Summary of Motions & Actions · 2018. 5. 21. · Larry Jennings, Rudy Lukacovic, John Page...

Tawes State Office Building – 580 Taylor Avenue – Annapolis, Maryland 21401 410-260-8DNR or toll free in Maryland 877-620-8DNR – dnr.maryland.gov – TTY Users Call via the Maryland Relay

Meeting of the Sport Fisheries Advisory Commission April 17, 2018

C-1 Conference Room DNR Tawes Office Building

580 Taylor Ave Annapolis, MD 21403

Summary of Motions & Actions Commissioners in Attendance: Jim Gracie, Vice-Chair Phil Langley, Steve Lay, Micah Dammeyer, Chair John Neely, Dr. Ray Morgan, Val Lynch, Beverly Fleming, Ed O’Brien, Scott Lenox, David Sikorski, Charles Nemphos and David M. Sutherland Commissioners Absent and Not Represented: David J. Smith, James Wommack DNR Staff Attending: Dave Blazer, Michael Luisi, Paul Genovese, Sarah Widman, Lt. Timothy Grove, Lt. Brian Noon, Lynn Fegley, Bill Anderson, Harry Rickabough, Alan Heft, Chris Judy, George O’Donnell, Susan Rivers. Members of the Public Attending/Presenting: Larry Jennings, Rudy Lukacovic, John Page Williams, Lee Haile, many from Susquehanna River region. Action Items:

• Commission request the department give an in depth presentation on recreational license sales. • David J. Smith was told by the Secretary of Appointments he is no longer a member of the commission,

as of April 10, 2018. Motions:

• The commission will send a letter to the AELR supporting approval of the emergency regulation requiring circle hooks while using live bait and chumming and a 19-inch minimum length requirement when fishing for striped bass. Motion by David Sikorski, seconded by Val Lynch. Vote in favor: 13, against: 0, abstained: 0

• Commission request Secretary Mark Belton send a letter to the AELR which states the economic and ecological benefits of the emergency regulation requiring circle hooks while using live bait and chumming and a 19-inch minimum length requirement when fishing for striped bass. Motion by David Sikorski, seconded by Phil Langley. Vote for: 13, against: 0, abstained: 0

Next Meeting Date: July 24, 2018 To be held in the Conference Room C-1 of the Tawes Building from 3:00-6:00 p.m.

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Maryland DNR

Winter Meeting of the Sport Fisheries

Advisory Commission(SFAC)

Tuesday,

April 17, 2018

Held at the Maryland Department of Natural Resources

Tawes State Office Building

C-1 Conference Room

Annapolis, Maryland

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Maryland DNR

Spring Meeting of the Sport Fisheries Advisory Commission

April 17, 2018

SFAC Members Present:

John Neely, Chair

Micah Dammeyer

Beverly Fleming

Jim Gracie

Phil Langley

Steve Lay

Scott Lenox

Val Lynch

Dr. Ray P. Morgan II

Charles Nemphos

Ed O’Brien

David Sikorski

David Sutherland

Roger Trageser

SFAC Members Absent:

James Wommack

Maryland DNR Fisheries Service

David Blazer

Paul Genovese

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Maryland DNR

Spring Meeting of the Sport Fisheries Advisory Commission

April 17, 2018

I N D E X

Page

Welcome and Announcements/Updates by John Neely, Chair, SFAC

and Dave Blazer, Director

MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 5

Public Comment 11

Questions and Answers 14

NRP Activity Report by Lt. Timothy Grove MD DNR NRP 19

Questions and Answers 22

Freshwater Fisheries by Susan Rivers MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 24

Questions and Answers 25

Nontidal Angler Survey by Scott Knoche Morgan State University 26

Questions and Answers 38

Wild Trout Angler Survey by Alan Heft MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 41

Questions and Answers 57

Work Group and Committee Reporting 59

Black Bass Subcommittee Report by Commissioner Roger Trageser 59

Cownose Ray Work Group by Sarah Widman MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 67

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I N D E X (continued)

Page

Formation of Clamming Work Group by Dave Blazer, Director MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 68

Questions and Answers 71

Striped Bass Work Group by Lynn Fegley

MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 78

Policy Program by Sarah Widman MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 81

Questions and Answers 88

Fishing Management Updates 89

Weakfish Presentation by Harry Rickabaugh MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 89

Questions and Answers 96

ASMFC/MAFMC Highlights and Updates by Mike Luisi

MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 102

Questions and Answers 107

MOTION 109

Commercial Black Drum by Lynn Fegley

MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 116

Questions and Answers 117

KEYNOTE: “---” denotes inaudible in the transcript.

“ * ” indicates word is phonetically spelled.

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A F T E R N O O N S E S S I O N 1

(2:05 p.m.) 2

Welcome and Elections 3

by Chair John Neely, SFAC 4

and Dave Blazer, Director, MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 5

MR. NEELY: Welcome to our quarterly Sport Fisheries 6

Advisory Commission meeting. The meeting will now begin. We 7

have a packed meeting today, a very full agenda. I am going 8

to ask that you keep your remarks direct and succinct and 9

speak just to the topic today. 10

Last month, we lost one of the giants of the 11

recreational fishing world. Bernard “Lefty” Kreh, born in 12

Frederick, a son of Maryland, a resident of suburban 13

Baltimore. He was known nationally and internationally, and 14

he did so much to promote our great sport. Please join me in 15

a moment of silence for Lefty Kreh. 16

(Moment of silence) 17

MR. NEELY: Thank you. One of the things that Lefty 18

told me when I first went on this commission was to focus on 19

the resource, on water quality. He said, everything else will 20

stem from that. You take care of the water quality, the 21

resource, all policy stems from that. 22

Here in Maryland, we are being watched by the entire 23

fishing community, and whether it is on the Fraser River out 24

in British Columbia where they are restoring steelhead, or 25

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they are trying to restore normal water flows in the 1

everglades, and here in Maryland on the Patapsco River in 2

July, we are removing the Bloede Dam, which should open up at 3

least 60 miles of fish habitat. And again, the entire country 4

is taking notice. 5

You received a budget. I am going to ask Dave to 6

speak about that in a minute but look at it. I don’t think 7

there are any skeletons but take a look at the budget. And 8

last, Commissioner David Smith has been removed by Secretary 9

Cavey, the appointment secretary, for the governor’s 10

administration, and he is no longer on the commission. Dave? 11

MR. BLAZER: Great. Just a couple of announcements. 12

In your packet and I think in the e-mail that went out, we 13

wanted you to know about the MORE Commission, M-O-R-E. I 14

think its Maryland Outdoor Recreation Economics or I forget 15

what exactly that stands for. 16

But basically they are going to look at outdoor 17

recreation business opportunities in the State of Maryland and 18

how can the State enhance that. The governor issued an 19

executive order for DNR, Department of Natural Resources and 20

the Department of Tourism to jointly chair this. 21

Those meetings are going to start up relatively 22

soon. In fact, I think they had one scheduled. It was 23

cancelled because of snow. They have rescheduled it for May 24

sometime. But we will let you know kind of the progress with 25

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that. They are just kind of kicking off. We sent you, I 1

believe, the executive order related to that, and as we hear 2

the discussions from that commission we will keep you 3

involved. 4

Obviously hunting, fishing, parks and boating are 5

all affiliated with that outdoor recreation initiative. So we 6

will keep you aware of what is going on. They also want to 7

have meetings across the State, something for you all to keep 8

in mind. 9

They want to go from Ocean City to Deep Creek to the 10

Yough and everywhere in between. They want to go and see a 11

lot of different locations and they have got membership across 12

the State as well. So we will be providing more information 13

about that as it progresses and keep you all up to date. 14

Also to let you know Fish and Hunt Maryland is kind 15

of re-energized, if you will, not only because of the MORE 16

Commission. They went to Harrisburg for the outdoor fishing 17

show. They have got an app that is available, and I have got 18

these nice little postcards -- take one and hand it down -- 19

with their Website. And they are trying to promote fishing 20

and hunting opportunities within the State. 21

This is really driven by the Department of Tourism 22

but we are working with them. We are looking for stories, 23

story lines. They put a blog out. So if there is some 24

interest here, if you are interested in, say, writing an 25

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article about some aspect that you are very familiar with, and 1

