|
|
Posts: 15
| Been reading the forums for quite some time, and finally decided to join the ranks.
There was a thread that was pulled on here earlier today that caught my interest. It was about some guide conflicts. I know the guide accused, and he is a great guide, fisherman, and guy. The post honestly raises some interesting questions.
I'll try to pose this as a non-argumentative topic, however it may turn that way once the internet brawlers take hold.
There has always been some localism in fishing. And since the sport is growing by leaps and bounds, there is definitely going to be some tension when fisherman and guides collide. Maybe jokes, maybe fights, who knows but it's bound to happen.
I've heard of pranks, vandalism, fights, and even guns being drawn to ward off foreign guides.
As a Wisconsin turned Minnesotan, I've noticed the guides are blossoming like Asian beetles. Many of which have out of state tags on their rigs. So I guess the question is, do you hire an out of stater or a local guide and why? Should there be a fee for out of towner guides to work in another state? And should the non-local guides show respect the local guides? And if so, how?
It is obvious, MN has worked hard to maintain a quality fishery over the last several decades, and the inconsideration from guides with no specific ties to an area may do nothing but harm it I fear.
These are obviously some of the thoughts that popped into my head when looking at some related posts. Do you all feel the same or not?
Hope I'm not crossing any forum guidelines, Like I said, I'm new to posting.
Joe Albrecht |
|
| |
|
| This has come as a topic in the barber shop at times. I guess I really don't mind if someone from another state guides here. He has bought a lic. He has bought a guide lic. so he meets the requirements. Those that I know that guide in states other then home state bring clients with them. These clients I donot believe would be booking with a local. How many guides in northern wisc. are not locals? Probably a whole lot. I don't see why anyone would get all worked up about this.
Everybody in the communities they spend time in welcome the money they leave behind. I think to bash them yet welcome them for the cash is.......oh well you get the picture.
Pfeiff
|
|
| |
|
Posts: 123
| I think that it may be different today than in the past because the catch and release ethic is now so popular among muskie fishermen. Just a few years ago it was well known that some guides were taking some huge fish from a small Minnesota lake. Due to the efforts of some Muskies Inc. members working with the DNR that lake became Minnesota's first catch & release only fishery. I haven't really heard of any gripes with guides there since.
Some of these lakes in Minnesota are getting hammered by guides, but they still seem to be putting out good numbers of fish. I haven't seen one instance of documented proof that a guide has harmed any fishery. At worst it seems that they've inconvenienced some locals by the added pressure, and by fishing "their" spots.
I'm not sure if out of state guides are required to do anything different than by a license, such as reporting that income to the state they came to guide in and whatnot, but as long as they're operating within the law I don't see how anyone can find fault with them or thing they should be required to pay anything extra. Unless the law was changed, that wouldn't be fair to them. Just my opinion. |
|
| |
|
| In my opinion there are two tops of guides in Minnesota. First, those who are residents, pay Minnesota taxes, and those who take great care and pride in the waters they fish. The second group is the one who drive me crazy. Some of them are out of state and pay no Minnesota taxes, jump from lake to lake to where the hot bite is, and have less care about the water they fish on. To me the second group is like the aliens on the independence day movie. A good friend of mine is a local guide and cares a ton for the local waters. When a client calls him wanting to fish another area he will kindly say those are not my water and refers him elsewhere. The second group goes where ever often in a group and burns the bite then will go elsewhere. First they are on Mille lacs, that bite slows and they run to the next hot lake untill that slows and on and on. Some of these guides have big names but I am not sure they are that good of fisherman. Anyone can camp on hot bites. Once the bite is burned onward they go. Now if they paid taxes in Minnesota, are licensed, and show up and support stocking meetings and do all they can to leave the resource better than it was when they came......well then that would be a different story, but sadly they are not that way. No wonder the local guides are ticked and the local fishermen despise them. IMO they are bad for the resource that many worked so hard to build and establish. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 968
Location: N.FIB | Not gonna mention the guides name,but I had a guide tell me who doesn`t live in minn but guides there tell me he had a couple guys apprroach him at the chi muskie show about 6-7 yrs ago and give him crap for guiding in minn.They told him to stay in his own state and leave minn alone,this was before minn started getting hammered like it is now.I thought that was bull because if you want to be successful in guiding you have to have clients to take out fishing,if an out of state guide is getting clients he must be doing something right. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 135
| Well let's hope that the government doesn't get involved in it, by Government I mean IRS or Dept of revenue. See, I'm a photographer and I travel all over the US shooting for commercial/advertising clients. Much of my work is done outside of my home state. Last year, I had to file taxes from the City of Los Angeles, the state of California, the state of Minnesota, New York (city and State), Florida and the state of Illinois in addition to the state of Indiana because the Depts of Revenue in each state is being very pro active in finding individuals who come to their state to make income but file no taxes. Kind of like NFL and NBA players who have to pay taxes for every state and city that they played in (what a nightmare!).
