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I wish y'all would lighten up a bit on Capt. John. I mean.....I feel the same way he does, except that I realize that there is nothing I can do to prevent "change," so I have decided to accept it and live with it. John obviously has not and he also actually seems a little bitter about it, but that's his prerogative and I feel a little sorry for him on that.
There have been several photos of headboat "massacres" here. Please know that catches like that did not happen every day. Art Flick charged money for those photos, so someone had to buy each one you see here. This is why you see maybe only one or two anglers and sometimes the captain (looks like a young Tony Tarracino here) and maybe the mate. In reality, there were probably 30-40 people on the boat. So when you divide those massive catches by even 30....you have each angler taking home about as many or even fewer fish than some of our people (snowbirds, tourists, AND locals) do today! People still come down from the north and try to fill coolers with a year's worth of fillets.
Of course the grouper, jewfish and shark massacres should never be condoned.....especially the jewfish, since they were undoubtedly shot with powerheads. The grouper may have been long lined, but I am doubting that too....there is a possibility that they were shot as well. Sharks are a different story and do not merit a long discussion here. Suffice it to say that this does not happen today (at least in not near the same intensity in the U.S.) and that is both necessary and a good thing. In my day, we (the light tackle guides) refused to sell cobia, because we felt that they were worth more to us as a gamefish, than the $0.25 per pound that the fish houses were offering for them. In short, I think the non-commercial locals in the Keys, did a pretty good job of policing themselves.
If there could be one thing I would be bitter about, it would be the advent of Loran C. Without that, (and now GPS) I believe that at least half of all our PIA snapper/grouper regs. would not be necessary, even today.
people who live in glass houses..........
http://forums.floridasportsman.com/showthread.php?114507-700lb-Bluefin-caught-off-Boynton-Beach
OK....I gotcha....I didn't know that.
Avatar photo: Grandparents and my Dad at Blowing Rocks, Jupiter 1923.
Nothing in the developed US is what it used to be decades earlier. Perhaps you prefer to live in some totally uninhabited environment hundreds of miles from civilization. You seem to be happier in Orlando. I live there too as well as the Keys. Let me tell you, where you are now has changed as much if not more than the Keys. You will never know what it was like back then in the Orlando area. Does that mean you should be chastised as a dumb ignorant tourist that has no clue about the Orlando area? The tourists own that place now. I know what it was like in both places decades ago. I remember Billy Pate marching down his skiff with two hired guides for the day with 5 fly rods in 1972 at Bud N Marys. I remember George Hommel manning the counter at World Wide Sportsman and negotiating travel bookings. I also remember the sign "Altamonte Mall Coming Soon" and Grand Opening Walt Disney World. Back then it was 45 min drive to hang out at The Springs which is now in the middle of everything and a gated community. So things change. Central Florida was a nice place back then. Now its full of tourists and jammed with rental cars and exploding in every direction. People like you are flooding in from all over. Its still a nice place. Just a lot different from back in the day. I spend most of the year there but the Keys are still a lot nicer in my view for people who enjoy water and fishing and I spend a few months every year in the Keys. There are far more tourists and T shirt shops and the like up in Central Florida than what popped up down here on Duval Street. So if you think you are living in some immutable panacea that has its growth act together you are sadly mistaken. I know what was lost here and what was gained and the same goes for Central Florida. If you want to move to a place that is pretty much what it was like back in the 40's and 50's move to back woods of Alaska. Most of Alaska remains native and undeveloped and is virtually unpopulated. Yes the character the Keys had back when the Keys were just developing after the highway was complete is gone. Its got a new character now and for those that appreciate the old one the new one is inferior but that doesn't mean that those that choose to live here now need to be castigated by some old jaded conch that thinks he is the only one alive that has meaningful perspective on what it used to be like. Your perspective on development in the Keys and the people that choose to live here today is way over the top. Next time your stuck at one of the dozens of traffic lights that now line 441 from Orlando to Ocala (there used to be none) or stopped on I-4 going nowhere fast, think about how nice that is compared to what the Keys are today. I was at Contents this week and didn't see another boat or hear anything except the tide and birds. The water was crystal clear. I was at Marquesas a couple of weeks ago before the storm and found the same thing. There were Tarpon all over the place. This place is still a very nice place to be and its nice to have those new experiences along with the older memories and perspective. "The more things change the more they stay the same."