being an expert on, let us know and we can help you out with 2

that because they are looking at stories every two to three 3

weeks throughout the year. 4

Again, trying to promote the fishing and hunting 5

aspects of what is going on in the State and stay out of the 6

regulatory management side. This is more of a tourism piece. 7

We just wanted everybody to know that. 8

One other note. Charter boat folks, the prepaid 9

envelopes, there is no longer any funding available for those 10

so if you have a prepaid that says postage paid in the upper 11

right-hand corner, don’t use those envelopes because that 12

funding source has dried up. So the charter boats were using 13

those for years to send reports back to us. So if you can let 14

your folks know that. 15

On the agenda here, and maybe I will wait. The 16

formation of a planned work group. I will talk a little bit 17

more about that in kind of a different form so I may change 18

that later one but we are looking -- because there are some 19

issues with aquaculture and clamming and a couple other issues 20

associated with aquaculture. And we have had the aquaculture 21

laws on the books for eight, nine years now. 22

We are doing some activities to relook at some of 23

those issues as we go through so I will talk more about that 24

later on. 25

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Let me also welcome Roger Trageser back because he 1

has been reappointed officially. You are in. So that has 2

happened along with the Dave Smith news. 3

And then the last thing I wanted to mention was we 4

sent you copies of the budget report. Sorry this has taken us 5

quite some time to get to you because of our reorganization, 6

and now boating is a portion of us, a part of us. So we have 7

included some of the boating aspects of the funding and the 8

activities that go on there. 9

So please look it over. Provide comments to me. 10

Let me know what you think -- good, bad, indifferent. Bottom 11

line is our budgets are -- we have endured some budget cuts 12

since I have been here for almost three years now. And we 13

used to have leftover money every year. That money is kind of 14

dwindling down and we have been using that. 15

So basically our savings account is close to zero. 16

So you talk about our skeletons. We are trying to be as 17

efficient as we can. And you can see what we are spending our 18

money on with our priorities. We are going to take a good, 19

hard look at redoing this next year but please take a look at 20

it, and if you have any questions -- 21

We still have the four major -- well, five now -- 22

major funding. Fishing license revenue, which is the special 23

funds. We get some general funds. Those numbers are 24

dwindling a little bit. We get federal funds. We get some 25

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reimbursable funds like the MDOT money. And we also get some 1

of the boating money, which now includes in our special funds. 2

We cannot use the boating money for fisheries work. 3

Likewise we can’t use the fisheries money for boating work. 4

So we have to make sure they don’t get commingled in the 5

process. So we talk a little bit about that in here 6

throughout. And I think that is about all I really wanted to 7

cover with this. 8

But again it tells how many licenses we have been 9

selling the last couple years. Our license sales have gone 10

down. Our revenues are down in addition to our budget cuts. 11

So that is the aspect with the Department of Tourism, trying 12

to promote. 13

We have started a couple of initiatives that we will 14

provide more information on at future meetings working with 15

the recreational boating and fishing foundation for automatic 16

license renewal and other things to get anglers to renew their 17

licenses. The retention rate of people buying their fishing 18

licenses keeps going down. We want to try to encourage them 19

to keep buying their licenses year after year. 20

That helps us with our work, with our conservation 21

work, and looking at other things to try to recruit, retain 22

other anglers to get participation in the sport that we all 23

care about. 24

But we have got a couple initiatives going on in 25

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that front and we will bring that back to you all a little bit 1

later. And I think for now those are all the announcements I 2

have. 3

MR. NEELY: Paul, I think maybe at a future meeting 4

we might spend some time with the budget and talk about 5

license sales. And just talk a little bit more about the 6

numbers. All right? 7

Lt. Noon, can I ask a favor? These wonderful folks 8

from the northern part of the bay have asked to get on the 9

agenda. And they have come a long way. And they have asked 10

for just a few minutes. And so I am going to ask them to step 11

up, and their representative, Kayla, speaking on the 12

Susquehanna, has volunteered to speak. And Kayla, you don’t 13

have anybody else joining you? 14

MS. HALE: I may have my father, Lee. 15

MR. NEELY: Why don’t you all come out front here? 16

MR. BLAZER: Have them sit in front of a microphone. 17

Public Comment 18

MS. HALE: So hi, everyone. My name is Kayla Hale. 19

I am a recreational fisherman up in the Susquehanna River, and 20

I am here today, and I know you have heard me talk before 21

about -- I would like to see a change for the line for the 22

catch-and-release season up the Susquehanna to a straight 23

line. 24

And I know there were a few options thrown out at 25

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the last meeting, and I am pushing for Option 4, which is a 1

straight line from Harford County to the end of Spencer, the 2

southern end of Spencer Island over to the Cecil County side. 3

I just -- this year especially, I have seen a high 4

increase in NRP up there, and even there, rumor has it that 5

they are having a hard time defining this V shaped line that 6

we have currently. 7

So I am just pushing for the southern end of the 8

island, which is as soon as you put any boat out there on that 9

river, even from shore, everyone knows Spencer Island. 10

Everyone can see it. It never goes under water. And the 11

current tip of the line right now is Twin Rocks. And if there 12

is a southern wind, a high tide and the river, the water 13

holds, and these rocks are submerged. A lot of boaters don’t 14

know where these rocks are. 15

So they go above this line and they don’t even know 16

it. So that is why I kind of just want to have the end of 17

Spencer Island. It never goes under water. It never changes. 18

It has been there for years. And that is kind of all I have 19

to say about it right now. 20

And it also opens up a lot of shoreline access for 21

shoreline fisherman because right now there is nowhere for 22

these people to fish. The only spot they have is Lapidum and 23

it is about a 20-foot area. You know, all these guys trying 24

to get in there, it can be a little hectic. 25

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MR. HALE: Do you all have any thoughts, as far as 1

the commission, who are familiar with the river because where 2

Kayla is speaking of, where we are trying to get this line 3

moved to is smack dab in the center of the river. 4

Even in low light, being the center, you have got a 5

distinguished line that it is show you straight, you know, 6

from left to right. If these others proposals, two and three, 7

are implemented, if you are fishing the left side, the Cecil 8

Country and/or Harford County side, to distinguish the line 9

from that point on either side, it is very difficult. 10

And that is another reason that we oppose these 11

other options. 12

MS. HALE: I also feel like there has to be some 13

kind of middle point. And the current line we have now has 14

those three points to easily distinguish if you are on the 15

Harford County side or the Cecil County side. 16

But like I said, when these rocks are submerged and 17

there is high water, or flood gates, which we have had a lot 18

this year, these rocks are under water and we are lost. So if 19

we have a distinguished center point like Spencer Island, 20

don’t go above the end of the island. 21

It is easy. Everyone -- at least for everyone I 22

have spoken to. I am like, hey, do you know about Spencer 23

Island? Oh, yes, yes. It is the first island you come out on 24

the lower end of the Susquehanna River. 25

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MR. NEELY: Let’s gets some questions from the 1

commissioners, and then the fisheries folks are going to 2

speak. 3

Questions and Answers 4

MR. NEMPHOS: I can’t see the option but the bridge 5

is how far from the island? The bridge option? How many 6

yards, miles? 7

MS. HALE: Three miles? 8

MR. NEMPHOS: So the options up at the top are 9

pretty well-grouped, but you are three miles away with the 10

bridge. What happens to all the people who have docks or 11

homes along the shoreline as far as fishing? 12

MS. HALE: You lose it. You guys were talking about 13

your recreational licenses are down, if you move it down to 95 14

bridge you can kiss myself and all these guys behind and 15

hundreds of other people, you can kiss those licenses goodbye. 16

MR. NEMPHOS: Well, I understand that. I think 17

everybody understands that but, you know, we are talking about 18

boats most of the time or charters, recreational fishing. 19

And I think we have a gentleman here who has a piece 20

of property on the river, and he is above the bridge. You are 21

north of the bridge? 22

MR. MORSE: Really the issue I have, those options 23

are very well-grouped together. I have about 100 feet of 24

shoreline that I have access to legally catch and release 25

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fish, and that is Lapidum ramp. 1

