[OldBaldGuy]

Originally Posted by catchNrelease

...I think some of you who think so high and mighty of the NGPC do so because you have private places to fish and a boat. What about the other fisherman? It's no fun driving 30 miles to a lake only to realize you cant even find a spot to fish. I have almost given up on fishing in Nebraska because of this. I think this year was the worst I had ever seen, TOO MANY ANGLERS. I dont want the banks to be loaded with people. If anything, promoting new anglers ruins the fishing for ME.

Although I probably shouldn’t “go there,” the problem with leaving statements like these unchallenged is that some unsuspecting soul may read them and actually believe part of it.

To insinuate, as you have done, that some of us involved with NEFGA as directors or volunteers (I’m one of the latter) are backing NGPC’s “angler recruitment” because of an elitist perspective is laughable. I know almost all of those guys, and to the best of my knowledge, none lives on or has a cabin on a private lake, and only two have boats. While many of them enjoy the occasional invitation to fish a private lake, if you look back through their hundreds of posts you’ll see almost all have depicted fishing public lakes. We're a bunch of “average Joes” with a far-above-average interest in Nebraska’s fish and game. (Well, among the volunteers, maybe Harold isn’t “average,” but he has aspirations in that direction. )

Second, you really don’t believe the number of licensed anglers has declined over the last 10 years?

Stop and think for just a second: if NGPC were to lie about the numbers, ALL the financial incentives would be to exaggerate the numbers, not lower them, because so much of their funding is federal reimbursement based on the number of licenses sold. Inflated numbers also would buttress their requests for legislative appropriations for non-fish/non-game portions of the budget.

When you say “promoting new anglers ruins the fishing for ME,” can we assume you personally will then pick up the tab state-wide for fishing stocking, lake renovations, law enforcement, research, etc., because the costs keep going up while the number of buyers (licenses holders) drops?

Finally, I have to call b.s. on the statement “you cant even find a spot to fish.” Isn’t what you’re really saying: “someone was in MY spot”?

So far this season I’ve fished 67 times in Nebraska (the other three times were in Arkansas), and, yes, sometimes I arrive to find someone fishing the spot I’d hoped to fish. But at even the most extreme example – the peak of the “trout season” at Two Rivers – I’ve always found a place to fish, and I usually caught some fish. My solution is to try to get there 30 minutes earlier next time.

Can we discuss/debate the “angler recruitment” issue with facts?