Last weekend’s flounder roundup was a big success any way you look at it.

    Despite less than favorable fishing conditions anglers brought in 33 live flounder to donate to the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD) for their fledgling flounder stocking program.

    “It was great to see so many people come in and participate in the roundup and bring in so many nice fish,” said TPWD’s Shane Bonnot.

    Eight of the fish measured more than 18 inches with angler Justin Hawkin’s 19 ?-incher being the largest and earning him a replica of his catch courtesy of Flounder Revolution.

    “These big fish will allow us to replace some of the smaller females in our Sabine tanks at Sea Center and go a long way toward helping us produce more fish to stock back into the Sabine ecosystem,” Bonnot said.

    TPWD officials want to keep the genetic integrity of flounder populations intact so they will only stock flounder into areas where their broodstock came from.

     The Sabine area received Sea Center’s first ever flounder stocking last May and we should get another one in 2010.

    TPWD officials are reminding anglers November flounder fishing is rod and reel only with no gigging allowed and the bag limit reduced to two.

    “The purpose is to protect greater numbers of migrating flounder as they move to offshore waters during the peak of the spawning run, part of a regulatory strategy to try to increase the abundance of a species in decline” they reported.

    “TPWD Coastal Fisheries Division data shows that the relative abundance of flounder has fallen by about 50 percent since the early 1980s, so that flounder populations are now about half what they once were. Anglers all along the Texas Gulf coast reported a rebound in flounder numbers in 2007 and 2008, also reflected in TPWD sampling, but even that short-term increase in relative abundance places numbers near the bottom of the long-term trend.”

    TPWD officials think that because of the relatively short, six-year life span of flounder, within two years anglers will begin to see a noticeable increase in flounder abundance.

    “Modeling suggests the new regulations will result in an increase of spawning stock biomass of slightly more than 80 percent over six years, with the majority of that recovery taking place in the first several years.”

   “Although flounder gigging is not allowed during the month of November and the bag limit will be reduced to two fish by rod and reel only, beginning Dec. 1, gigging will be allowed and bag limits will return to five for recreational fishermen and 30 for commercial fishermen.”