Guides, just hope that the taxing bodies don't take notice or you will be paying taxes to a state in which you do not live. They're trying to close every loophole that they can, and this is a big one. Doesn't matter if they sent you a check to your Wisconsin home or if you took cash on the water in MN, they want a piece of it if you earned it in MN, (or CA, FL, NY, IL, whatever) |
|
| |
|
Posts: 720
| I can't understand why people get threatened physical violence for simply trying to make a living. It's fishing folks. This is not a matter of life or death. Yes the locals have a right to question the tax implications. But the threats of violence is way out of line. The act of vandilism is way out of line. But at some point eithier one of the locals or guides is going to have their bluff called and somebody is going to get hurt. Not cool at all. |
|
| |
|
| I have trouble with a private business destroying a public resource. I do not believe MN requires a guide license so there is no restitution being paid by the guides to reinforce the resource they are profiting off of. When 3-5 well known guides decend on a 3,000 acre lake like a bunch of cormorants for several weeks during a peak bite you cannot tell me there is not some delayed mortaility going on. Minimally the sudden impact of their back to back 15 hour days on a little 3,000 acre lake has to be changing fish behavior and therefore disturbing the balace of the lake. We're not talking walleye's here, this is a low density fish. They ARE making an impact! I would like to see some kind of guide fee instituted with the funds dedicated to stocking the lakes they fish. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 32955
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Disturbing the balance of the lake? |
|
| |
|
Posts: 311
Location: Ontario | The taxes/putting money directly into a fishery in a state you live in is the only part of this debate with any merit at all if you ask me. The rest is simply local fishermen and guides not liking out of state guides pounding their spots. I agree with casting55...a guy who lives somewhere else travels to a lake out of his home state and is able to catch enough fish to warrant charging people to fish with him and people are getting upset? If you ask me, the guy deserves at least a little credit. He has found out how to do well on a lake that might be quite far away from his 'home base.' Points about not paying into local stocking, lake associations, federal taxes etc are all well-taken, though. If a guy is making a living out there, he should be putting back some of that money along with the locals. Were I a travelling guide, this'd be the first thing I want to do..get involved locally and try to support a fishery that I enjoy no matter what state its in. If there are guides out there running and gunning all over the place without consideration for this, I think its a business mistake on their part. Image-wise (as noted by many above) as well as sustainability-wise (ie: support a lake that is supporting you!) |
|
| |
|
Posts: 3165
| not a "bash" just passing on a fact,,,not one outstate guide showed up at the Gull lake public input meeting for stocking muskie,,held in Brainard central part of the state easy access from Mile Lacs and northern Minn months of notice given about it,,Its too bad their input about how impressive the Minn muskie fisherie is that our DNR has created and the fact that they were willing to relocate here would have been powerfull testimony but sadly none showed up.
