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Making Waves Summer 2019
Florida Shuts Down the Big Three of Inshore Fishing on SW Coast by Frank Sargeant, Editor, The Fishing Wire
Story courtesy The Fishing Wire (www.thefishingwire.com)
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lorida's Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) made a pre-emptive strike on restoration of inshore fish on the state's southwest coast devastated by red tide--and shocked many anglers--by moving to shut down all harvest of the Big Three of Florida fishing, snook, redfish and spotted sea trout. The closure, which begins May 11 this year and continues until May 31 of 2020 as it now stands, will likely have a significant financial impact on guides, bait shops, fishing-oriented resorts and tackle and kayak and boat sales to say nothing of individual recreational anglers--but will be very good for the fish. It won't be the first time one of the state's premiere fisheries has been shut down to allow recovery--in 2010 after a massive winter kill of snook, the commission shut down all take for almost three years. Millions of adult fish were killed in the most recent red tide, which extended from November 2017 to early 2019, 15 horrendous months. Countless tens of millions more fry-size fish as well as the bait all gamefish feed on were also wiped out. While some estuarine areas where the tide did not reach remain very good--or even better than before in a few places because the noxious water pushed fish off the coast and well up the bays to escape--others like Sarasota Bay, a narrow bay with three inlets direct to the beach, had a devastating complete kill. Beaches and residential canals were littered with tons of rotting fish, and spending a day on the beach became
impossible--many beachfront hotels all but shuttered their doors as thousands canceled vacations.
Rotting fish not only wiped out anglers' hopes but also decimated the beachfront resort business during the extended red tide. (Photo credit FWC) The red tide finally dissipated as mysteriously as it came, in February this year. The state still has no cure and perhaps never will, though the new conservationoriented Republican governor Ron DeSantis has appointed a commission and created a department to attack the problem along with blue green algae, a separate issue mostly affecting fresh water but also a major issue in the Indian River Lagoon near Jensen Beach in recent years. (Why there are not more Republican's tapping into the conservationist/boater/ angler/outdoorsman vote these days is a mystery well worth exploring.) The closure will extend from the Pasco-Hernando county line near Tarpon Springs south (including all waters of Tampa Bay) through Gordon Pass in Collier County, just south of Naples. The area traditionally has been the heart of snook country in Florida. Redfish and trout were already down when the red tide struck, some think from overharvest as a result of Florida's booming population of inshore anglers, guides and kayak fishers. There have also been some water quality issues, particularly on Tampa Bay, where the city of St. Petersburg has had several massive sewage spills in recent years. (In general, though, 40 years of conservation efforts on the