BACKLASH

Doctor Snapper

An IntervIew wIth Dr. BoB ShIpp

Dr. Bob Shipp is widely recognized as one of the most authoritative voices in red snapper management in the nation. He’s spent some 18 years—six separate 3-year terms—as a member of the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council, including three terms as chairman. He’s also chairman emeritus of the Department of Marine Sciences at the University of South Alabama.

Here are some of his thoughts on how we got to where we are today in Gulf red snapper management, deemed by most anglers as unnecessarily repressive on recreational harvest, and on where we need to go to make things better.

BY Frank Sargeant

Dr. Bob Shipp

CA: How did we get to the current status of management?

DS:There was a time when red snapper was overfished and undergoing overfishing—too many elements impacting the stocks, both adult and juvenile. This was in the late ‘80s. There were not a lot of harvest rules on either commercial or recreational anglers—anglers back then had a seven-fish bag limit and no size limit. Maybe more importantly, there was a huge wild shrimp trawl fishery at the time. Studies showed that the trawls in some areas were killing over 80% of the juvenile red snapper, so the whole system was disrupted. There was no question that the numbers were way down, particularly in the larger fish, and something had to be done to preserve the fishery. Today’s rules are the result of an effort to turn that around, which we have done, but in my opinion we’ve now gone too far the other way, to the point where we’re not getting maximum sustainable harvest out of this fishery or giving fishermen what they could be enjoying without harm to it.

CA: What factors have brought

fish numbers back?

DS: First, the trawl fishery for shrimp is just a fraction of what it once was. The combination of cheap, farm-raised shrimp, high fuel prices in the ‘90s and the requirement for use of fish excluder devices to allow escapement of juvenile fish all made shrimping far less profitable than it was once, and a lot of boats just quit operating. So the destruction of the juveniles is no longer a significant problem from these trawls.

Secondly, I think the cumulative numbers of artificial reef

structures placed in the Gulf over the last 25 years are having a huge impact on red snapper, which requires reef habitat for success. There are literally thousands of reefs out there today, both put down by fishermen and by government agencies, everything from washing machines to 300-ft.-long ships and discarded oil rigs; and the Corps of Engineers now actually encourages anglers to put them down in a 1,200-sq.-mile area of the northern Gulf, so we’ve had a big change in the available habitat there, from a soft mud or bare sand bottom to all these structures that form the base of the food chain. Some researchers argued early on that the reefs were simply concentrating the fish that were already there, but that’s been proven to not be the case—the reefs are a huge population multiplier.

And, of course, the very tight harvest rules have also greatly increased the snapper population. The take today is a fraction of what it was at one time, and all the factors together in recent years have resulted in a larger average size of the fish, so that the take, which is limited by poundage, has gone down in numbers of fish.

CA: How good are the stocks

today, in your opinion?

DS: I think there are more and larger red snapper on average in the Gulf of Mexico today than there have been in modern history. Not only are the traditional areas off North Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas completely loaded with fish, to the point that reef anglers can’t get baits down for grouper and other reef species, but the larval distribution has restored a very good fishery off central Florida, where there had not been fishable populations for generations. Adult snapper don’t migrate, so the fish that settle on a reef will remain in that general area throughout their lives so long as the habitat doesn’t get covered with sand, and they’re long-lived fish—we think they might average 20 years or so in the wild, with a few living to be 40 or more. A lot of the fish that are on the reefs today will be there for a long time, in other words, with the protective rules we have in place.

CA: Does this mean we can

expect a lot of monster red snapper on the reefs in the future?

DS: Not necessarily monsters, but probably a lot of big fish. Snappers get most of their growth in their first 10 years—a 20-pounder might be 10 years old, or it might be 25—they don’t keep on getting bigger indefinitely. Commercial fishermen actually prefer two to four pounders because they bring the best price on the market, but anglers all sort of feel management for bigger is better, we know.

CA: How has the

management of these stocks, now apparently so healthy, gone off track, in your opinion?

