Tidelines – July 4, 2013
Fisherman’s Post has tried several times to start up the recurring content in each issue of “Letters to the Editor” (or Letters to the Publisher, or Emails to Fisherman’s Post, etc.). The problem has been, if it really is a problem, that we don’t get enough letters or emails to publish them regularly.
We don’t keep records of any of these contacts, but some can’t help but be memorable. One of the first that comes to mind is a not-so-recent email where a reader threatened to never read the paper again nor support any of our advertisers if we didn’t change our sexist name. The “man” in Fisherman’s Post was bigoted, in her opinion, and warranted an immediate change.
We receive simple and less confrontational questions, too, such as one reader who asked us whether a South wind means the wind’s coming from the South or blowing towards the South.
Other readers offer feedback, sometimes constructive and sometimes not. Following our annual Pleasure Island Surf Fishing Challenge last fall, we received an anonymous letter that detailed a few areas of the tournament that they felt should be addressed. The suggestions ranged from getting the Town of Carolina Beach to waive parking fees and parking tickets for tournament anglers over the weekend, to placing more port-a-potties on the beach, to employing scouts to look for anglers breaking tournament rules.
Most of the feedback was constructive, but they sent in the letter anonymously. We had no way to get more information from them to discuss, follow up, and better act upon their feedback.
Then there is the feedback where “constructive” is debatable. Late last fall we received a letter from a reader that had taken the time to cut out four photos from our October 25 issue. Each photo was of an angler holding up a big red drum before releasing the fish, and on each photo he had written in pen, “This fish will die!”
The letter itself was less inflammatory—the gentleman, who in addition to his name also told us he was a former commercial fisherman, noted that ideally a person should not touch a fish they plan to release with their bare hands. A better practice would be to use wet gloves or a wet towel.
The wet gloves and wet towel may be optimum handling practice, but I’m not ready to concede that every red drum that meets with bare hands and then quickly released is inevitably a victim of “This fish will die!”
Perhaps the most frequent question we field, though, is why we go bi-weekly after Labor Day, the time of the year when most of the fishing is at its best. Why don’t we stay weekly since the fishing is so good?
This certainly qualifies as a fair question, especially since the answer isn’t straightforward but rather a mix of reasons. For one, the staff at Fisherman’s Post needs a break after the tournament-heavy and grueling weekly print schedule of summer. Another reason relates to our advertisers. The income of many of our advertisers decreases after Labor Day, and subsequently so does their ability to afford advertising.
The answer also lies in the early years of Fisherman’s Post, before I was able to afford payroll and had to do just about all the work myself. I could keep that pace up over the summer, but couldn’t maintain it once my teaching load resumed in mid-August. I had to pull back to bi-weekly as a simple matter of survival.
Most questions or comments that we receive are answered in the office within a day or two by a quick email or phone call back to the person who contacted us. However, I received a letter this week that I felt warranted more than a quick reply. The author didn’t appreciate the comments I had made about an Ocean Isle Inshore Challenge angler not entering TWT’s, and then using those same OI anglers as an example of what not to do in a tournament, the Tournament Director lesson of “you got to be in it to win it.”
The well written and respectful letter noted that there are reasons other than being “cheap” that could explain someone not entering a TWT—this person offered that the camaraderie and shared experience of the day, and not the amount of prize money, were their true priorities of the day.
The author made a good case, and the letter reminded me that there is always more than one way to look at anything.
Well, maybe not the South wind. It’s definitely coming from the South.
