Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, November 15, 1993 TAG: 9311160262
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By BILL COCHRAN OUTDOOR EDITOR
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Long
Smith, and Ralph Key, another friend, traveled from Roanoke to Cape Cod in the mid-'70s, where they savored a flurry of fishing on a scale so extravagant that it spawned a lifetime of memories.
Just as the evening shadows were lengthening over the ripply water, they got into a school of striped bass. They were big fish, with black backs and silver sides cut by distinct stripes, and bulging bellies the color of drifting snow. When the water settled, their count was 20 stripers, most of them weighing in the high 20s, one a 32-pounder.
The bite occurred at a time when the anadromous striped bass population, from Labrador to North Carolina, was beginning to take a nose dive.
The fact that about all the stripers you'd hook were big ones was a startling clue that we had overlooked early on. No youngsters were joining the ranks.
The fishing rapidly grew so sorry that those of us from the western part of Virginia simply started staying home or going after other species; no more striper trips to New England, to the Chesapeake Bay, to the foaming, autumn-chilled surf of the Outer Banks. Before long, the seasons shut down. By 1988, in Virginia you couldn't keep a striper, or rockfish as they frequently are called, even if you found one.
The alarm and sting of that loss was offset in our part of the world by a strange bit of irony. The very time that saltwater striper populations were crashing, freshwater introductions were soaring beyond anyone's wildest dreams. We soon could catch 20-pound fish in the tailrace of Kerr Dam and a little bit later, just down the road from where we lived, there were 30-pounders in Smith Mountain Lake. When we talked about dominant year classes, it simply meant that the hatchery had enjoyed a vintage season.
For a new generation of anglers, striped bass rapidly became a landlocked species. The truly wild ones, those living in the turbulence of surf and tides, those capable of responding to migratory mysteries that send them riding the currents for hundreds of miles, were all but gone.
So it was a special day last week, when Smith and I eased out of Lynnhaven\ Inlet, aboard Claude Bain's boat, and cut a course to the bridge-tunnel to\ cast for - of all things - striped bass. We were there, because in a brief and\ wonderful period, a species that appeared to be going the way of the passenger\ pigeon has turned the corner. I have this gut feeling that we are going to be\ making a whole lot more November and December trips eastward. When life turns\ favorable for the striped bass, the sun also shines on the striped bass angler.
Examples:
The Virginia Institute of Marine Science has announced that the 1993\ Virginia juvenile striped bass recruitment index was the highest ever measured.
Deal Fowler, a district fisheries supervisor for the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, has stated that ``the fish population is very close to recovery.'' He sees little reason to continue the hatchery-rearing efforts that have stocked nearly 1 million stripers into the Mattaponi and Pamunkey rivers the past half-dozen years.
Virginia's fourth recreational saltwater season in a row opened Oct. 28 and will continue through Dec. 19. It is restrictive and promotes catch-and-release, something anglers should have no problem living with. Even so, there is an overwhelming feeling that a relaxations in regulations will come soon, possibly by next year.
For the first time since 1985, the striper has been restored to the Virginia Saltwater Fishing Tournament as a catch category. Anglers landing a fish that weighs 55 pounds or more during the open season will earn a citation plaque. A catch and release of a 44-inch or longer striper also will earn a citation.
``I think it is entirely conceiveable that we will see 50 or 60 release citations for fish 44 inches or bigger, maybe even more,'' said Bain, director of the tournament. ``It might even be up around 100.''
The return of the striped bass already is creating a rush of tourist dollars in Virginia and Maryland and the count is destined to soar into the millions. The fishery has the potential of adding at least two months of intense fishing activity to the calendar, a fact that is going to cut into everything from deer hunting to Christmas shopping. One Virginia Beach marina operator said Thanksgiving Day already is bigger for him that July 4th. In Maryland, Gov. William Donald Schaefer announced a new Fishing Hotline (800-543-1036) designed to disperse information on where stripers are biting and how to find a charter boat to get you them.
``Fishing for rockfish is a tradition in our state,'' said Schaefer. ``We want to help anglers get the most out of this fishing season.''
Virginia Beach has mailed a news release on the striper run to the media with information o charter boats and piers. It contains an information number, 800-822-3224. The Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation is keeping Kiptopeke State Park open during the run, with camping and 24-hour access to the fishing grounds.
Just what caused the frightening plummet in the striper population remains a subject of debate, with everything from acid rain to pesticides to shoreline development to changes in weather patterns to chemical runoff to overfishing being cited. What has appeared to count most in its recovery is the removal of sport and commercial fishing pressure through closed seasons and sharp limits on how many fish can be kept.
``It is a classic example of what you can do with management, when you take the tough measures that in some cases are needed,'' said Bain.
How good is the fishing now? How great is its potential?
As we headed toward the rock islands of the bridge-tunnel, we asked Bain to recall a day that stuck in his mind last season. He thought for a moment, as if considering several:
``Last year one day we pulled in north of the second island about 7 o'clock at night [with two fishing friends and a guy named Jack, who is a world-class fly fisherman.]
``On every piling was a boat. When you cast, you had to get up tide and hold the boat into the tide and the people cast off the stern. We crused north of the second island until we found an open piling and pulled in and started casting. We caught fish on every cast for two hours on one single piling. We couldn't move, because there were boats on either side of us.
``When we left I commented that this was the best night of striper fishing I've ever seen in the Chesapeake Bay. Jack had an international perspective. He said it was the best fishing in North American he'd ever seen.''
The day we were out last week wouldn't match that, or the outing two years ago when Bain hooked and released a striper estimated to weigh 50 pounds. When we were on the water, there really hadn't been enough cold weather and migration activity to concentrate thick schools and big fish.
Bain believes the peak will occur around Nov. 20 to Dec. 10. He even apologized for the size fish we were catching, but Smith and I were too excited to pay any attention. We were catching fish, 10 of them, all taken on light tackle, most boiling onto top-water lures cast to the shadowed water within inches of the rocks.
The stripers were back on the rim of the Atlantic and so were we, with bowed rods and memories of how it once was, dreams for the future and a new generation of rockfish anglers bobbing in boats to either side of us.
by CNB