NS: It’s definitely mostly a problem of the accuracy of the population estimates. If we use flawed data that indicates we are harvesting too many fish for the population to maintain itself at the desired level, then by law, the federal regulators have to put tighter restrictions on the fishery. I think that’s what we have today. For example, in 2014, NOAA Fisheries estimated about 1.5 million pounds of red snapper were harvested off Alabama. At the same time, the state of Alabama, with an extensive survey system that’s generally recognized as far more accurate, found that only about 500,000 pounds had been taken—one-third as much.

There’s actually good momentum right now to improve this system. I just returned from a meeting in New Orleans with 50 fishery scientists where the primary topic was how we can generate “fishery independent data,” or information that comes from outside the catches of both recreational and commercial fishing reports to give us a better overall picture of the actual red snapper populations. Alabama Senator Richard Shelby helped to get a $10 million appropriation into the federal budget for this effort, and it looks like it should come into being soon—in the future, hopefully we’ll set limits based on current and accurate population information.

CA: If you were made the

Gulf red snapper czar today, what would you do to make things right?

NS: I like the IFQ commercial rules the way they are— the fishermen can take their quota whenever it’s best for them, there’s no derby causing fishing in unsafe weather, and there’s no glut on the market. The only thing I would change there is to eliminate the right of fishermen to lease out their shares—they’d have to fish it themselves or lose it.

For recreational anglers, I think we could go back to something like in the early 2000s, when we had 180 days open and a four-fish bag limit—the stocks were still going up under those rules, and there are a lot more fish, as well as more habitat today, so that should work and still preserve the fishery at a really high level. We may not see regulations that liberal for a while, but I’m hopeful we are definitely beginning to head in the right direction.

Dr. Bob Shipp’s iconic Guide to the Fishes of the Gulf of Mexico is a book that belongs on every saltwater angler’s bookshelf. The volume includes color illustrations and photos of hundreds of Gulf species, as well as a description of their life cycle and habitat preferences. It’s $26.95, signed by the author, from www.BobShipp.com.

This 300-lb. blue marlin charged and obliterated a teaser before being hooked up and hauled in for a clear release by Thomas Gorman. Photo: Thomas Gorman.

Gorman is an avid fly angler, traveling around the globe from his home in Hong Kong to target new species, but until recently, landing a marlin on fly had always eluded him. Photo: Thomas Gorman.

If you Google, “marlin on the fly,” you’ll see a bunch of stoked up, bloody fishermen showing off their fly fishing prowess. For a lot of hard core fly fishers, a marlin is a bucket list thing. And, even though a Google search proves that it’s possible, don’t be fooled. It’s ain’t easy. First of all, you have to go to a place where marlin live. So my buddy, who’s a fly freak in Tulsa, definitely has to leave Oklahoma. Then you have to find a captain who doesn’t mind fly line slinging around everywhere. Let’s face it, non-fly fishermen don’t appreciate it when your fly zips an inch past their ear. Sissies! Of course, you also have to find the fish. Then there’s the required skill set one must have to hook a marlin, then get it to the boat. And, even if all of that works, you’d still better be damn lucky. Hard-core fly fisherman Thomas Gorman had a lot of luck but, unfortunately, much of it was bad. For years, he traveled the world trying to hook a marlin on his fly rod. His success rate was zero. So, on the bright side, things could only get better. Gorman grew up in Chicago fly fishing in freshwater. In 1974, he visited Hong Kong for a few months and ended up never leaving. Well, to be more specific, he never moved back to Chicago. He definitely left China on countless fishing trips to pursue his marlin dream. He has fished Australia, Mexico, Belize, Costa Rica, Florida, Malaysia, Guatemala and everywhere in between. In his travels, Gorman has caught lots of blue water fish on the fly, but the one that always eluded him was the coveted marlin. Finally, in January 2014, he booked a trip to the Panama Big Game Fishing Club with one goal: to get his first shot at a marlin on the fly. He spent months tying 12-in. flashy flies with removable popper heads. He rigged lines, leader, backing and connections to heavy 12- to 16-wt. gear. In short, he was ready. But the airlines were not. He checked three bags, one of which was his rod case that contained six rods. After some 20 hours of flying from Hong Kong to Panama City, two of his bags arrived, but the rod case was a no show. Getting to and from Panama City to PBGFC requires a one-hour flight to the city of David, then a one-hour drive, then a short boat ride. The airline said they’d do their best to forward his bag to the resort when, and if, they found it. Gorman figured, quite understandably, that he’d never see those rods again. Dejected, he boarded the plane for David and tried to forget the months he’d spent preparing for this moment. For the first three days of the trip, he and his group caught black marlin, blue marlin, sailfish, yellowfin tuna up to 200 lbs., a lot of big dorado, and plenty of big pargo and roosterfish—all on conventional fishing gear. “My mind was still preoccupied with fly fishing and the months of preparation and anticipation building up to this trip,” Gorman said. “No doubt about it, this was an area with plenty of big fish, inshore and offshore. I felt confident I could have hooked a marlin on the fly.” On the fourth day, like a miracle from God, his rods arrived. He rigged up a 12-wt. and a 14-16

