On Sun, 01 Apr 2007 13:53:59 -0400, Wayne.B
wrote:

I know we have at least one or two people here who do some shark
fishing, presumably catch and release. Just how common is shark
fishing however, and do most folks release them alive or not?

I don't go shark fishing anymore because of that very issue - sharks
are overfished.

I read that article last week on another site. Their main contention
is that because the shark population is being slowly decimated, other
critters like rays are cleaning up the scallop beds. It makes some
sense.

This is one area where the IFGA should step in and say no more records
will be entered for catch and kill tournaments. It's not like the
technology for tournaments isn't up to date - laser measuring and
on-water judging and video records works for extreme billfish
tournaments, the same can be done here.

Two seasons ago, the Martha's Vineyard tourney had a huge PR problem.
One of their captains latched into a monster Tiger - (1290 pounds),
but it was late on the last day. It would have been the winning fish,
so the Captain made a choice to continue and try and board the fish.
When they finally figured out they couldn't make it back in time, they
went on with the capture anyway instead of just getting a picture and
cutting it loose.

Major uproar over that one. That's a top of the chain predator and
they just removed it from the ecosystem for the sake of landing a
monster fish.

That's bull**** as far as I'm concerned.