Editor, Gazette-Journal:

I see in the Gazette-Journal where a friend has now become a criminal because of catching a rockfish! These fish have become a political football in the years since their return. Every time I see anything to do with their original demise, overfishing is always thrown out there, though I don’t believe that anyone knows what happened or where they went. You hear little of how polluted the upper rivers where these fish spawn once was. Always blame the commercial guy; that is the default setting.

I actually had to give up pound fishing due to an overpopulation of these predators. I allowed net-full after net-full to escape, day after day. Other fish won’t go into a pound net if rockfish are already in it. This year, our tags/pounds of catch have been cut yet again as the rockfish continues to eat up everything in the bay: crabs, shad, gray trout, you name it.

We protect them as our new favorite son because sports fishing for these trophies is a ...