bass Nation Proposal: Year-round catch-and-immediate-release statewide; move Lake St. Clair system (LSC) harvest opener (from third Saturday in June) to statewide bass opener Saturday before Memorial Day when all other waters open for catch-and-keep choice (harvest). Year-round catch-and-immediate-release statewide with the same harvest seasons currently in place – Saturday before Memorial Day for all waters except third Saturday in June for LSC system. Year-round catch-and-immediate-release statewide. Change Lower Peninsula (LP) inland and LP Great Lakes (including LSC system) opening harvest (catch-and-keep choice) dates to last Saturday in April; Upper Peninsula (UP) inland and UP Great Lakes to May 15 to align with pike and walleye openers. Options 1 and 4 (as ordered here) had the most group representative support during the April 28 WRSC meeting. Recently, MUCC members also voted to make the MBN bass season change resolution (PDF) matching option 1 above their official MUCC organizational policy along with a call to the MDNR and Natural Resources Commission (NRC) to consider Adaptive Management when needed to manage our bass populations. Option 4 (as ordered above) has good support from state government leaders who have repeatedly stated they like the idea of allowing anglers a longer bass season and the opportunity to attract more bass tournaments because this can increase interest in bass fishing and boost our very important Michigan Natural Resources economy. The MDNR has gone on record at two hearings in the Senate Outdoor and Recreation Tourism and House Natural Resources Committees on SB 869 (PDF) – now state law as Public Act 145 of 2014 – also saying more bass fishing and the opportunity to attract more bass tournaments will be good for Michigan.

Bass fishing in Michigan is unbelievably amazing. We still have a closed bass season but it hasn't protected most of the bass spawn in the 'more sensitive' Northern and Upper Peninsula waters since it was changed to Memorial weekend 43 years ago. We've had legal catch-and-immediate-release statewide now since the 2006 season starting the last Saturday in April. We still have bass. And those 'extra sensitive smallies' are as big or bigger than ever. We had numerous weights on smaller inland lakes the last two summers over 20 to 25+ pounds for 5 bass. It's common on many parts of the Great Lakes to need over 25 pounds to win and even over 20 pounds to place in the money in tournaments. Most of the tournaments the first 4 to 6 weeks of the regular season are won off bedding bass every year and have been for as far back as I used to fish tournaments - I started in the mid-1980's. If the lake has good habitat (usually weeds) and forage the bass fishing is usually really good. We've seen more 6 to over 7 pounds bass weighed in in tournaments the past 10 years than the previous 40 years of my life. We've even had bass over 8 pounds weighed in up North where the spawn starts AFTER the regular opener every single season since 1970. Northern inland lakes that we started fishing regularly in the early 90's would take less than 3 pounds to win on now take over 5 pounds to almost 5 and 3/4 pounds average to win! And we've been bedfishing tournaments that whole time on the smallmouth bass. We have lakes that have changed due to things like weed treatments or introduction of exotics that has swung from smallmouth-dominated or smallmouth-largemouth mix to mostly largemouth than now also put out 17 to 25 pound limits of largemouth bass. Sometimes these are inland lakes less than 1,000 acres. I don't need to leave my state to have awesome bass fishing, and I'm very thankful for that. Hopefully, next year we'll be able to bass fish all year.

Closed bass seasons only exist in 4 states because they aren't needed. Fishing is good in Michigan because we have more freshwater resources with good habitat and clean water than just about anywhere on the planet. Our primary bass season hasn't changed in 43 years but our bass fishing sure has gotten much better since the mid to late 80's (when no major fishing regulation changes occurred). A real good way to get an education on modern bass biology and fisheries management is to talk to people who make their living managing bass fisheries and populations. In the B.A.S.S. Nation we now have one of the best bass biologists in the country on staff full-time - Gene Gilliland. I talk to him as much as I can. To say anyone is 'very money connected to fishing' shows a misunderstanding about how fisheries management is financed - through fishing licenses and equipment purchases BY anglers (user fees and excise taxes related to the activity). To have enough fisheries management budget you have to have enough anglers buying licenses, equipment and gas. To have enough anglers buying licenses, equipment and gas you need to give them access to good fishing waters and make it as easy to go fishing as possible. A real good start is to emulate other states that are successfully managing their bass fisheries AND providing the maximum fishing opportunity to complete the circle. In Michigan, fishing is a multi-BILLION dollar industry that directly supports over 40,000 JOBS. People like me and many of my best friends. The people who care the most about the fish and game are the people who hunt and fish them (hunters and anglers who foot over 90% of the annual management bill) and the people who need healthy natural resources to keep their JOBS. I know every decision I make and every position I support or urge the various groups I'm active in to support directly affects my job, the jobs of many of my friends and my personal most favorite in the world activity - fishing. It also happens to be the favorite activity of most of my friends. The vast majority of the people I meet along the public meeting, citizens' advisory, policy change paths are doing so mostly as volunteers on their own time because they care enough to give their time back to the sport, the natural resources and the big picture that keeps hunting and fishing as protected as possible from the people and groups who go way beyond restricting opportunity unnecessarily to taking away our rights to hunt and fish completely. Every major fisheries meeting and group of consequence knows the significance and importance of keeping the economics of fishing out in the open and clear. Anyone who doesn't understand why that is important needs to make an effort to find out why. Questioning persons, groups and agencies that do put an emphasis on the economics of fishing shows a need to seek more understanding about who our system of fisheries management works. I NEVER question anyone's motivation until I get to know them personally well enough to be sure I'm not judging them based on my own personal bias or interests verses what they actually say and do. I especially don't question or judge the people I see putting a great deal of their personal time into attending meetings, writings letters, email and papers, speaking at public meetings and joining committees, and generally vocally and publicly working for change and the betterment of hunting and fishing as a volunteer because just the fact that they are doing that in this day and age tells me they are probably at least trying to be well informed and to make the world a better place. Even if I don't agree with them all the time I give them credit for doing things not enough people do these days (just in my own opinion) - giving their own time freely to make a difference. I know I started to back off on talking about the economics of fishing earlier this year because some people were claiming that since I'm a 'former bass tournament angler' I only care about money. This came up at several meetings from people who really don't know me personally at all. And then I realized that I was making the fatal mistake about caring too much about what uninformed persons think (or persons who just plain don't like any change or the change I'm working for, and look for any excuse to stop it). It's more important to care about what the people already on your side, and the people open to listening and learning think than what we call the 'unsavables' inside any change movement. Change is hard for most people. But those who volunteer to make a difference can't let that stop them. It is critically important to the future of hunting and fishing to educate and discuss the complete economics of the industry. I know I have returned to the groups and ways of the others who don't forget that because I was listening to and thinking about the wrong people. If someone won't ever change their mind, or try to learn if they might be on the wrong track that's an unsavable. It's too important to the future of hunting and fishing to not do the right things all the time regardless of the occasional uncomfortable times. Which means educating people in government, business and the public about the entire economics of fishing and hunting, and making it as easy as possible through increased public access and minimum absolutely necessary restrictive fishing and hunting regulations much heavier on scientific management than social management. Social management too often leads to 'doing something' that does nothing positive. It's been great the past 18 months to see more progress made in the right direction in Michigan than pretty much the 30 years prior. I hope it continues and I hope to see more people comprehend why this is so awesome for Michigan, bass fishing and our Natural Resources Economy.