Would a 10 fish limit on specks be so bad?

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Give it a little thought before you rain me with downvotes.

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I still think the 15 fish limit at Big Lake is the perfect limit.

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This gets brought up every so often and the general answer is because the science is there that says Louisiana can support a limit of 25 without depleting the fishery, keep in mind not everyone speck fishing is catching 25 every time they go out. Reducing the limit would likely result in no changes to trophy trout caught as Louisiana doesn't have the high salinity levels of Texas and Florida, which is what big trout need.

*Not a scientist*

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But the conversation reminded me that a long-discredited chant is being heard again in some local fishing circles: We should drop the limit on specks and/or increase the minimum size limit, because we'll have more and bigger fish.

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But the suggestion is also coming from sports fishers, who wonder if the quality of their trout fishing experience would improve if we had more conservative regulations.

To find an answer to that question, and to reconfirm we are not "fish hogs," I turned to the fisheries biologist at the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

I got a quick, one-word answer: No.

"We've run (computer) scenarios on lowering the creel limits and increasing the size limits, and from our assessments those actions did not noticeably increase the number of fish in the system or the number of big fish," said Joey Shepard, acting deputy assistant secretary of the LDFW, and a biologist who has spent much of his long career studying specks.

But there is also some real-world experience to back up those computers. In 2006, yielding to requests from some guides and sports fishers hoping for more large specks, the state reduced regulations on Calcasieu Lake. The daily limit was dropped to 15, and although the minimum size remained at 12 inches, anglers were restricted to only two fish of more than 25 inches. The result six years later? "From our assessment, it did not increase the number of big fish in the system," Shepard reported. "Of course, we didn't anticipate it would."

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"Based on those numbers, our assessment is we would have to reduce the daily limit to five before anyone would notice a difference in the fish available," he said.

The daily limit of 25 is seldom reached by most anglers. Studies show that the average catch per trip is fewer than five fish. Obviously, if all of the almost 1 million anglers fishing caught 25 each trip, the limit would have to be lowered.

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OK, so what about reducing the minimum size to increase the number of big fish? Shepard said the LDWF ran the numbers and got these results: Increasing the minimum from 12 inches to 15 inches would put 13 percent more fish back in the water; from 12 inches to 16 inches would reduce harvest by nine percent.

But because anglers would be hooking and releasing more fish, the improvement is dampened by an estimated 10 percent release mortality.

"Essentially, we would increase spawning potential by about four percent if we raised the minimum to 15 inches, and six percent if we raised it to 16 inches," he said. "Either way, the improvement would not be noticeable to fishermen."

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