MR. NEMPHOS: And that is north of the bridge? 2

MR. MORSE: Yes, the boat ramp, where everything 3

originates there, that is the only reasonable shoreline access 4

for someone who doesn’t have the means to afford a boat or a 5

charter. 6

MR. NEMPHOS: That was my question. 7

MR. MORSE: And so, anything below that will divest 8

me completely of this fishery. 9

MR. NEMPHOS: Okay. 10

MR. NEELY: Val? 11

MR. LYNCH: Is there any comment from enforcement in 12

terms of moving that to the north? I guess that is the north 13

to the proposed line? 14

LT. GROVE: My only concern with something that goes 15

across the tip is a straight line -- it is a straight line 16

across the tip but I am looking at what angle, what degree. 17

So unless we put two markers on either end, to truly 18

delineate that line, it beats saying that it is easily 19

definable. I have been there, done that. If someone is 20

looking across -- I am across the tip, but they are not 100 21

percent perpendicular to the river’s flow itself. 22

I would like to see -- and I have worked that area 23

my whole career. I can say -- I will totally support Twin 24

Rocks being hard to delineate. Are we really impacting the 25

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fishery to move it that far north? Not really. But I would 1

like to see some significant delineation on the shoreline, 2

whether it is fisheries putting out signs that say -- 3

MR. HALE: Signs I think are a great idea. They 4

have signage up at Conowingo Dam for 400 yards and that works 5

really well for you guys as far as enforcement. We could put 6

a sign on Harford County/Cecil County side to implement this 7

reg. 8

LT. GROVE: From an enforcement standpoint, it 9

doesn’t matter, truly it doesn’t matter where the line is from 10

an enforcement standpoint, as long as it is definable. As 11

long as that officer can go in and go, yes, you are across the 12

line and you should have known you were across the line 13

because of this, this, this and this. 14

MS. HALE: And that is what we want. 15

LT. GROVE: And enforcement efforts are sometimes 16

gray in that area because you can’t see Twin Rocks. 17

MR. NEELY: We are going to have one final comment 18

from the commission, and Dave, and then we are going to ask 19

Dave Blazer to speak. 20

MR. SIKORSKI: I just want to provide some 21

clarification. So in the report that was sent out for this 22

meeting, the reason that this topic was in that report was 23

because at the last meeting, this commission unanimously 24

supported moving this toward scoping. 25

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And I think clarification with the department on the 1

next steps are important because scoping provides a lot of 2

private comment. It is a not a decision that will be made 3

here today. 4

I appreciate the input, and I have some thoughts, 5

but that will all occur during the scoping period. 6

MR. BLAZER: So basically that is what I was going 7

to add, Dave. If you remember, at the last meeting, the 8

recommendation from the Sport Fish Advisory Commission was to 9

take all four options out to public comment. And then come 10

back through the scoping process and then go through the 11

regulatory process at that time. 12

So there were advantages and disadvantages of each. 13

The reason the bridge was on there was because that is 14

enforceable, you know. You know where that line is. The 15

other two were, you know -- and then the fourth one really 16

followed your recommendation from the meeting when you all 17

were here before. 18

So those four options are going to be scoped. I 19

think they are in the packet today or -- 20

MR. GRACIE: Dave, could you briefly summarize the 21

process with scoping and then regulatory promulgation for 22

people who may not understand it? It is gobbledygook to some 23

people. 24

MR. BLAZER: Sarah is not here. 25

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MR. GRACIE: You can do it. 1

MR. BLAZER: I may get the timeframes wrong. 2

Usually we get regulatory ideas for changes in our 3

regulations, either from sport fish, tidal fish, advisory 4

committees, the public, like you all brought this. 5

We bring them to sport fish. Ask them for comments 6

and thoughts. We did that a meeting or two ago. Then we do 7

what we call scoping. So it is a step where we publish and 8

put out on social media and our Website and say, we are 9

thinking about changing this regulation. And here are some of 10

the options that we have heard. What do people think? 11

Would they support? Are they opposed? Blah, blah, 12

blah, whatever it is. That scoping process can take anywhere 13

from a week to two weeks to four generally. Once we get that 14

scoping information, then we determine whether we are going to 15

go forward with a regulation on one of those options or 16

whatever. 17

We bring it back to sport fish and say this is what 18

we heard in scoping. Come back with a regulatory proposal. 19

Everybody okay with going forward? And then we would propose 20

a regulation and that would be a 90- to 120-day process and 21

there could be a public comment period. There is a public 22

comment period but there could be a hearing associated with 23

that as well. 24

We take public comments, and at the end of that 90 25

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days then we can adopt or modify -- if we modify it, if it is 1

not substantially changed, we can go forward with it. If it 2

is a substantial change, then we have to repropose it. 3

So the whole idea of scoping is, like in this case, 4

if we have four, five or six different options, we are not 5

sure what the best one is, we get to get some previous 6

information. 7

If we go and make a regulatory proposal and say go 8

with Option 1, and people object to that, then we have got to 9

go back and start all over and add that other 90 days for that 10

regulatory process. So does that cover everything? 11

MR. NEELY: I really want to bring this to a close, 12

so what do you have to say? 13

MR. SIKORSKI: I will just say so there will be 14

another opportunity at a Sport Fisheries Commission meeting 15

for us to make a motion or some sort of advice to the 16

department on the options. 17

MR. BLAZER: Yes. 18

MR. SIKORSKI: Thank you. 19

MR. NEELY: Thank you very much for coming. 20

NRP Activity Report 21

by Lt. Brian Noon and Lt. Tim Grove 22

MD DNR NRP 23

LT. GROVE: Lt. Tim Grove. I just wanted to come in 24

one last time. We are kind of handing off the baton. I have 25

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been here for probably about the last year and half maybe. 1

Six meetings or so. Lt. Noon, who is the commander of Area 2

Five, which is Baltimore City Marine, Howard and Carroll and 3

Montgomery counties, is going to take over for me. 4

Activity -- I think it came out in your, some of the 5

top cases that have popped up in the last quarter are in your 6

chart. The listing of citations and warnings, which again is 7

incomplete. Just a brief update on that. 8

Hopefully our E-tickets program will go into play we 9

are hoping by July 1 for our citations. We have been doing 10

the warnings but that will be hopefully in play by July 1, and 11

that will give us a lot more hands-on, real-time data at any 12

given time because everything is electronically -- 13

There are no tickets in process. There are no 14

tickets being sent through the chain of command down to our 15

records section and being hand-imbedded into the system. 16

So it will be a lot quicker. 17

So what you see as far as some of the citations and 18

warnings is not probably quite up to date. I can tell you 19

that we did, up in the Susquehanna, even issue I think -- the 20

one there is 10. We issued 10 citations for the striped bass 21

in a closed season on the Susquehanna. 22

I know in our area we got quite a few more people. 23

Since then some of that, until the end of the March quarter 24

but even -- this past weekend 14 people were charged with 25

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anything from disobeying a lawful order, which is an 1

arrestable offense because they dumped their catch. They 2

wouldn’t hold it for us. To possession, actual possession, of 3

striped bass during the closure. 4

Targeting of striped bass: Numerous targeting 5

tickets were issued. And also possession of herring was also 6

issued over this past weekend. A lot of -- like I said, a lot 7

of late night activity in those areas that the big fish are 8

coming into. And a considerable number of out-of-state people 9

coming in just for that purpose: Delaware, New Jersey, that 10

kind of thing. 11

MR. NEELY: Commissioners, are there questions? 12

(No response) 13

MR. NEELY: How many of these offenders are repeat 14

offenders? 15

LT. GROVE: Quite a few of them actually. You know, 16

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard guys just tell me 17

flat out, that is the cost of doing business. 18

And one of the problems with that, I will tell you, 19

is that, to be a repeat offender, the timeframe is like, one 20

year. So because it is a seasonal thing -- I would recommend 21

some consideration be given to expand that repeat offender 22

timeframe out to incorporate maybe another season and make it 23

two or three years, where -- 24

And that is the way it is pretty much across the 25

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board in all the fish and game stuff, and it is hard to get a 1

