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All the hubbub over red snapper might never have happened if the Magnuson-Stevens Act had never been passed. The act was designed to give more power to the folks who would come into the federal system to handle this fishery conservation act in federal waters. Like all folks handed … Continue reading →
Happy Mother’s Day. Much of what we enjoy in the outdoors is directly related to our mothers, maybe more than any of us know. Statistics abound tracking the dramatic decline in our country’s number of hunters to the rapid increase of single-parent families. Yes, there are … Continue reading →
Hope you read front-page headlines Wednesday and Thursday. If you did, you know we have a new
publisher. John Georges calls New Orleans home and wants to expand The Advocate’s presence in the Crescent City. Just want to let you know he also wants us to maintain, if possible … Continue reading →
Thursday’s Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission meeting has a full agenda headlined by final public comment on the 2013-2015 resident-game hunting seasons and consideration of opening days of the spring inshore shrimp season for our three shrimp zones. High on that list,too, is an item calling for the LWFC to discuss a … Continue reading →
If the issue of red snapper and the recreational fisherman has sparked something near anarchy across the five Gulf States, then the continued raid on the Louisiana Artificial Reef Fund is that same issue on the state level. The background here is that Gov. Bobby Jindal’s administration put enough pressure on the … Continue reading →
The report was quick and to the point: “11 guys, 33 snapper, 9 a.m., 4½ miles out. Great day.” It was Saturday of Easter weekend, and these guys were bound and determined to make up for time lost after rough seas left them and lots of others sitting dockside for Louisiana’s recreational red snapper opener … Continue reading →
There’s little doubt timeliness is important for reporters, and more importantly for a reporter’s readers. That means you should be reading about Roy Crabtree, the man who heads the Gulf of Mexico Fishery Management Council and his recent proclamation about Louisiana and our recreational red snapper season. That’s going to happen next week. Continue reading →
What’s getting ready to happen Saturday along coastal Louisiana is, in the fishing world, a clear shot across the bow of the federal fisheries bureaucracy. Our state will open a recreational red snapper season in open defiance to the proposed June 1 start of a 27-day recreational red snapper season in federal … Continue reading →
TULSA, Okla — The subject this week in this oil-based northeastern Oklahoma city is bass. That’s natural when the Bassmaster Classic comes to town for the first time it’s been this far west since the first one on Lake Mead near Las Vegas in 1971. The … Continue reading →
LAFAYETTE — Conservation Week started in our state this weekend with CCA-Louisiana’s state convention. This coming Friday, Saturday and Sunday, the Louisiana Wildlife Federation will convene its 74th annual convention in Baton Rouge. The state’s two largest volunteer organizations are closer today as any time in the past … Continue reading →
What happened on our most recent Thursday certainly gives outdoors writers months of topics. The following occurred during that day’s Wildlife and Fisheries Commission meeting: The Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, through the commission, confirmed plans to establish its recreational season and daily limits for red snapper in state waters. Continue reading →
You have only two more days to post your comments about Reef Fish Amendment 39, the instrument that could, if enacted, change the way recreational fishermen take red snapper from the Gulf of Mexico. RFA 39 deals with regional management of red snapper for recreational fishermen, and the ongoing battle between recreational fishermen … Continue reading →
My first thought venturing into a new year is that Hurricane Isaac likely was 2012’s top outdoors story. It’s not that this minimum hurricane overpowered south Louisiana. Instead, it’s that the storm showed how destructive a Category I storm can be as long as our state continues to suffer through prolonged coastal land … Continue reading →
Started out thinking about Christmas, about unique gifts, and somehow began to believe a Jack-in-the-Beanstalk gift might be a one-size-fits-all solution. Pause, rewind and realize that the idea of some magic, cure-all-ills seeds is what got us into today’s troubles. For all our formal education, we haven’t learned there’s a … Continue reading →
Friday gutted our country. Any of us who have children live in fear of what happened in Newtown, Conn. two days ago. There are no words for the 20 sets of parents, the teachers’ families, nor the school principal’s family that can be said or written that can explain … Continue reading →
