Article by Mama Jock
With the Memorial Day holiday weekend just a few days away, the Town of Ocean City will be preparing for the start of the summer season and a huge onset of visitors to the resort. Many of those visitors will be fishing. And for good reason. Inshore, summer flounder, bluefish, striped bass, black sea bass, tautog, and other species are becoming more active with the warming water temperatures. Offshore reefs and wrecks offer excellent sea bass and tautog fishing opportunities. The late spawn of stripers in the Chesapeake should allow for continued success for surf anglers on the beaches at Assateague and Ocean City. Offshore, shark fishing is approaching prime time, with species with a preference for cooler temperatures such as threshers and makos available, and others like blue, duskies, hammerheads and sandbars to follow.
Recreational Fishing License Update
Now that the fish and the fishermen have both arrived in Ocean City, it’s time to put them together and see some great photos in the Coastal Fishermen newspaper. As more and more of you are coming to know, new this year is a requirement to have a Maryland fishing license when fishing in Maryland’s coastal waters. That would include the waters of the coastal bays, the Ocean City Inlet, the surf on Assateague Island and Ocean City and the nearshore waters out to 3 miles. And as many of you have come to find out over the past weeks and months, there has been one license agent where fishermen could actually walk into a store to buy a license, and that has been the Walmart on Rt. 50 in Berlin. While the option to purchase a fishing license over the Internet and via a toll free phone number has been an option, that does not work for everyone. Last week, I mentioned that we had a great meeting with our Coastal Fisheries Advisory Committee where the concept of a paper based license received support. The outcome of that decision will result in all interested bait and tackle stores, and others who are interested in selling fishing licenses, being set up with a triplicate, paper based fishing license form. By the time you read this column in the Coastal Fisherman, DNR will have completed training of the new license agents and they will be selling the paper based license in their stores. I’ll have a full list of those new agents in next week’s edition of Coastal Fisherman, but we expect most of the local, popular bait & tackle stores will have them by the time you are reading this column, but please call ahead to make sure. When you go to purchase your paper based license, one portion of the triplicate form will be retained by the angler, one by the tackle shop/agent, and the other copy will be sent to DNR for our records. I would like to reiterate my compliments to Skip McGuire for his vision to help us solve this problem which we were all collectively involved in. Skip, along with Sue Foster and many others worked with our staff to address the logistics and other complexities that the fishermen faced, and a positive, if not perfect outcome was achieved for all involved. I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to have good communication with everyone involved in the fisheries management process. I believe that is what makes Maryland stand out from other states. While I’m sure the paper based license may have its share of bumps as we roll it out, we’ll smooth those out in short order as we move forward.
What to do with that great catch? Enter it into the Maryland Fishing Challenge!
The fishermen are out on the water, the fish are arriving in increasing numbers with each passing day, and the pages of the Coastal Fisherman newspaper are becoming more and more crowded with pictures of impressive size fish and the anglers who caught them. Before you clean that fish for dinner, don’t miss out on the opportunity to possibly win some great prizes. The Maryland Department of Natural Resources, in partnership with Under Armour, Bass Pro Shops, the World Fishing Network and Bill’s Outdoor Center and over 20 major sportfishing organizations, are sponsoring the 2011 Maryland Fishing Challenge. For Ocean City area anglers, just register a fish of a qualifying size (as measured by length) for over 35 different species at a participating bait and tackle store and you become eligible to win any of the grand prizes that range from a boat, motor and trailer from Bass Pro Shops and Tracker Boats, a trip for two to the Bimini Big Game Club from the World Fishing Network and thousands in prizes from Bill’s Outdoor Center and Under Armour. The contest runs through Labor Day, with no age restrictions and is free of charge. Just go fishing, catch an eligible fish (example: 24 inches or greater flounder) and check it in. For more information, please visit our Maryland Fishing Challenge website at:
http://dnr.maryland.gov/fisheries/challenge/index.asp
So far, over 700 lucky anglers have qualified, and summer has not even begun!!
That is the latest from the Maryland Department of Natural Resources for this week. We’ll be back next week with an update on the listing of all of our new license agents, and more on the Maryland Fishing Challenge and other news. As always, feel free to contact me if you have any questions by e mail: [email protected] or 410-260-8289.
Marty Gary is Assistant Director/Fisheries Ecologist at the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, Fisheries Service.