repeat offender. 2

We have done it. One guy we caught two years ago 3

early in the season and then late in the season again doing 4

the same thing. So he got an escalated fine because it is 5

$250 for a first offense, $500 for a second. 6

MR. NEELY: And how many of these repeat offender 7

actually receive punishment greater than a modest fine? 8

LT. GROVE: Again, it depends. A lot of these guys, 9

they are paying out. It is a prepaid amount. They can pay 10

the ticket. It is adjudicated at that point. They have a 11

guilty conviction but if it is adjudicated as a natural 12

resource charge, it doesn’t really go on any criminal records, 13

anything like that. 14

And they know that. They pay the $250 and they are 15

done. If it does go to court, that is a crap shoot. It 16

depends. Are we talking Cecil County? Are we talking Harford 17

County? Are we talking what judge in on the bench? Do they 18

have a knowledge of what is going on? 19

It could be anywhere from a probation before 20

judgment or they could slammed for the $250. 21

MR. NEELY: Thank you. Beverly? 22

Questions and Answers 23

MS. FLEMING: Are they boat fishing or are they land 24

fishing? 25

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LT. GROVE: Both. We have been targeting 1

here -- this past weekend was a lot of the shore-based 2

fishermen just because it is easier to surveil them, to be 3

honest. You can see them from a reasonable distance. When 4

they are on a boat -- 5

MS. FLEMING: Maybe the law should be rewritten that 6

you can confiscate their car because they are going to have to 7

take the illegal fish in their car. If they are fishing by 8

boat, confiscate the boat. Make it hard. 9

LT. GROVE: The confiscation laws get into a -- that 10

is a deep area. 11

MS. FLEMING: Of course, of course but you have to 12

make the law hard enough that they are not going to go back. 13

MR. BATTISTA: I don’t know if I can add anything 14

but I talked to some gentlemen who were from out of town. 15

They weren’t familiar. They were actually fishing at 16

Conowingo Dam. 17

So they fish and troll in illegal areas. And they 18

said, well, what happens if we go above the line? I said, 19

well, you will get a fine. I said it probably $200, $300. 20

They said, that is okay, I can pay that. Will they take my 21

gear? That is what they were concerned about because the rods 22

are very expensive. 23

LT. GROVE: And that does get done sometimes. 24

MR. SIKORSKI: For the record, that is Alan 25

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Battista. 1

MR. NEELY: I think we all hear, over and over, why 2

don’t these offenders get punished. I hear it over and over. 3

Susan Rivers, speaking on fresh water. 4

Freshwater Fisheries 5

by Susan Rivers, MD DNR 6

MS. RIVERS: As John said, I am Susan Rivers. I am 7

with the freshwater program with Fishing and Boating Services. 8

Just to let you know a little bit about my program, it is 9

officially called planning but in freshwater we refer to 10

ourselves as statewide operations. 11

We have another unit that actually does regional 12

operations, so they manage local fisheries. The people in my 13

unit actually manage statewide programs, so things that affect 14

all the regions. 15

And some of the functions that are in my unit 16

include brook trout, tidal bass, regulations. We do some fish 17

health work. We sample invertebrate populations. We have 18

members on an education and invasive species matrix teams with 19

the department. 20

We manage the fish management areas for the state, 21

and unfortunately I am heavily involved in budget so that is 22

something I am not really proud of. I have biology degrees. 23

It is like, okay. 24

Tony Prochaska was going to be here today but the 25

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Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies is meeting 1

this week in Vermont, and he was elected as the chair of the 2

Fish Administrators Association, a portion of that meeting. 3

So he apologized that he could not be here so he asked me to 4

take his place for him today. 5

Now I know that you guys have received the monthly 6

report. And he asked me to check to see if anybody had any 7

questions or any concerns regarding that report. 8

Questions and Answers 9

MR. NEELY: What is going on in Western Maryland in 10

terms of stream remediation for acid drainage is nothing short 11

of incredible. Our wild trout streams, our brook trout, 12

native brook trout streams, are stronger today than they were 13

30 years ago. It is incredible. 14

MS. RIVERS: And we have to credit both -- well, 15

number one, a lot of the volunteers, especially in Western 16

Maryland. They are very active. They are very involved. We 17

have been very fortunate to get liming projects and 18

restoration of the riparian buffer, reclamation and 19

reforestation on stripped lands certainly have been a big 20

impact. 21

We also have been able to get good liming projects 22

going on that will help improve the ph on those areas and to 23

prevent further erosion and degradation. 24

MR. NEELY: Thank you. 25

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MS. RIVERS: With that, if nobody has any questions 1

about the monthly report, two years ago in 2016, the 2

commission received preliminary information on two surveys 3

that we had been doing. It was actually two angler surveys. 4

The first one was our Statewide Angler Preference 5

Survey. And it was conducted for us by Dr. Scott Knoche, with 6

PEARL with Morgan State. And I am happy to report that he is 7

now the director of PEARL. And PEARL is the Patuxent 8

Environmental and Aquaculture Research Laboratory. 9

And then the other report was on wild trout 10

management preferences of anglers in the State of Maryland. 11

We have completed those reports and so today what we would 12

like to do is have both Dr. Knoche and Alan Heft, who is with 13

our brook trout program, who administers the Wild Trout 14

Preference Survey, to give you a brief presentation of some of 15

those results. 16

MR. NEELY: Great. Thank you Susan. 17

Nontidal Angler Survey 18

by Dr. Scott Knoche, Morgan State University 19

DR. KNOCHE: Thank you, Susan, for the introduction. 20

And I for one am glad you are in charge of budgets because you 21

made this survey happen, and I appreciate that. 22

This survey began as series of discussions that I 23

had with the former nontidal inland chief Don Cosden, and 24

ultimately got it going after his retirement, and Tony came 25

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into the position, Tony Prochaska. 1

So I was a postdoc at Maryland DNR Fisheries 2

Service, now Fishing and Boating Services, so many things are 3

changing here. I have since moved to Morgan State. Now I am 4

the director of the Morgan State University Patuxent 5

Environmental and Aquatic Research Laboratory. 6

I am somewhat of a unique position there obviously 7

as director but also I have a strong social scientist 8

background. I am trained as an economist. So I am going to 9

make that a big part of what we are doing at the PEARL moving 10

forward. 11

I left some cards here, by the way, right on the 12

table. I am going to take off right after, but if you are 13

interested in what I am talking about or if you have some 14

further questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me. 15

So without further ado, I will get going here and 16

describe this survey. 17

(Slide) 18

So first off, why a survey. Why not just hold a 19

town hall to find out what people are thinking or do something 20

online, something more informal. Well, we want to do a survey 21

so we can understand what the population, writ large, is 22

thinking about any given issue, any given topic. 23

Businesses spend of hundreds of millions, billions 24

of dollars, on surveys. I am sure many of you are bombarded 25

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with surveys. You call Comcast, you call Verizon afterward, 1

they want you to do a three-minute questionnaire, answer a 2

couple questions. 3

So businesses do surveys to better understand their 4

customer case. And think of the angler, the recreational 5

angler as the customer of the Maryland DNR Fishing and Boating 6

Services. 7

So the data collected help the DNR improve the 8

quality of products it is offering, find out what people want 9

out of their fishing experience, right? So again, the 10

nontidal angler, this is a nontidal survey, as a customer of 11

the Maryland DNR. 12

(Slide) 13

So we know a little bit about what these customers 14

are fishing for -- very, very roughly. We know who has bought 15

a trout stamp. We know how many people bought a senior 16

license, which of course permits you to fish for nontidal fish 17

and also fish in the bay coast areas and also trout. 18

Some people have short-term licenses. They are here 19

for a short period of time and they are not going to commit to 20

that full license. But we have limited knowledge. There is 21

this USDOI, Department of Interior survey. It is every five 22

years. It captures information at a pretty rough level. 23

So Maryland DNR has done surveys intermittently. 24

The last major effort was by Susan Rivers in 2002. So we 25

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thought we needed to do a new survey to really understand what 1

