Quote Originally Posted by Noelm View Post
This comes up all the time, the big issue is nearly all rec fishermen will not provide information, they are either paranoid about how the info will be used or just can't be bothered, add to that rec fishermen are widespread, and their catch is taken home to eat, there is no proof of take like pros have through the fish market system (of course there can be a black market (from both parties) that side steps this) I have said this before, I think stocks are "kind of" OK, as in (say) over a weekend, recs catch 500 Snapper (this number is just an example) but, 30 years ago, only 50 recs fished, catching 10 each, but now, because of population increase, more boats and so on, there is 500 recs fishing, still catching 500 Snapper over a weekend, but it's now spread out to average 1 per boat, creating the impression that the place is "fished out".
All that said, I am not naive enough to think that getting a feed of fish is as easy as it was decades ago, but, it's not as clear cut as it first seems, everyone hates pros and want them banned from anywhere near their "local", it's very complicated to get a handle on it all.
Well they use surveys backed by statistics to estimate the rec catch. Also there is no way the rec effort has gone up 10x in 30 years. In a lot of areas it has been stable or even gone down. Also monitoring the size and age structure of the catch gives an indication as to the status of the stock.