Thread: Hogfish
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Old 11-25-2016, 11:02 AM   #11
kywestfreediver
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Re: Hogfish

I can only speak on my experience here in the keys, but here is what is wrong with this new law..

Hogfish are still everywhere down here, they are just smaller.. In my opinion they fixed the over fishing by raising the size limit alone, maybe reduce bag limit to 3 and give the commercial sector a legitimate trip limit of something like 100 pounds. Every patch reef i dive on the south side has schools of 30 hogfish, but they are all 8-12 inches.. So in my opinion it's not a numbers issue, it's a size issue. Once you raise the size to 16" (which we have all wanted for years) you get more breeding cycles for all these fish that are under 16" and the stock stays healthy. No reason to make it 1 fish per person and 25 pounds commercial. When we do a 80 mile run to dive commercial we will be limited out with 3 fish and will have to pass on the normal 100 pounds that we normally average on the trip.
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