this customer base is looking for out of their fishing 2

experience. 3

(Slide) 4

So here is the objective, and it is a mouthful, 5

but it is to cost-effectively, cheaply -- we don’t have an 6

unlimited budget of course -- to collect management relevant 7

information on Maryland nontidal anglers, with the objective 8

of drawing scientifically defensible population conclusions. 9

So again, not the town-hall style where people are 10

maybe a little more passionate than your average person. 11

Maybe they are little more angry than your average person. 12

This is to understand what the average angler, the population 13

of anglers is thinking about a host of issues. We can get a 14

distorted view when we dig down and just look at folks at a 15

town hall, what they are excited about. 16

Not that those aren’t important opinions because 17

they are. But what is the population in general for and what 18

do they want out of their fishing experience. 19

(Slide) 20

So to do this scientifically defensible study, we 21

surveyed 4,300 individuals. We sent those individuals up to 4 22

survey contacts. The first 3 contacts were mail invitations 23

to participate in an online survey. There was the website 24

link that they could type in, and then they would take the 25

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survey and we would get that information through the computer, 1

of course. 2

And then if folks did not respond to either of those 3

three mailings -- the first one was an envelope with a 4

document explaining the survey. The next two were follow-up 5

postcards. The fourth was a 12-page hard copy survey booklet 6

with a business reply mail envelope for them to fill out the 7

survey and send it back. 8

The response rate was 25 percent, which is in line 9

with many surveys nowadays. Unfortunately response rates are 10

declining. For my master’s thesis, I worked with a survey 11

that had 67 percent. For my dissertation, one had 45 percent. 12

Now we are down to 25 percent. It is survey overload possibly 13

in combination with distrust in government maybe a little bit 14

too. Just a suspicion. 15

(Slide) 16

So the survey asked anglers about a host of their 17

behaviors, their preferences for regulations, where they go 18

fishing, how often they go fishing. What they fish for. 19

Whether they go fishing more often if certain things change. 20

So we looked at effort and trip-specific 21

information. I will highlight that. That is what I am going 22

to speak about today primarily. I am going to focus on the 23

species targeted and key locations visited with three primary 24

metrics: participation, what proportion of the population of 25

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anglers fished for a certain species or went fishing at a 1

certain location. 2

And then effort: How many trips at that location 3

were for that species? And then finally expenditure at the 4

locations for those different species. 5

(Slide) 6

It is not all about money. You see a lot of smiling 7

faces here. People fish for a variety of different types of 8

fish in nontidal waterways, from large muskies in the nontidal 9

Potomac to carp and perch and panfish, catfish at the bottom. 10

So lots of different species of fish. 11

(Slide) 12

Many of you probably won’t be shocked that for nontidal 13

fishing, bass was the most popular species to fish for. 14

For anglers, it took at least one fishing trip to a 15

nontidal waterway 77 percent of those anglers reported that 16

they fish for bass at least once during that year. That bass 17

could be largemouth bass or smallmouth bass. 18

Now as far as effort goes, 41 percent of all 19

nontidal fishing trips, the angler reported fishing for bass, 20

could it have been largemouth or smallmouth or just bass 21

generically. Many folks responded bass generically to the 22

survey. 41 percent of trips had bass as one of those species 23

targeted. 24

And you can see expenditures there. The mean trip 25

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expenditure for fishing for bass, largemouth or smallmouth, 1

was $140 per trip. And the median was $38. 2

So basically what that is saying is there are some 3

are trips on that bar, I guess you call them outliers -- well, 4

you would call them outliers -- on the right end of the 5

distribution, where people are spending $300, $400 for a trip. 6

But the median, right in the middle there, is about $38 a 7

trip. 8

The bottom line is that the survey estimated, we 9

estimated through the survey, that bass anglers spent about 10

$150 million in 2015 fishing for largemouth bass or smallmouth 11

bass in nontidal waterways. That is not including the tidal 12

Potomac. 13

You see it is broken down by largemouth bass and 14

smallmouth bass on the left and the right there. They are 15

somewhat comparable. Slightly more effort with largemouth but 16

slightly higher expenditures for the smallmouth bass fishing. 17

(Slide) 18

Now trout is also an important type of fishing for 19

Maryland anglers. 44 percent of all anglers that fished 20

nontidal waterways reported fishing for trout in 2015. 27 21

percent of trips were for trout. The trip expenditure is a 22

little bit lower. And I suspect that is a couple things. 23

There are the put-and-take fisheries that are pretty easy to 24

access and low cost. And also the trout fishing is not always 25

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part of a summer vacation. And bass fishing is more likely 1

part of a summer vacation. 2

So you have a high -- and I will talk about this in 3

a moment. The expensive trips are to places like Deep Creek 4

Lake where you fish for bass and spend a week out there and 5

spend thousands of dollars. Maybe they are not fishing for 6

trout when they are on that lakefront condo in Deep Creek 7

Lake. 8

You can see it broken down here by different types 9

of trout. So we looked at stock trout. More money is spent 10

on stock trout than either brown or brook. If you combine 11

brown or brook today, wild brown and wild brook, it 12

approximates what is spent by anglers on stock trout. 13

So these are popular types of fish. And a brook 14

trout, we had mentioned that earlier, about $10 million spent 15

annually on fishing for brook trout. And when you think about 16

how niche of a species that is and out on the Savage River, 17

maybe in a couple other places, it is a pretty impressive 18

figure. 19

(Slide) 20

Panfish is also popular. About two-thirds of 21

anglers reported fishing for panfish. About $80 million spent 22

total on panfish, and that is defined as either blue gill, 23

sunfish, a perch or crappie. 24

And you can see the figures down there too. So 25

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getting maybe a little redundant with a lot of these figures, 1

there is a lot here. The point is people spend a lot of time 2

fishing and they spend a lot of money fishing in this state. 3

And this is again nontidal. 4

(Slide) 5

And catfish was something that -- I was impressed 6

with the amount of people fishing for catfish and the amount 7

spent on catfish fishing: about $19 million total. 8

Not all folks identified particular species of 9

catfish. That is why channel plus flathead doesn’t equal the 10

total expenditures of $19 million right there. Some people 11

were just generic and said, I fish for catfish, right? So 12

catfish is an important species as well. 13

(Slide) 14

So moving on from the species to the wonderful 15

fishing locations, nontidal locations, in the state of 16

Maryland, there were three locations that really stood out. I 17

should say that people fish all over the state. There are 18

hundreds of places listed but these were the three that really 19

stood out and were kind of really key for managers, I feel 20

too. 21

The first is the nontidal Potomac. You probably 22

won’t be surprised. The length of that waterway, the 23

diversity of fishing opportunities out there. 22 percent 24

people, of anglers who fish in a nontidal waterway, fish, 25

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reported fishing, at least once in the nontidal Potomac. 1

Estimated about 240,000 trips, fishing trips to the 2

nontidal Potomac, and $23 million in annual expenditures. If 3

you look at the bottom left blurb here, just kind of break it 4

down about how long that trip was, what the purpose of the 5

trip was, was fishing the primary purpose or wasn’t it, right? 6

So about 20 percent, just less than 20 percent were 7

overnights. There were some overnight trips. Mostly day 8

trips. Most people who went fishing there said, yes, fishing 9

was my primary purpose, 85 percent. 10

And again, a diversity of species targeted. 63 11

percent of trips, people targeted bass. 49 percent of trips 12

was smallmouth bass. We have got catfish right there, 1/3 of 13

trips. I guess higher than I expected so that was very 14

interesting. 15

We have got walleye down there. It is lower but it 16

is kind of a more specialized, unique fishery. 17

(Slide) 18

Gunpowder Falls: Very important trout fishery. 19

About 12,400 anglers. They took an estimated 55,000 trips to 20

fish in Gunpowder Falls, spending $4.1 million. These trips 21

were predominantly single-day trips. And all of the 27 trips 22

reported in the survey, there was a special page that 23

discussed in detail the nature of a recent fishing trip. All 24

27 of those trips were reported as being primary purpose. If 25

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people were going there, they were going there to fish. 1