Since 1993, there have been complaints about the 14-inch-long size limit on taking bass in the Atchafalaya Spillway and the nearby waters of the Lake Verret-Belle River basin. The limit was placed on fishermen the year after Hurricane Andrew came close to wiping out all fish species in the country’s largest overflow swamp. … Continue reading →
Photos give us memories to treasure, and The Advocate Outdoors wants to share those memories, especially those for our young outdoorsmen. There’s a years-long commitment here to acknowledging the accomplishments of youth hunters and fishers. Every so often we need to remind families about what we need to publish these … Continue reading →
Just about this time every year, the complaints start piling up. Fishermen fed up with other fishermen; hunters up to here with other hunters. Most fishing complaints have to do with courtesy, or lack thereof, at landings and on the water. Guys pull up to the top of a launching … Continue reading →
OK all you this-will-never-happen-to-me guys who are going into the fields, forests and swamps of Louisiana in the next days and week, please hand this to your wives, mothers and anyone who cares about you so deeply that they want to see you at their holiday tables — in one piece. Done? Continue reading →
The reason you seldom read anything about the Second Amendment to the Bill of Rights here over the past many years is that there’s no debate about the amendment’s meaning. Not to me. There are words about a “well regulated militia” and words that, for gun owners, carry the most … Continue reading →
The longer you go into the outdoors, the more you can come to understand that what you see in animals you see in people, and what you see in people you see in animals. Jam young humans into classrooms or adults into office buildings or on airplanes during the flu season and you … Continue reading →
Want a hot-seat job? Become a state fisheries biologist, and you’ll find out. After working with most of those folks in the Baton Rouge office for a quarter century, you know this is not an easy profession in state government. Two items surfaced last week to … Continue reading →
Another summer, another hurricane and another time when Capital City freshwater fishermen can only wonder if Mother Nature leaves them any hope of a future in their cherished pastime. There are dead fish everywhere across the southern parishes. The Lake Verret-Belle River appears to have been the hardest hit. There’s … Continue reading →
As hurricanes go, Isaac was a middleweight. He didn’t carry the knockout punch of heavyweights like Katrina, Rita, Gustav and Ike — or Betsy, Camille or Andrew. What Isaac did was go 15 rounds with our state. He scored with a jab here, jab there, an occasional right hook, but, … Continue reading →
It’s taken about four months to try to understand what President Barack Obama’s administration is trying to accomplish with its Idle Iron Policy. Most offshore fishermen might not know this U.S. Department of the Interior project by that name, but they sure know its effects. In short, this policy is … Continue reading →
I was planning to have some light-hearted fun this week, but another fishermen has died by drowning. Thursday, officers from three agencies found and recovered the body of 27-year-old Brandon Jeane from Toledo Bend. The story is that he was fishing late Thursday with his uncle, fell overboard and never surfaced. Continue reading →
For all of what’s happened during the past three months concerning Louisiana’s future in the recreational red snapper business, the next eight months promise to be all that and more. How much more will depend on what happens later this month when Department of Wildlife and Fisheries marine fisheries managers outline their … Continue reading →
The buzz across the five Gulf of Mexico states during the past three months is Louisiana’s move to extend its state fishery waters into the gulf and the push to take control of managing the fish in those waters and out into the federal Exclusive Economic Zone. The EEZ covers gulf waters out to 200 miles … Continue reading →
GRAND ISLE — It’s amazing that amidst the excitement stirred by the annual Grand Isle Tarpon Rodeo, there would be angst approaching anger stirred by the way federal agencies are managing our near-coast and offshore fishery. During the last three years, the lightning rod for this growing discord is the red … Continue reading →
The drill sergeant at Fort Bragg was the first person I ever heard utter the words “chicken salad” and not talking about putting that fantastic concoction between two pieces of bread, or better yet, a croissant. That morning Sgt. Dokes (never really knew his first name) all 6-foot-5 of him, said in his … Continue reading →
