No gigger is "slaying doormats several nights a week". Period
No gigger is "slaying doormats several nights a week". Period
Lol, I beg to differ.
Be proactive about improving public waterfowl habitat in South Carolina. It's not going to happen by itself, and our help is needed. We have the potential to winter thousands of waterfowl on public grounds if we fight for it.
I am gathering data.
Either write things worth reading, or do things worth writing.
What impact does gigging have on South Carolina’s flounder population?
From past estimates, we believe that somewhere in the neighborhood of 15% of licensed saltwater fishermen may participate in flounder gigging in a given year. Surveys of flounder giggers have shown typically larger landings per person than are estimated for the average recreational hook and line flounder fishing trip. However, given the limited number of available days with the proper conditions for tide, moonlight, water clarity, current, etc. it is most likely that total recreational flounder gig landings are much less than total estimated recreational hook and line flounder landings.
– Mel Bell, director of the Office of Fisheries Management
I used to go gigging like it was my job. It was something that was hard to learn on your own. You needed to have someone teach you the ropes. Along came the Internet and sites like charlestonfishing.com and online training came for free. For some reason, people seeking the validation and approval of strangers were gleefully spilling their guts about everything they just learned about fishing. They learned how to gig but not how to keep their mouths shut about a finite resource. The numbers of giggers exploded. I felt like I had the Charleston Harbor to myself on most nights and within a few years, it seemed like there was a brightly lit boat on every bank.
If you ever get a chance to ride the ferry to Ocracoke, notice what looks like standing timber. Most of those are net posts for gill nets. Pamlico Sound could be the biggest recreational fishery on the East Coast but instead has been sold or given to the commercial lobby to ruin with netting.
Mel failed to take notice that in Charleston County, there’s always clean water just a short truck ride away if your first hole is dingy mud.
Mel also failed to account that the tide variations surrounding Charleston can almost always allow for good water somewhere within a 45 min truck ride.
I’m not saying gigging is the major problem, but I see more and more gig rigs in back yards in WA, JI, hell even MT P.
Saw 4 parked in yards on Rifle Range the other day.
Folks don’t see em unless they’re putting in at 4am to run offshore.
Be proactive about improving public waterfowl habitat in South Carolina. It's not going to happen by itself, and our help is needed. We have the potential to winter thousands of waterfowl on public grounds if we fight for it.
The days of tide , moon conditions for flounder gigging are gone. There are people out gigging every night .
From what to what? There is a law of diminishing returns. DNR gets an astonishingly large pile of money from OOS licenses. I am all for sticking it to them, but every year I make a list of states, their seasons, and their license fees. The states with the highest fees are at the bottom of my list unless it works in a different way. Dont go shooting us in the foot.
Regarding the undersized fish not surviving the gig, on some inland lakes in the summer, you have to keep every rockfish you land because the mortality rate is so high in summer months. Perhaps a parallel rule?
"Rivers and the inhabitants of the watery elements are for wise men to contemplate and for fools to pass by without consideration" -Izaak Walton
Flounder fishing and trout fishing is my main focus. Always has been since I can remember. I do know last year I caught multiple flounder in the 21-26” range on the regular. However they were not in their usual places.
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Gigging:
do away with generators, underwater lighting, and mechanical propulsion (trolling motors etc) go back to push poling. unless you are from a coastal county no gigging for flounder allowed. if you don't call it striking then you aren't allowed.
"Check your premise." Dr. Hugh Akston
25 years ago, met a guy in Georgetown at Ferry Landing. Rode in a green High tide from what I remember. Smoked a pipe. I'd say he was in his fourties then. It wasn't Stewart Ballard either.
Any how, that guy was the best I'd ever seen. Limits every night when limit was 20 per person.
Low country redneck who moved north
Scdiver, I will trade you grouper filet for flounder filet any time you want to.
Low country redneck who moved north
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