What I feel is an alarming trend

[Fishin is life]

A major problem i see with the argument is that theyre public lakes. If they keep the tourny fisherman off the water shouldnt they also keep the guides and pleasure fisherman off the water. If they stop sanctioned tournies then youll have the same group of guys show up at the ramp and have a good ol boys non sanctioned tourny. To be honest i think the tourny boom is just a fad, like poker was for a few years. You went through a phase where everybody started playing and now its just the guys who were playing before the fad. I think another problem is that the really large circuits have broken up and small clubs/groups are springing up everywhere. In another 10 years itll the number of tournies will decline

[kc]

A major problem i see with the argument is that theyre public lakes. If they keep the tourny fisherman off the water shouldnt they also keep the guides and pleasure fisherman off the water. If they stop sanctioned tournies then youll have the same group of guys show up at the ramp and have a good ol boys non sanctioned tourny. To be honest i think the tourny boom is just a fad, like poker was for a few years. You went through a phase where everybody started playing and now its just the guys who were playing before the fad. I think another problem is that the really large circuits have broken up and small clubs/groups are springing up everywhere. In another 10 years itll the number of tournies will decline

I wish what you are saying is true but I think tournament fishing is becoming more pervasive rather than less. I have spoken with guys before that all they do is tournament fish -- they can't even fathom fishing unless in a tournament or for tourney prep. Pretty sad to me. Fundamentally I don't have a problem with tournaments - it is just the sheer number of boats and added rudeness that come with them dominating the lakes as they can do. I have learned to adapt but there is still a part of me that resents having to adapt for a faction of the fishing community obsessed with competing and the love of the dollar. I am hopeful that in time you are correct and the fad will fade but I doubt it...


kc

[GeoFisher]

I wish what you are saying is true but I think tournament fishing is becoming more pervasive rather than less. I have spoken with guys before that all they do is tournament fish -- they can't even fathom fishing unless in a tournament or for tourney prep. Pretty sad to me. Fundamentally I don't have a problem with tournaments - it is just the sheer number of boats and added rudeness that come with them dominating the lakes as they can do. I have learned to adapt but there is still a part of me that resents having to adapt for a faction of the fishing community obsessed with competing and the love of the dollar. I am hopeful that in time you are correct and the fad will fade but I doubt it...


kc

Yea, we're having a 1000 boat kayak tourney in the Boundary Waters this summer..........It will be EPIC. .

[kc]

Yea, we're having a 1000 boat kayak tourney in the Boundary Waters this summer..........It will be EPIC. .

That will be an interesting blast off!!! Better watch getting paddle slapped from any direction...


kc

[roadrunner]

One of the worst experience you can have is try to get into Kentucky Dam Marina when a big tx is over these idiots think the road is one way out I saw a tx man cuss a lady out who was coming into the marina and he was on her side of the road he got out of the car and ripped her apart because he got up at 4:00 to make it to the tx and she should get the hell out of his way. I will say he met his match because she explained that she paid 6,000 for a boat slip and he was on the wrong side of the road blocking her from getting to her weekend home and it was not her fault that he was so stupid to get up at 4:00 to catch a stupid fish that would still be in the lake at 10:00. Then she dialed 911 and reported him. I will say that the park service needs someone at the tx before fisherman show up and before they leave for crowd control. I have seen people park with the front of their truck in the road which makes it one lane into the marina all day long. The park service should have towed about 15 vehicles.

[Dave Stewart]

I have been guiding full time for 20 years now. For many years I guided from the end of February to the end of November with no days off (7 days a week) except for an occasional cancellation due to inclement weather conditions. I have seen the boat traffic continuously increase here on Ky/Barkley every year since my first year of guiding. About 10 years ago I was guiding on the 4th of July weekend and went through the canal that connects the two lakes. Half way through the canal I made a promise to God that if he would just let us survive until we got through the canal alive that I would never again guide on a holiday weekend...and since then I have never put my boat in the water on a holiday weekend. About 3 years ago while guiding on a Saturday during the summer my clients and I were fishing a ledge outside the navigation channels.....there was a Poker Run that day as well as a number of bass tournaments....3 times that day we came very close to being run over by packs of 90 mph cigar type boats and I lost count of how many times bass boats pulled up right beside us and started throwing their lures on the same spot we were fishing without saying a word to us...most close enough I could have stepped into their boat. I made the decision that day that I had enough of the summer weekend nonsense and I have not guided on a weekend between Memorial Day weekend and Labor Day weekend since. All this and I am working on the biggest freshwater water way in the country except for the Great Lakes. I can't even imagine what it is like now on Barren, Green, Rough, Cumberland, Dale, Herrington, Cave Run, Taylorsville and other lakes I fished many years ago before I moved here...it has to be a nightmare at best. I certainly can see why all the frustration here. I also do not know the answer to the problem. All I can say is that if everyone out there would practice the Golden Rule things would certainly be better but of course that would apply to every thing in life, but the problem is that there are some folks that just don't care about other folks. I do see that sometime in the future this will lead to more government regulations and restrictions....I am surprised actually that this has not already happened here in Kentucky....it has in some states already and that is one of the biggest reasons we get so many anglers from the northern states here.

