Striper tips: Know how, where

After reading last week’s edition of ”In the Outdoors,” in which Mike O’Donnell of the Nevada Striper Club shared a few Lake Mead fishing tips, reader Robert Gunny wrote in with a few tips of his own.

“Over the years I’ve taken people out (who) said there aren’t any fish in the lake besides carp,” Gunny wrote in his e-mail. “You just need to know how, where and the signs. Where there are birds, there are fish. They (the stripers) don’t have to be boiling.”

While reminiscing about Lake Mead fishing trips with his father, Gunny said, “I’ve done my best fishing at night, especially for the big ones.”

They had a favorite spot where they would anchor just before dusk. Then, “Once it was dark, we would light up the place like a Christmas tree. We would start chumming with anchovies, and would punch holes in cans of cat food. After we punched the cans, we would hang them 10 to 15 feet over the side, along with one or two baggies of store-bought fish food.”

This setup, Gunny said, would hold the bait fish throughout the night, which meant that the larger striped bass wouldn’t be too far away.

“We had to use heavy sinkers to get our whole anchovies down below the layers of different sized fish. I’ll tell you what, we caught some monsters,” he wrote.

And like so many of us, Gunny said he got his start as a kid.

“I’m also a product of taking a kid fishing, been doing that one for years. That’s why it’s important to let the adults know how and where to fish. Kids are impatient, but once they start catching fish, they’re hooked.”

• ECONOMIC ISSUES — One year ago, despite gasoline prices that shot toward the $4-per-gallon mark, nearly 60 percent of American anglers reported in an online survey that they still were planning on taking an out-of-state fishing trip during the next 12 months. Now the number of anglers planning an out-of-state fishing adventure has dropped 54 percent.

The figures for both years are based on results of online surveys conducted by Southwick & Associates at AnglerSurvey.com. It appears that ongoing economic woes are starting to have an impact after all.

Another issue having an effect is the same one giving hunters fits. I’m talking about angler access. In a January 2009 survey, 23 percent of respondents reported that one of their fishing spots had been closed in the past three years.

“The access problem is most acute for freshwater anglers. Of those reporting a loss of access, 74 percent said that they lost a fishing location on fresh water; just 24 percent reported the loss of a saltwater location. Reported access loss results for 2008 were 77 percent fresh water and 17 percent saltwater.”

In each of the last two years, about 37 percent of anglers participating in the online surveys reported that they were fishing less frequently as a result of lost access to fishing spots.

• GUN, AMMO SALES BENEFIT WILDLIFE — For anyone looking to buy a firearm or ammunition, it’s no secret gun sales skyrocketed after the election of President Obama. In fact, guns and ammo are moving off the shelves so fast that finding what you want can be difficult.

While that is frustrating, there is a good side. Sales have been so brisk that the IRS collected more than $98 million in federal excise taxes on firearms and ammunition sales in the fourth quarter of 2008. That’s a 31.2 percent jump over the same period in 2007, according to figures recently released.

Through the Pittman-Robertson Act passed in 1937, these excise taxes are earmarked for wildlife management at the federal and state levels. More than $345 million was collected for 2008, a 13.9 percent increase from 2007.

Freelance writer Doug Nielsen is a conservation educator for the Nevada Department of Wildlife. His “In the Outdoors” column, published Thursday in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, is not affiliated with or endorsed by the NDOW. Any opinions he states in his column are his own. He can be reached at doug@takinitoutside.com.