Get all those stripers. Fun to catch but they have decimated Castaic's large bass fishery and even DVL's DD bass fishery is not even close to what it used to be. Get'em all boys...every one of them....
DVL's DD bass fishery isn't what it used to be also because nobody keeps any bass Of the 88,453 reported caught in our 2009-2018 creel surveys, 1,171 were kept. That is 1.9%.....C&R only doesn't promote growth rates that produce DD's.
Harvest of both species within the regulations is a good idea to promote both fisheries.
Yes, you are right. That is an issue too. But I believe the stripers are the main issue for low numbers of quality size big bass. We do need to get a lot of the smaller drinks out but the bass size limits are also 15" too. We need better fishery management at some of these lakes like what you seem to be alluding to...
What is a good percentage to shoot for? And is that 1.9% affected by the current 2 fish limit? Would that percentage go up some if the limit was increased to 5 do you think? Also is this low percentage unique to DVL? Sorry for all the questions this kind of an interesting topic to me.
I am glad that you said that, KWIN. I have in fact read similar things about bass populations, but the catch and release meme is so strong that I think people are afraid to admit keeping any on a site like this. I don't target largemouth or smallmouth bass, but I have kept an occasional one over the years, which I have never reported here because I don't want to deal with the bass Nazis. And yes, they do taste good. They are basically a large sunfish. I used to keep Striped Bass from Silverwood too, but they have had a "do not eat" warning due to pollution these past few years, unfortunately.
25-30% harvest rate is good. The data I presented was for DVL not Skinner....but coincidentally of the 5,223 LMB reported caught 2014-2017 only 104 were kept....again at 1.9%....not very unique is it? I believe all of SoCal is predominately C&R only and why big fish are becoming more rare. I don't think a 5 fish bag would be beneficial at Skinner given the limited habitat and quagga induced reduced recruitment observed since 2008 when they got in.