Minnesota is divided into 4 fisherie management zones,,if you had guides apply for guide licenses by "zone' you would eliminate the piling into 'hot bite' overcrowding factor |
|
| |
|
| so let me get this straight, a minnesota guide can jump from lake to lake, fishing the "hot bites" but if somebody from out of state does it, then it is wrong. I have also read where it is wrong to have out of state guides stay on one lake. So which one is it??? Why don't these northern guides from Wisconsin and Minnesota head south for the spring and guide in Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana?
|
|
| |
|
Posts: 3165
| NO,,,all guides apply by zone,Resident and non resident,,,you have to apply for a turkey license by zone to avoid crowding and you have to apply for a deer license by zone,,why not do the same for guiding??? |
|
| |
|
Posts: 15
| I think one of the major concerns is the interest in the lakes well being. Guides who live in the area they guide in may belong to chambers, associations, musky clubs, etc. that care for those waters. Also they may earn their pay from only those lakes. Since yesterdays post I have made some non assuming / anonymous calls this morning to 2 well known local guides and two well known visiting guides looking for possible stocking donations for specific lakes. Only one of each answered.
The local guide answered with a bunch of questions about what the money will go to? what organization am I from? and
exactly what lakes was I calling about? He was a bit stand offish but seemed willing to get involved. I
told him this was just a contact call and we would get back to him later about the actual donation
Maybe I wasn't a good enough actor since he seemed skeptical of my call.
The visiting guide told me he didn't live in this state. When I asked if he would donate since he guided here, he said he was busy and didn't have time for this. and politely hung up on me with a rushed Goodbye.
Maybe he was super busy, but he dropped it to answer? And the TV in the background sounded like he wasn't that busy and just didn't want any part of this. Who knows?
This little experiment may have been falsely intrusive, and maybe I shouldnt have done it,, but for some reason I want to know the general opinion on this. Are the people making money from the lakes actually doing something to improve them?
And the damage guides do on lakes can be pretty severe. Don't you think Mille Lac, Leech, and other places where the fish are now slow to bite have felt the abuse from guides on the same spots day in day out catching the same fish over and over? The fact that on some lakes fish mainly bit only after dark where they used to bite through out the day is an obvious sign of pressure. The only people who really have the advantage of fishing every day, and putting that type of pressure on the fish are the guides. Yet many of them could care less. They just move on to the next lake to demolish.
Edited by Joe musky 9/8/2009 9:57 AM
|
|
| |
|
Posts: 221
Location: Detroint Lakes, MN |
Hooker has a very good idea. Brad you should take the ball and run with this one. I think you'd get alot of support.
JS |
|
| |
|
Posts: 148
Location: Northwest Wi. | I was born in Il. ,,Work in Mn.,,Live in Wi...Can I fish in Mn?? This is silly...Does fishing a MMTT in '02 make you a guide?? |
|
| |
|
Posts: 15
| I just got a call from a very irritable out of state (southern) guide working in Minn. not sure how he got my number? He explained how my thought process on this is wrong, and the water in Minn. is public, therefore he can fish where ever when ever he wants, and shouldn't have to bow down to any local or give a penny to keep fishing it.
I told him that the "Public" stocked lakes he is fishing were built with "Private" funds from mostly local people. So he should respect that. He had some other choice words for me about TV and videos etc. and again I pretty much got hung up on.
I like hookers zone idea. What about a steep fee for guides in general. Has that ever happened in minnesota? Or licensing? That way alot of the part time fisherman want-to-be guides would fall off. And the serious guides would remain.
|
|
| |
|
Posts: 186
Location: West Chicago, IL | How many out of state guides are there guiding for muskies in Minnesota? This makes it sound like there must be hundreds of them to be wrecking all of this havoc. |
|
| |
|
Location: The Yahara Chain | I find this whole 'my waters mentality' extremely silly. Some people in Minnesota are starting to sound like some people out East. That's pretty sad. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 32955
Location: Rhinelander, Wisconsin | Joe musky/everyone,
We do not allow personal arguments and vendettas here, for obvious reasons. Creating both or either for dramatic purposes and posting it here won't keep this thread alive for long. Discuss the concepts of why a license, fee, or whatever should be applied, etc, but keep the names and direct references to what they 'supposedly' said out of this conversation.
I'd also suggest you contact the Minnesota DNR, get in touch with the fisheries folks managing muskies up there, and discuss what funding came from where to stock and manage the lakes up there for muskies, down to the penny if that suits; just in the interest of accuracy. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 2384
Location: On the X that marks the mucky spot | MN hasn't licensed guides because of the argument presented from the resort owners had their kids guiding people as a part time summer job. There has been a lot of people outside the muskie world in MN that have been clamoring for a guide fee as well. This is especially the case in Brainard where there are guides bringing in limits of walleyes for 2-3 groups a day every day of the summer. Don't be surprised if there is legislation that gets presented this next legislative session.