Trout was the most popular, not surprisingly. Brown 2

trout at 44 percent of folks, stock trout at 33 percent. Some 3

people did report fishing for smallmouth bass or bass but -- 4

(Slide) 5

And then finally, one of the most impressive things 6

that I uncovered in this survey -- again, it probably won’t be 7

as impressive to some of you folk, especially if you are 8

familiar with Western Maryland, but Deep Creek Lake is really 9

an economic powerhouse out there for fishing. 10

Over $60 million is our estimate for how much was 11

spent on fishing trips to Deep Creek Lake in 2015. Really 12

impressive. Look at the trip duration there too. It is 13

completely different than those other two areas. 62 percent 14

of trips were reported to be overnight. 31 percent, almost 1 15

out of 3, was 4 nights or more. People are going out there, 16

they are spending lots of time and they are spending lots of 17

money. 18

The mean trip, the mean expenditure amount per trip 19

was over $700, and the median, the middle one, was $300 so it 20

suggests that, yes, there are some outliers, but most of these 21

anglers who reported these trips, they are spending a lot of 22

money out there, and you can see how easily a night or two out 23

there and some other expenses would easily add up to $300. 24

There were a number of folks who reported $2,000, 25

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$3,000, $4,000 fishing trips in the survey. I wanted to weed 1

out anything that really looked fishy, no pun intended but 2

mostly I couldn’t. They said they stayed eight nights, and 3

they were there in the summer so you really got a sense that, 4

yes, this is a legitimate response here. 5

I know in the U.S. DOI survey that they do every 6

five years, they do a lot of outlier analysis and weeding 7

out. You have got to be careful when you do stuff like that. 8

There are a lot of people who spend a lot of money out there 9

in places like this, and if we don’t account for them we are 10

not getting a true picture of what is happening in that 11

economy. 12

MR. NEELY: Dr. Knoche? 13

DR. KNOCHE: Yes? Am I going too slow? 14

MR. NEELY: I just want to respect your time. You 15

have got four more minutes. 16

DR. KNOCHE: Great, I am moving through. Thank you 17

very much. 18

MR. NEELY: And I was hoping to leave some time 19

questions. 20

DR. KNOCHE: Well, I will continue to wrap it up 21

here. That was -- we have hit the species. We have hit the 22

key locations. What is the total? 23

(Slide) 24

Nontidal fishing effort in Maryland, 2.6 million 25

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trips is the estimate. More in rivers and streams: 1.6 1

million versus about a million in lakes, ponds and reservoirs. 2

$400 million in expenditures. 3

(Slide) 4

So what are the key findings in summary here? I 5

want you all to remember that these are just estimates. They 6

are best estimate. We have done our due diligence with the 7

repeat contacts to try to resolve the nonresponse bias issues. 8

We tested different demographic characteristics for response 9

bias. 10

Older anglers were more likely to respond slightly. 11

It doesn’t really affect the estimates in any fundamental way. 12

People fished for lots of different fish. 13

Stock trout: I want to highlight that. Spending for 14

stock trout, $27 million. Stocking ponds, about $1.5 million, 15

according Susan Rivers more recent estimates. Pretty good 16

return on investment when you are talking of a Maryland 17

Outdoor Recreation Economics Commission. 18

Deep Creek Lake is a key fishery. So I hope I can 19

take some of your questions. Thank you. 20

MR. NEELY: Great talk. Commissioners, are there 21

any questions? 22

Questions and Answers 23

MR. GRACIE: Is there a handout of these slides? 24

DR. KNOCHE: I can send you -- 25

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MR. NEELY: Please. This is really good stuff, and 1

I am hoping you might come back another time with a follow up. 2

DR. KNOCHE: Absolutely. I would love to. I am 3

actually using data collected in this survey to -- I have a 4

paper in development on acid mine drainage and the economic 5

benefits of trout angling from acid mine drainage. 6

I recently wrote a proposal to NSF to look further 7

into acid mine drainage as it pertains to recreational fishing 8

economics. So that is on my agenda too. I was excited to 9

know that was brought up here just a moment ago. 10

MR. GRACIE: Have you seen the survey that was done 11

on that seven or eight years ago? 12

DR. KNOCHE: The north branch downstream strategies? 13

MR. GRACIE: Right. 14

DR. KNOCHE: Yes, I have seen it. A good step. 15

What I have broached is going to go further, and what I have 16

done so far is a little bit different. 17

MR. GRACIE: Well, I would like to see more than 18

that. 19

MR. : (Away from microphone) I am a 20

stakeholder as well in that western fishery as far as what has 21

been done with the brook trout and what has been going on out 22

there has just been exceptional. I spend a lot of time and a 23

lot of money out there as well. 24

MR. NEELY: Are there any other comments from the 25

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commissioners? 1

MR. SUTHERLAND: So a lot of this presentation, is 2

the report available as well? 3

DR. KNOCHE: Yes. So Susan the report, the federal 4

aid report? 5

MS. RIVERS: What I have done is I have gone and 6

excerpted out -- our report is like 500 pages. I have 7

excerpted out Scott’s portion and Alan’s portion and I can 8

make them available to the commission. 9

MR. SUTHERLAND: Electronically. 10

MS. RIVERS: Yes. 11

DR. KNOCHE: So the next step, I would love to do a 12

similar survey for the tidal fishing, the bay fishing the 13

ocean fishing so let’s try to find a way to make that happen. 14

As you can see, this is valuable. 15

MR. SUTHERLAND: So what did this cost? 16

DR. KNOCHE: The survey cost -- I gave the Maryland 17

DNR a discount. So I would like to charge a little more next 18

time. I think it cost $42,000 when it was all said and done. 19

A lot of time, a ton of my time was a match. I justified it 20

because I am going to write some interesting research papers 21

on it. 22

MR. NEELY: Are there any other comments from the 23

commission? 24

(No response) 25

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MR. NEELY: Is there any public comment? 1

(No response) 2

MR. NEELY: Thank you, Dr. Knoche. We will receive 3

handouts and a copy of the report. Alan drove through a 4

blinding snowstorm this morning to get here on a great spring 5

day. 6

Wild Trout Angler Preference Survey 7

by Alan Heft, MD DNR Fishing and Boating Services 8

MR. HEFT: This survey was done for a more specific 9

purpose than what Scott had worked on. His was a big 10

statewide all-species. This was generated for -- it started 11

out specifically going toward brook trout. We ended up 12

expanding it to make it more of a little bit statewide wild 13

trout survey basically because we were trying to answer some 14

questions about brook trout. 15

When we got our survey put together. We realized we 16

had some more time, some more ability to ask a few more 17

questions because we were so focused on some specific 18

questions. We expanded it a little bit but overall it is 19

pretty small survey compared to what Scott says but with $10 20

million going toward brook trout, that just blew us all away. 21

Pretty neat to see that we are getting that kind of 22

economic return on a small resource like that. 23

(Slide) 24

So the first thing, to make sure we are all aware of 25

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what we are talking about, Scott had mentioned some stock 1

trout stuff, some wild brown trout, some wild brook trout. 2

Basically there are two types of trout populations 3

we manage in Maryland. We have got our stock trout 4

populations. That can be a special management, a put and 5

grow, catch-and-release type thing or a put and take where we 6

harvest the fish specifically or we put the fish out 7

specifically to be harvested. 8

So those populations, those stock populations, are 9

not maintained by natural reproduction. They are controlled 10

and managed by us putting the fish in on an annual, monthly, 11

whatever, basis that we are stocking them at. 12

What we are going to focus on with this survey, what 13

we were interested in, was out wild trout populations. These 14

are the trout populations that are self-sustaining. We don’t 15

stock them. They naturally reproduce in the streams. They 16

support their populations on their own. 17

We have two types of wild trout populations. We 18

have our introduced populations, which include brown trout and 19

rainbow trout, which are non-native species. Brown trout came 20

from Europe hundreds of years ago. They were introduced into 21

the state. And the rainbows came from the western U.S., 22

brought, and they are also an introduced species. 23

The native trout we have, the wild trout we have, is 24

our -- our native wild trout is brook trout. That is the one 25

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that has been here, evolved here. That is the one that my 1

