Border war over stripers

[Flysmallie]

26 minutes ago, Stump bumper said:

Click on the link, smallmouth were originally in Canada and were spread during the early 1900s by the railroad. They go back 100 years but they are an invasive species.

I did click on the link. But smallmouth can't be an invasive species on a lake that was created after they were already in the system. In the case of Smallmouth vs. Table Rock the fish were there before the lake. True story.

 

[Stump bumper]

Ok, I can't argue that point taking "natural" as to mean after the man made lake was made and Mother nature to mean the Corps of Engineers I guess not to mess with nature means "don't make the people with money mad". Got it. 

[Champ188]

22 hours ago, Notropis said:

This situation is a great example of one of the reasons I retired from the AGFC. Politically appointed Commissioners with an agenda getting into egotistical urination matches (trying to keep it clean here).  I've worked with some great commissioners who respected the biologists and listened to them before making decisions but I've dealt with some who had an agenda and totally ignored the recommendations of the biologists. 

It's interesting in the articles that the biologists managing the different lakes are not quoted.  Chris Racey, Chief of Fisheries, did a pretty good job of describing the situation in a non-biased way including his recommendation not to stock striped bass in Table Rock (which I agree with) but it sounds like one of the Commissioners didn't want to hear it and showed his animosity to the Chief and some of the other Commissioners. 

I miss working with the Fisheries staff and all the dedicated biologists and technicians that did their best gather good data and make sound biological decisions but I don't miss the politicks and egotism of some of the Commissioners.       

I spent many an hour sitting in that board room in Little Rock covering those commission meetings for the old Arkansas Gazette. You couldn't have said it better, Notropis. It was sickening to watch sound data gathered by highly skilled biologists ignored and cast off because some bigwig landowner/power broker had the ear of a crooked commissioner.

To underscore what Notropis said, this did not apply to all commissioners. Some were very good people with only the best interests of the state's fish and wildlife at heart.

This state will always have problems of that nature as long as the AGFC commissioners are appointed rather than elected.

[Ham]

Ours is a fallen world. I for one am not at all sure that electing the AGFC comissioner would make things better. I do want decisions to be based onthe best available science, but even the science can be flawed. It isn't wrong to consider the desires of the fishermen and business owners as part of the decision making process, but it is wrong to give landowners and businessmen the final say.

I don't really have a dog in the striper fight. I like catching them from time to time, but pursuing them is not going to be a passion of mine. I'll just stick to swinging a stick on smallies Thank You very much.