I believe that guides should be licensed myself. In a perfect world it would mandate insurance and the fee would give back to the resource. This will be especially important as the DNR budget gets squeezed more and more over the next few years. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 186
Location: West Chicago, IL | I would think that if your DNR budgets get squeezed over the next few years that it would be especially important to have lots of out of state revenue coming into Minnesota. Guides (generally) are brining in people and their $$$ from out of state. |
|
| |
|
| The MN DNR has been contacted with the concerns about guides lake hopping.
I find it very funny that guides are suppose to be some of the best fishermen out there right but when a lake cools off or the fishing gets "tough" in their eyes they simply jump to another lake to find fish to catch.
Lakes can and do change with the guides coming. There are a few lakes that they guide on that the fishing pressure has increased as a direct result of them showing up. Fish have become harder to catch, are more boat shy and quite often you catch one thats jaw is mangled from being caught so many times.
The one point above that is probably the most eye opening is that not ONE out of state guide showed up any of the meetings to get more lakes stocked but we all know they will show up at the landing to profit off of the hard work done by others. Why didn't one show up? They use the public resource for private gain but how many guides really give back to the stocking of the lakes they fish? Are any out of state guides members of the local Muskies Inc chapters they guide on as a minimum?
It is very sad that some lakes use to be somewhat quiet and fishing was good, now there are days there are 4-5 guides that never use to fish the lake on it pounding it for 15 hour days, one day after another. You think that doesn't have some negative effect on the lake? who are you kidding? it does.
I like the idea of a zone permit, at a minimum a guide should be required to buy something like that for stocking the lakes they fish.
|
|
| |
|
Posts: 189
Location: Barrington, Il | I'm fishing with an out of state guide next week and he better be on a hot bite! I am driving 9 hours and dropping over $1000 on the local economy which should trickle down into the tax cofers to pay for any fish I might catch. Would I be doing this to fish with a local guide? No. I have a cabin in Wisconsin and can go there anytime. I choose to fish with this particular guide because I know I can learn something new. Maybe I'll even be on his next video. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 186
Location: West Chicago, IL | What percentage of in state guides showed up to this meeting? Where was this meeting held and what dates? I'll ask the question again, how many out of state guides are currently guiding for muskies in Minnesota or is this a vendetta against a small handful of people? |
|
| |
|
Posts: 2384
Location: On the X that marks the mucky spot | Musky23, the money the out of state guides bring in never gets near the DNR. The people who buy a license from out of state more then likely would have done so anyway. The $$$ from those that would not have come because of it is counter balanced from them not utilizing the resource in the first place. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 1169
Location: New Hope MN | Land of the Free..? |
|
| |
|
Posts: 186
Location: West Chicago, IL | Treats, if that's the case (you're making it sound like out of state $$$ means nothing to your economy) then why is tourism such an important industry? I know I spend a lot of time fishing in Minnesota and spend a lot of $$$ there and may never had gone there if I wasn't brought there once upon a time by an out of state guide. |
|
| |
|
Posts: 1243
Location: Musky Tackle Online, MN | musky23 - 9/8/2009 11:11 AM
What percentage of in state guides showed up to this meeting? Where was this meeting held and what dates?
I was at this meeting and I don't recall any guides being there, in state or out state. There may have been an in state guide, but I don't recall. The meeting was held in October of 2007 (maybe '06?) at the local college in Brainerd, MN. It was announced several months in advance.
Aaron |
|
| |
|
Posts: 2384
Location: On the X that marks the mucky spot | Reread where the money goes. The VAST, VAST majority doesn't find it's way back to the resource. Also with what the MN muskie fishery has become I seriously doubt that most out of state people would not have come if it weren't for out of state guides.
dtaijo174, while this may be the land of the free, stocking muskies and getting new lakes and changing public opinion about muskies and muskie fishermen is not.
Edited by Muskie Treats 9/8/2009 11:22 AM
|
|
| |