program focuses on managing, working with the brook trout 2

population. So I just want to make sure we are clear on what 3

we are talking about. For the purpose of the survey, it is 4

all about wild trout, not anything to do with the stock trout. 5

(Slide) 6

So the reason we really got going with this survey, 7

it comes from Susan’s work, but we had met with Secretary 8

Belton. Back in 2007, we had implemented a special regulation 9

on the Upper Savage River out in Western Maryland, kind of our 10

premier brook trout fishery. And it had gone on, we had that 11

regulation in place when Secretary Belton came out and met 12

with us in 2015. 13

There was still a little bit of controversy. Not a 14

lot but some. We were still getting some concerns from 15

anglers and some local writers who weren’t pleased with what 16

we had done. Overall we had good support for it but not 17

universal. We still got some questions so Secretary Belton 18

came out and met with us. We explained to him what we had 19

done. 20

And the freshwater fishery is a little different 21

than commercial because of the different aspects. You are not 22

selling the fish. Not using big, wide open fisheries out in 23

the bay or the ocean. It is a little bit different 24

management strategy when we look at freshwater, especially in 25

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cold water. 1

So there is something we call the fisheries 2

management triumvirate. Three-legged stool, basically. You 3

have got to have your biology. You have got to understand 4

what is going on there. You have got to have your 5

conservation aspect, especially with wild trout. And 6

especially with the native brook trout. 7

And then you have got your social aspect, which 8

includes, you know, your fishing pressure, what the anglers 9

desire. You know, what they want to see from the resource. 10

So we met with Secretary Belton. We talked to him about what 11

we had. 12

(Slide) 13

We explained to him, hey, we have got the biology 14

down. We have been working on these brook trout for a long 15

time now. We have got a good feel for what is going on. The 16

management strategy we had implemented in the upper Savage had 17

worked really well. These are some of the pictures of some of 18

the bigger fish that were collected in our surveys since we 19

implemented the management strategy. 20

This is on par with anywhere in the eastern United 21

States outside of Maine basically. You can’t catch fish like 22

this in but a few places, and you go to a resource that is so 23

much public land and easily accessible hardly anywhere. This 24

is kind of the premier fishery for brook trout in the mid-25

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Atlantic. 1

So we had that box checked off. We got our biology 2

covered. 3

(Slide) 4

Conservation, we have been doing a lot of different 5

things. Here are some of the logos from some our partners 6

that we have worked with over the past 10-15 years on these 7

projects. You can see we have managed to leverage a lot of 8

money for brook trout projects in the state. Working with 9

Eastern Brook Trout Joint Venture, lots of different things. 10

So we have got the conservation leg of the stool 11

covered also. 12

(Slide) 13

Once we sat and talked to Secretary Belton though, 14

we realized, and we knew this, that we could use some more 15

information on the social aspect. That is a challenge within 16

our agency to get social information, creel survey 17

information, things such as that nature. 18

So we knew we needed some more information so we 19

talked to him and we all agreed that we needed to get that 20

information. The other thing, and that is a side that I will 21

hit very quickly at the end and kind of a little advertisement 22

for what we do with that is get some more outreach to the 23

communities that were directly affected by the regulation, 24

where we were getting some of the kickback. 25

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(Slide) 1

So we decided to do this survey. Like I said, it 2

started out for the upper Savage River but we had about half 3

dozen questions. And putting all this effort and energy into 4

doing a survey and only asking a half dozen questions, we 5

said, let’s see if we can expand it a little bit. 6

So we expanded it to try to get some more 7

information on other wild trout, lake brown trout and other 8

wild trout resources. But basically this whole thing was 9

geared toward brook trout. 10

(Slide) 11

So I am not going to get into the -- Scott got into 12

the nuts and bolts a little bit of how this was designed. 13

Scott helped us design this. We are biologists. We didn’t 14

know how to do a survey. We went and worked with Scott. 15

We had $4,000 I think for our budget. I don’t know 16

what you guys have. That is not a lot of money. It is very 17

difficult. A lot of challenges doing that but it worked. 18

So we basically followed Scott’s design. He helped 19

us. We did all the same things Scott did. We sent mailings 20

out. We asked for responses, and we ended up getting a 26 21

percent response rate, which was just a little bit more than 22

we needed to meet our statistical needs so this survey would 23

have the validity we needed. So that worked well. 24

(Slide) 25

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Survey question design, kind of the same thing. 1

Scott said, hey, you need to go out. We met with groups. We 2

discussed them. We revised them. We had some test groups 3

where we went out and tested the questions to make sure they 4

were working. 5

We incorporated those changes, and we ended up with 6

basically 11 questions for our survey. 7

(Slide) 8

So what I am going to do is go through the questions 9

really quickly, get the responses. And then at the end there 10

is a nice summary that really kind of tells what the value of 11

this is from a management perspective because for my group 12

and our agency’s purposes, we are managers. And so we want 13

this information to help us direct what we do in the future 14

and what regulations and what the public wants from the 15

resource. 16

So the first question, first we had to see what kind 17

of trout fishing the anglers that we contacted do. And it 18

ended up being 61 percent of the anglers fish for both wild 19

and stock trout. So they fish for put-and-take trout and they 20

fish for wild trout. 21

Thirty percent of the anglers only fish for put and 22

take. They didn’t fool with wild trout at all. And eight 23

percent fish strictly for wild trout. They didn’t fish any 24

kind of stock trout. They were purely wild trout. 25

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So basically 70 percent either fish for wild and/or 1

stock trout. 2

(Slide) 3

As a manager -- I have been doing this for 30 years 4

in another month -- that was a pretty high number. That 5

surprised me. There are groups, there are camps of anglers 6

out there that believe in their method or their style, or they 7

only want wild trout or they only want put-and-take. It was 8

eye-opening to see how many fish for both. That says they 9

have a lot of use for the resource. 10

(Slide) 11

Another question we asked was what type of method do 12

they use because there are camps. There are worm dunkers 13

versus fly fishermen. That is kind of the colloquial way of 14

putting it but it is also the reality of it. 15

We were surprised again. Once we combined some of 16

the numbers, because these things were all over the place, 17

basically what we found was that our anglers in Maryland are 18

generalists. They fish for trout with bait, they fish for 19

trout fly fishing. Some are exclusive but most are a mix. 20

Most use more than one method. 21

And again that was kind of an eye-opener because the 22

individual groups can be pretty loud when they want something 23

their way but overall there are a whole lot of different 24

methods being used and a lot of people are using those 25

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methods. 1

(Slide) 2

So we got into the questions on the upper Savage, 3

and again that was the focus of the survey. The question we 4

asked was, you know, have you fished in the upper Savage River 5

since we put those new regulations in effect? 6

And the answer was basically 14 percent of our 7

anglers who trout fish said they had fished from the Savage 8

River. You might initially go, well, that is not very much. 9

But you have got to realize that is in Garrett County and this 10

is a statewide survey. 11

This is anglers from all over the state answering 12

this question, and 14 percent of these people travel all the 13

way out to the Savage to fish. That is a long way to go. 14

That is a couple hundred miles. So what it really tells me as 15

a manager is that a lot of people are using this small 16

resource way out in the middle of nowhere and isolated. So 17

that again, another eye-opener. 18

(Slide) 19

Then we asked them, you know, what did they think 20

about the Savage fishing since we put that regulation in 21

effect? And overall, 78 percent basically said it had 22

improved. So they were pleased with the fact that 23

regulation -- they thought fishing had improved. 24

We don’t have creel survey data to go along with 25

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that but at least that is their opinion. And again this is 1

the social aspect of the fisheries work we were doing. 2

(Slide) 3

Another question about the Savage we wanted to get 4

an answer on was, you know, we put the regulations in. Did 5

the people -- not only, you know, they thought the fishing had 6

improved but did they approve of the regulations? We had had 7

some public meetings, and we had asked at those public 8

meetings but all we were getting an answer from was the people 9

who attended the meeting, and typically those are people who 10

either support it or are strongly against it. 11

And so this was important question for us, and what 12

we wound was 93 percent basically, 92 1/2 percent of the 13

anglers out there statewide, thought this was a great 14

regulation. They were very pleased with what we had done with 15

that. 16

(Slide) 17

Now we also have -- this is a special regulation in 18

the upper Savage River. We stock harvest up there, restricted 19

the methods that we use. We also have a statewide regulation 20

that a lot of our wild trout streams fall under and a lot of 21

our brook trout streams scattered around the state fall under. 22

That is open year round. No minimum size. You can keep two 23

fish per day. 24

So that is kind of our standard fall-back regulation 25

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for wild trout. And we asked the anglers if they thought that 1

regulation was okay. And, you know, their options were it was 2

okay or it wasn’t restrictive enough or too restrictive. 3

And what we found with this was that over half felt 4

that the regulation was fine. Another 36.8 percent felt that 5

it was actually not restrictive enough, and only 7 1/2 percent 6

thought the regulation was too restrictive. 7

So in general, almost 92 percent of the anglers 8

either thought the statewide reg was good that we had or could 9

even be more restrictive. And again, this is for waters 10

outside the Savage. 11

(Slide) 12

So that kind of led into a question for statewide 13

regulations that focused on the brook trout. We asked them, 14

should we enact some regulations statewide that would be more 15

conservative? You know, trying to focus on conservation of 16

this brook trout resource. And it ends up being that 85 1/2 17

percent felt that, yes, that is a good idea. 18

So we are finding we have a strong conservation 19

ethic among our wild trout anglers, especially if they are 20

brook trout anglers. 21

(Slide) 22

And along with that, we asked them, you know, what 23

would they like? You know, as an angler, what kind of 24

regulations would you like to see? If we are going to do 25

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something, how would you like us to implement this? 1

