Fish expert blasts bowfishing tournament
- Thread starter JasonsPlecosCichlids
- Start date
Thanks man! and thanks for the heads up on the post/forum updates! will definitely be checking back in more frequently! hope you are all doing well!--neoprodigy look who's back!! lol Would love to hear your thoughts here
--solomon
E_americanus
I'm interested in this work you've been doing as far as the Great Lakes go (I'm pretty much a Great Lakes and more specifically Erie nerd and love to study all aspects of the lakes). What species have you been primarily studying? Oh and wonderful work defending gars my friend, we need more advocates for our wonderful rough fish!
I wonder where our local MFK so called "Expert" is at, curious as to what he has to say about this 
I don't see any problems with bowfishing taking native roughfish species. Our roughfish populations are healthy and stable for years even with a bow fishing season stays open all year.
Then I suppose our gamefish populations are just as stable if we bow fished for them, what with prolific species like black bass and added stockings? Just a thought, not trying to be presumptuous.
Hello; I do not have personal knowledge of other areas but around the tri state area (where Kentucky, Virginia & Tennessee meet.) there seem to be plenty of gar.
Is the gist of some opinions from this thread that "bow fishing is unpopular simply because it it bowfishing" or is there some other legitimate concern about the gar population?
I am presuming that the bowfishing is legal where the tournament is happening.
Laws and regulations prevent that, because since gamefish is more tasty than most native roughfish and are more targeted by the people. Sure there may be some anglers that targeted native roughfish but they will be outnumbered by anglers that targeted gamefish/panfish. We are talking about causal anglers, not bowfishermen BTW.
Theres no difference between a gar caught by a "sports fisherman" who kills a gar because it took his lure and a gar that was shot bowfishing each case the gar is removed from the waterbody.
Granted there are fisherman that are specificly target gar and want to release them alive. On the other side of the coin some people will take as many gar as they can taking advantage of no limit and leave them on the bank to die.
Granted there are fisherman that are specificly target gar and want to release them alive. On the other side of the coin some people will take as many gar as they can taking advantage of no limit and leave them on the bank to die.
Wanton waste is a huge problem, regardless of what species. Seen few piles of dead rock bass, pikes and undersized panfish quite regularly and even few dead muskellunges and sturgeons. But there are more respectful bowfishermen that will take fish home than the ones who leave fish on the bank nowadays. I just don't believe that bowfishing pose a threat to the native roughfish populations.
