Originally Posted by
mrl0004
IMO that makes you smarter than the people that do have the degrees a lot of the time. I definitely am not an expert on fisheries management, as previously stated, but I learned a lot while there doing what I was doing. But what you said sums up what true intelligence is all about, because with any information, the only thing we can do is take it in and apply it with our own experiences to make the best judgements. With the bass stuff though, I have seen it with my own eyes, if a lot of the 14-16 bass aren't culled it will severely stunt the whole bass population. Now this applies from 1 acre ponds to 150 acre lakes. Beyond that I am not sure.
I certainly agree, but I haven't seen it personally. I have noticed this specifically with Bluegill or Bream.
Pertaining to Bass, I live on a private 14 acre lake. There are about 10 houses on it and I can count on one hand the number of fisherman who fish it. Fish numbers (Pike, Bluegill, Specks/Crappie, Bass) are all in very large numbers. I will bet that over the course of a year less than 5 Largemouth bass are taken out of the system. I continually catch half pound bass, and 5 pound bass, a few up in the 6.5 and 7 pound range. For some reason the fish have found a way to maintain the life cycle.