Interestingly, the top two choices by far were catch and 2

release only, which is what we did in the Savage, and tackle 3

restrictions, which is what we also did in the Savage. 4

So the anglers like this, those kind of regulations. 5

They like to see, if we are going to do a conservation 6

regulation, that is how they would prefer for it to be done. 7

(Slide) 8

And also we wanted to get a feel for, you know, what 9

makes brook trout angling so valuable to these anglers? If 10

you are familiar with brook trout at all, they are typically 11

up in the headwaters. They are in forested lands. A lot of 12

aesthetics. A lot of neat stuff. 13

So that was one of the things we asked. One of the 14

options we gave them, they could pick from one to ten, to put 15

a score on it, and then we took an average of that. 16

So it ends ups being natural surroundings. People 17

like to fish for brook trout because of where they are at. 18

You know, you are back in nature. It is quiet. It is away 19

from other people. You don’t typically have brook trout if 20

there are people around. 21

So you can see less crowded, a unique resource, the 22

conservation of the resource appealed to the anglers. And the 23

least important value that people chose was harvest. So we 24

were pretty much right on track with the regulation we had 25

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done in the Savage. We were finding that the people kind of 1

preferred, our anglers preferred what we were doing. So that 2

was good to see that. 3

(Slide) 4

Now there are places in the state -- we have a 5

policy, we typically don’t stock hatchery trout on top of wild 6

trout. There could be competitive effects. You could also 7

increase the pressure on the wild trout. 8

But it still happens at some places in the state, 9

places that we have been stocking for hundreds of years. It 10

would be difficult to change that strategy but we wanted to 11

see what the anglers thought of that. 12

So we asked them if we do have wild trout in the 13

system, should we stop stocking trout if we are doing that? 14

And a slight majority said, yes, we should do that. But a 15

strong contingent also said, no. They didn’t want us to fool 16

with changing a fisheries resource even though there could be 17

harm being done to the wild trout population. So that was 18

kind of interesting. 19

(Slide) 20

And of course for brook trout, it was much stronger 21

though. If it was a wild trout resource, in general wild 22

trout, rainbows, they kind of felt, you know, we should stop 23

there. But brook trout specifically, they really felt that 24

get the stock trout out of any wild brook trout streams we 25

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have. So again more support for brook trout in general. 1

Really eye-opening on how strong the support for protecting, 2

conserving brook trout was. 3

(Slide) 4

So a quick summary of this. Seventy percent fish 5

for stock in wild -- vast majority, this includes the 30 6

percent that fish only for put-and-take. We included this 7

because as you will see down in another bullet, there is a 8

value to having stock trout out there also for wild trout 9

also. 10

But overall in general, the anglers are generalists. 11

Their method is -- they like lots of different methods. Not 12

one restrictive to where they won’t fish any other way. They 13

use -- if they can catch fish, they are going to use it. 14

Also the species -- they want to catch fish. 15

We found overall the upper Savage River regulation 16

was strongly supported both from the quality of the resource 17

and, you know, the concept to protect that resource. We also 18

found that not only worked for the Savage but statewide. Our 19

anglers really support the fact that they want to protect our 20

brook trout. Very strongly supported catch and release and 21

tackle restrictions for doing so. 22

The majority supported not stocking hatchery trout 23

on wild trout but not a strong majority. That is a question I 24

think we need to further explore. We are fortunate we don’t 25

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have a lot of places where that occurs but it is happening, 1

and it is a conservation question in general not just a 2

resource question. 3

If we are doing some, having some impact on the wild 4

trout, we really have to explore that issue. Again, harvest 5

was the least important aspect of the value of brook trout. 6

People don’t fish for brook trout in general because they want 7

to harvest a bunch of brook trout and go home and show their 8

stringer off, which you might do with put-and-take trout, 9

which is fine. 10

But it just kind of emphasizes the fact that it is 11

nonconsumptive resource. Wild trout in general are a 12

nonconsumptive resource. People don’t fish for wild trout, 13

brook trout mainly to fill a stringer. It is a lot of the 14

other aspects of why they are out there. 15

And this goes back to where it is important to note 16

that so many people fish, 91 percent, for wild trout and stock 17

trout is that in a wild trout fishery, having hatchery trout 18

in other streams to pull some of the pressure off those wild 19

trout has a lot of value. 20

Wild trout are more susceptible to harvest and, you 21

know, effects on the population. The hatchery trout are put 22

out there to be harvested. We want them caught. We are 23

raising them to be harvested. 24

It is an opportunity, having our hatchery trout out 25

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there, to protect our wild trout at the same time just to pull 1

some of the pressure off. Like we saw, 50 percent of these 2

guys, they are fishing for wild and stock trout. 3

MR. NEELY: You have got about two minutes for 4

questions. I want to make sure you -- 5

MR. HEFT: Perfect. One more slide and we are good. 6

So that is kind of the management implications of the work we 7

did with this survey. Answered the questions we were looking 8

for, answers to, so it came out well. 9

(Slide) 10

And the last thing was, the other thing we had 11

talked to Secretary Belton about was having a youth fishing 12

event, trying to teach local youth especially because where 13

this happened in Garrett County, is where we got most of the 14

kickback. We wanted to give them an opportunity to learn how 15

to fish for brook trout not using bait. 16

So we have been sponsoring the last two years, and 17

these will be online, these presentations, so people can see 18

more of the specifics. We have been sponsoring this event 19

where we bring local youth in. We give them rods and reels, 20

tackle, and we teach them how to fish for brook trout using, 21

you know, artificial bait rather than live bait, and it has 22

been a huge success. 23

It is a challenge because we are doing all this with 24

donations mostly. Money from local businesses and all that 25

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but it has been incredibly well received. 1

MR. NEELY: Thank you, Alan. I know there are going 2

to be questions. Commissioner Jim? 3

Questions and Answers 4

MR. GRACIE: I have two questions. First of all, 5

will we get a copy of this in that? 6

MR. HEFT: Yes, Susan will -- 7

MR. GRACIE: You threw a lot at us. 8

MR. HEFT: Yes. There was just not enough time -- 9

MR. GRACIE: And the last few slides where you 10

talked about the preference for not stocking the wild trout 11

populations, the two sides seem to be in conflict. You have 12

got a small majority that favor not stocking, and then when 13

you named the species, you had much higher percentages for 14

every single one than you had for the total. 15

MR. HEFT: Those were for the people who wanted to 16

stop stocking. And that is spelled out in the report more. 17

It was hard to get to it. So basically for the people who 18

wanted to stop stocking on top of wild trout, brook trout were 19

the strongest support. 20

MR. GRACIE: Where did we get all that concern for 21

wild rainbow populations? 22

MR. HEFT: That is a good question? We have about 23

three of them. We even had some -- it was interesting. We 24

had some information in the survey, I think you had seen it 25

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when we did the thing trying to explain to people. And they 1

still didn’t seem to understand it. 2

MR. NEELY: Ray Morgan is a geneticist and I am 3

curious about the upper Savage specifically, about stocking 4

rainbow hatchery trout over wild trout. If you have any 5

thoughts about that. 6

DR. MORGAN: Well, I have always been pro-habitat, 7

anti-stocking. I think a lot of people realize that. Rainbow 8

stocking over brook trout probably would be okay but there 9

would be the potential for competition of the rainbow trout 10

with the young brook trout, which I would not want to see 11

because the rainbow trout --