Michael Iaconelli was in Orlando last week, and the accomplished New Jersey bass pro was smiling. Mention Louisiana and the recently signed RESTORE Act and the grin went from ear to ear. “Isn’t it great,” Iaconelli blurted. “I love Louisiana ... won the (Bassmaster) Classic there. The state means a … Continue reading →
While ducks dominated the discussion during last Monday’s Wildlife and Fisheries Commission meeting, fishermen needed to pay attention to what’s ahead, too. The LWFC reinforced the National Marine Fisheries Service move in June to close the recreational season on gray triggerfish. Effective last Wednesday with the close of state waters, the entire Gulf … Continue reading →
Friday was a great day: News came from Washington, D.C., that the RESTORE Act was passed and that federal fisheries managers extended the recreational red snapper season by six days. It started with a trip to Breton Sound and a trout-limit fishing trip that showed how much we need to make sure the … Continue reading →
It’s late June, and the first reminder to all fishermen is that your fishing licenses expire Friday. That usually means a mad rush to the local license vendors to get that 2012-2013 fishing license, but it’s good to note that all recreational licenses have the same expiration date: June 30. Continue reading →
Happy Father’s Day. That comes with the hope you have the chance to hale your dad with those words. Mine is not here and I sure do miss him, and I know my wife misses her dad, too. It comes with the wish that our sons enjoy this day, too, … Continue reading →
Whether the big change in waterfowl hunting zones approved last week will hold more plusses than minuses for Louisiana hunters might not be known until its four-year run expires on the last day of the duck and goose seasons in early 2016. The move to a three-zone, two-splits duck season is the major … Continue reading →
Once again, the 2012 session of the Legislature provided us with more reason to understand why the words “infinite wisdom” and “Louisiana Legislature” are seldom mentioned in the same sentence. With countless numbers of folks working to convince both houses of Congress to pass the Restore Act, our Legislature is determined to take … Continue reading →
Friday is June 1, and Louisiana’s offshore fishermen have the first of an again-reduced recreational red snapper season in federal waters. It’s a 40-day recreational season that, by federal mandate, ends July 10. So while other deeper-water anglers in our four sister states along the Gulf of Mexico share in this time — except … Continue reading →
Saturday was the start of National Safe Boating Week: “Wear it” is the catch-phrase, words that the National Safe Boating Council is pushing around the country this week. For us in Louisiana, that’s missing the point. Being in a boat is a year-round proposition here. Our climes here mean fishing, … Continue reading →
Happy Mother’s Day. Much of what we enjoy in the outdoors is directly related to our mothers, maybe more than any of us know. Statistics abound tracking the dramatic decline in our country’s number of hunters to the rapid increase of single-parent families. Yes, there are other … Continue reading →
Making a move, even proposing a move, like the one Thursday during the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission’s meeting likely will spark national attention for weeks and months. Yes, the commission approved a Notice of Intent to institute a 2013 recreational red snapper season in state waters. OK, so the … Continue reading →
Maybe it’s because most folks around me are older that the term “bucket list” has become part of more and more conversations. Maybe it’s because more guys my age took time to take in Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson starring in the movie “The Bucket List,” that they decided to make their personal … Continue reading →
Lots of us older folks grew up with our parents’ adage an almost constant in our ears: Politely stated, it’s “The road to ruin is paved with good intentions.” It’s a saying we should repeat weekly beginning just about the time every spring when our State Legislature convenes. And it can be applied … Continue reading →
How much more can you stand to read about the tussle between recreational red snapper fishermen and federal fisheries managers will be sorely tested in the coming weeks and months. Fact is that recreational anglers, especially the folks who venture from Louisiana ports and marinas, finally are angry enough to launch a push … Continue reading →
Too bad during the week before Easter so much pent-up frustration throughout our state’s offshore fishing community was vented in such a way as to cast a pall over this glorious day. Sure, the ever-building anger over increasingly lower red snapper seasons and daily limits was bound to boil over. It was coming: … Continue reading →