Thresher shark

[danny]

Originally Posted by Jim Day

I hear that.. Do they even make a ziplock this big?



Tsharks in So Cal generally fall into either the sub adult category under 200 pounds and adults over 200. The subs hold tight to shore, school up and are super easy to target. The adults migrate up the coast further offshore, move in smaller groups and are a lot harder to find and target.

Back in the 90s T shark populations were in trouble because the gillnetters were wiping then out. A large one like the one in my pic above were and extremely rare catch back then because few were making it to adulthood.

They were targeting the subadults tight to shore with their nets and nailing them in huge numbers. So the DFG made them move their nets out to three miles, and since then we have had an huge increase in Tshark population number. Now catches like the one in my pic above are now common place, which shows clearly that protecting pups benefits the population as a whole..

The obvious conclusion is that if you protect the sub-adult pups from over exploitation you not only end up with more breeding adults, but the population numbers increase across the board. What I'm saying here is the old save the breeder argument is BS. You get more benefit from releasing pups then protecting breeders.

These sharks have no natural predators other then man, possibly white sharks, and killer whales, and whites and killers though they can eat them hardly ever do.

There is no reason that this shark:


Wouldn't grow up into one of these if released...
.....and eventually get much bigger then that.

That second shark may look big, but that male is just reaching breeding age kind of the equivalent in biology of a 10 inch Calico. I wouldn't of even taken it if it had not died on the line, as it cut my total T season that year down to thirty minutes.. (I only keep one a year)

We live in a shark nursery so we have an abundance of small easy to target sub-adult sharks both Mako and threshers. Pretty much every other fish we fish for has a size limit, most states have size limits on their sharks, but California does not.

Something like 95% of the sharks taken by recreational fishery in So.Cal are not of breeding age. If that was the case for Seabass, Calicos, Halibut or any other fish the DFG would instantly stop it. The only reason they do not when it comes to sharks is the commercial and business interests have lobbied to keep the pup fishery open. The commercials still target pups, even if they now have to do it further offshore and they do not want the pup shark fishery closed down.

Imagine if we lived in a Marlin Nursery with an abundance of baby Marlin, would it make sense to take twenty or thirty pound Marlin and only release the adults? Of course it wouldn't. We are sport fisherman and we would know enough to protect our Marlin for the trophy big game fishery they supply as adults.

Over the years a lot of misinformation has been pushed around on this subject. By a lot of self proclaimed Gurus. I'm no Guru... I'm not going to tell anyone what they can and can not do. The catch above is legal no doubt but I will say that if the DFG is not going to regulate us properly, I think then we need to regulate ourselves.

When people ask me about fishing Tsharks: I tell them to only target sharks over 200 pounds, and to only keep the ones that die on the line. Big T's over 200 often will fight so hard they kill themselves in the process. Unlike pups that do not fight as hard, and release well, the adults will literally just beat themselves to death. That big shark above at one point jumped three body lengths through the air, and also sounded at one point 1200 feet straight down. Nothing local fights as hard as an adult T shark, they are unbelievable fighters when they get big. Unfortunately that means they do die often on the line. So if you fish for them you not only need the right gear but you better have freezer space. Like I said I only take one a year, and once I get that one, I quit fishing for them. Which has lead to some pretty short seasons for me, but that is all part of the game.

A 200+ T shark is the hardest fighting fish we have off Southern California, they fight much harder when they are big and muscled up then when they are juveniles and a big T easily outfights a Marlin of the same size. Archer says the only fish that outfights them as adults are Giant Bluefin. I've never caught a Giant Bluefin but I'd be inclined to agree with him on that one.

These are southern California's true Big Game Trophy Fish, my take is to let them go and target them when they are big enough to put on the real show.

Just my take though.

Jim

that is not a knife this is a knife.
That is one monster shark, I think i will take one pup a year the older ones have more mercury. The way that one fought was about all i can handle on a kayak for now so I will stick to the babies.

[Tman]

Originally Posted by danny

that is not a knife this is a knife.
That is one monster shark, I think i will take one pup a year the older ones have more mercury. The way that one fought was about all i can handle on a kayak for now so I will stick to the babies.

Wow...I was gonna keep my trap shut until I read that last comment.

I'll prob get riled for this, oh well. He was a pup...you didn't get tail slapped, you got beyotch slapped, after all, he was only a pup.

Not gonna get into a battle over what is too big of a thresher to take or what is too small, reproductive cycle, season, take per year, etc. but that is a pup and in my eyes should've been released.

If that was all you could handle, then release him and know ya got some experience under your belt, ready for a bigger model.

Showed that to my Son, his exact comment was, "What? That shouldn't even be legal. Are you kidding me?" I wouldn't let him keep one that size, seems he wouldn't either.

Just my opinion...

[StinkyMatt]

Great catch Danny. Your kid looks stoked about holding a fish as big as him.

After I catch a Tshark, I will tell all of you to stop fishing for them. You got to be kidding me! I can catch them, I get to self impose my limit at one shark per year, why not ZERO sharks?

With our own fishing community bashing each other like this, the enviro groups don't have much of an opponent.

[Nic D]

StinkyMatt,

its not called bashing... its called educating. Huge difference! Bashing happens on BDecks.

Im still not going to tell anyone else what to harvest and what not to... but there's no way on earth am I ever taking a T-shark of that size.

Jim- nice post and I learned something. thank you

[danny]

Originally Posted by Tamarack Studios

StinkyMatt,

its not called bashing... its called educating. Huge difference! Bashing happens on BDecks.

Im still not going to tell anyone else what to harvest and what not to... but there's no way on earth am I ever taking a T-shark of that size.

Jim- nice post and I learned something. thank you

Yeah that was good info jim. Thanks Matt. inappropriate comment removed
.

[FISHIONADO]

Bashing a guy for a legal catch is not the BWE way...
Let's take the debate to this thread: http://www.bigwatersedge.com/bwevb/s...ead.php?t=8175

[AquaticHunter]

Originally Posted by danny

inappropriate comment removed
.

Whoa! Danny I didn't even see this til just now. WTF is the matter with you? You clearly took a baby thresher on purpose and I wasn't going to say anything until I saw that! People on this board were trying kindly not to "bash" you but to educate you. Not until you started saying stupid shit did anyone hardly mention your, and I quote you.. "baby fish."

The people who you are talking smack to have done more to protect your freedom to catch baby fish than your sorry fat ass will ever know. And this is all you can handle? My 8 year old has caught bigger threshers from a kayak. Maybe you should go back to freshwater.

[crusty]

three, maybe four tacos??????????????

CLOWN...



crusty

[driftwood]

Did you save the umbilical cord? I hear its a delicacy in china.

[BWE]

Sorry, we missed that nasty comment too.

Danny, that was not cool.

Majority on this board will say it's not cool that you killed that pup neither. It is your right.
You don't have a right to be offending other people.

Martin you should have reported this post.