Wow... after a year off of Gaia, I'm astonished that this is still on the front page. I'll need to re-upload the schmancy graphs (since they were hosted on my alma mater's server). I appreciate all of the nice comments... and chuckle at the hecklers.
So far, the most valid criticism that I've seen of my analysis is that I haven't taken into account market prices into the profit rates. Such will require some statistical work on fish market prices (which will take some time). At the very least I can say, "for D bait to be worth the extra cost, you need to be able to sell Pebbo's on average at X gold, Biters at Y gold... etc.".