[Crankinstein]

Fellow bass fishermen, my name is Crankinstein and I am a derby fisherman. I started just fishing them for fun, I then became hooked. It doesn't affect every person the same but it consumed me. I went broke, lost my 1st wife, gave up my job, separated from my family. I am better now and now just fish for fun. I admit that when the derby was on the line you had better not be close to MY spot, slowed me down or got in my way. I had the idea that derby fishing was my way out of the middle class. it didn't pan out. I quit enjoying the art of fishing only the drive to win.


As I said, not every fisherman is the same, but a lot of you got it just as bad. Next derby picture your grandma crappie fishing in every boat you see!! If you cut them off or send them a big roller to break loose their anchor, get help!!! I did and enjoy fishing again. I can even fish a open derby now.

Crankinstein

[astrobass200]

I can't stand all the tournament fishing and rude fisherman, but I sure love my 20 foot bass boat and my 200 outboard, but I don't forget that they came from tournament fishing, just my 2 cents,

[mhall]

By no means am I trying to say they don't have a right to do what they are doing I'm not that selfish. I think stiffer reg's on the fishing would help alleviate some of the pressure and actually boost our fishing.

I asked this question on an email to the KDFWR a few years ago and it went like this.
Are we managing our lakes for tournaments or are we managing our lakes for quality fish? I got a typical government response and I kind of understood it. I have been blabbing for years now about placing the slot limit on the smallmouth at Cumberland that is at Dale. I keep hearing, it won't work but no one single person can explain to me why it won't work.

I brought it up on here a few years ago and asked why and the best I got was Cumberland isn't Dale Hollow. What the hell does that even mean and it makes NO sense at all. Oh it will work, guaranteed.

In closing I feel our lakes are being pressured to death. A few Saturdays ago there was an estimated 250 to 300 tourney boats on Cumberland at one time. I was told this by a few that were fishing a BFL down there and there was a huge tourney going out of the dam. If that is even close to being true and I think it is how can a lake sustain that much pressure for very long its just crazy.

[GeoFisher]

By no means am I trying to say they don't have a right to do what they are doing I'm not that selfish. I think stiffer reg's on the fishing would help alleviate some of the pressure and actually boost our fishing.

I asked this question on an email to the KDFWR a few years ago and it went like this.
Are we managing our lakes for tournaments or are we managing our lakes for quality fish? I got a typical government response and I kind of understood it. I have been blabbing for years now about placing the slot limit on the smallmouth at Cumberland that is at Dale. I keep hearing, it won't work but no one single person can explain to me why it won't work.

I brought it up on here a few years ago and asked why and the best I got was Cumberland isn't Dale Hollow. What the hell does that even mean and it makes NO sense at all. Oh it will work, guaranteed.

In closing I feel our lakes are being pressured to death. A few Saturdays ago there was an estimated 250 to 300 tourney boats on Cumberland at one time. I was told this by a few that were fishing a BFL down there and there was a huge tourney going out of the dam. If that is even close to being true and I think it is how can a lake sustain that much pressure for very long its just crazy.

The world would end if they closed the season on bass, much like they do up north.......Could you even imagine not being able to take a bass off the beds.........

NOT saying I'm an advocate for that, but you know.......it cannot be good for the fishery to pull those fish off the bed, or close to the bed, and throw them in a tank of sub par water, and haul them down a lake 20-40-50 miles away.

I'd love to see the big tourneys go to a catch, weigh, release method, and using digital scales with a marshal.

Later,

Geo

[mhall]

Now I never said anything about closed seasons now, lets don't get carried away here, LOL....

[dabassking]

I think that managing a lake for tournaments and managing a lake for quality fish can be one and the same. We live in KY. A 15" bass IS a quality fish in this state. It's not like 5 pounders are as much common place in lakes here as compared to Guntersville, Chick, or lakes in Florida and Texas. Dale Hollow is regulated to be a Trophy Smallmouth lake. Cumberland has an 18" size limit on SM and that is, without a doubt, a quality fish. I think a lot of you guys that want a slot limit on Cumberland only want it to run off the tournament guys. It won't! Look at Dale. It gets heavy tournament pressure and it has a slot limit.

Also, if you look at the tournament pressure that the previously mentioned lakes like Guntersville and Chickamauga get, you would see that the pressure put on Cumberland is not even close to theirs.