Panama Big Game Fishing Club hosted Gorman for his pursuit of a marlin on fly.

wt. outfit, the former intended for sails and the latter for marlin. They headed to nearby Montuosa Island, locally known as “Monster Island” because of the big marlin, which are attracted to its perennial huge schools of tuna. At long last, it was marlin time. Catching a marlin on the fly requires a bait and switch plan. You bring them in with bait then pull it out of the water so you can present them with the switch— your shiny fly. Just south of Montuosa Island, the captain and mate deployed two hookless bonito as the long teasers, placed about 30 yards from the stern of the boat to act as skip-baits. The short teaser, a 20-in. custom-made, hookless marlin lure with a tuna belly bait sewed onto it, was run to the inside of the long starboard teaser and placed about 10 yards back. Gorman’s hands were sweating with anticipation as he stripped line off of his 14-16-wt.Thomas & Thomas to allow for roughly a 12-yd. cast. The 12-in. red, white and pink popper fly he had tied was ready for action. In less than 30 minutes, a big blue marlin—estimated by Captain Tati and Mate Narcisso at 300 lbs.—aggressively charged the short teaser, which was the 20-in. marlin lure. The big, blue female whacked the lure mercilessly and repeatedly, ripping the belly bait off in the process. With the marlin lit up, Captain Tati yanked in the short teaser, put the engine into neutral and signaled Gorman to cast. The pressure was on, but he landed the fly just far enough to the side and behind the fish that when she began searching for the missing teaser, she spotted the big popper fly and switched her attention to it. For once, it all happened according to the script. She turned, inhaled the fly, and as she began heading away in the opposite direction from the boat., Gorman set the hook. “I gripped the line between my gloved and wrapped fingers and the rod butt and yanked it directly backwards away from the fish,” he said. “It felt like a solid hook set, and even with veterinary tape wrapped around the index and second fingers of my right hand, her rocket-like acceleration after the hookset burned my skin.” “What I realized after the initial blistering series of runs was the value of having a gimbal butt on a fly rod when fighting a big marlin,” Gorman said. “Apart from the comfort, it offers more leverage in lifting and regaining line.” The fight lasted two hours and 20 minutes. Captain Tati and Mate Narcisso did exactly what was needed when it was needed. Narcisso leadered the fish 12 times, but each time it was followed by a powerful surge away from the boat, taking Gorman back into the backing. As fate would have it, the 13th time was lucky. Having some 600 yards of Hatch backing gave Gorman comfort, along with having all of the right gear and being completely prepared. Narcisso was able to bring the fish to the boat for a quick photo then release her. The 300-lb blue quickly swam away. Finally, after years of trying, Gorman had his marlin. During the next two days, he only hooked up once more. That time it was a big, black marlin that broke his line and took his lucky lure into the depths of the blue Pacific. Still, the man who first fly fished 40 years ago in a lake in Illinois, was leaving Panama a very happy man. Despite the bad luck at the outset, the Universe finally smiled upon Gorman who, like any great fisherman, learns from his mistakes. “Next time, I’ll make sure to bring at least one rod as carry-on baggage.” That’s not lucky. That’s just smart.