Quote:
Originally Posted by Fish Nut
Honestly, I love the ease of the boating sticker. The easiest way to achieve compliance with the feds and use the Maryland licensing as a data collection system would be to eliminate the boat sticker. This would require all fishermen buy a saltwater license and submit there info. Unfortunately, I think this would also require land owners to purchase a license for fishing off of there private pier.
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That's the way I see it going, too. The MD boat sticker would have to go away and you, your wife, your kids (over 16), brothers, cousins, friends, whoever you take out on your boat would have to buy their own individual MD Saltwater fishing license. The Boat Sticker was the best idea MD has come up with for ease of use in many years.
I think NOAA would get better information if just the boat (captain/owner) was registered and was responsible for reporting all fishing activity on his boat.
I can just imagine the answers NOAA would get on a phone survey if they called some of the guests on my boat - - - Where did you go fishing?
"We were out in the bay somewhere near a lighthouse!" Did you catch any fish?
"Sure did - a whole bunch of silver ones" How many did you keep?
"We kept a few in a water bucket , then put them back in the bay later on a different hook". I meant, how many did you take home and what size were they?
"Oh, I took home 4. Don't know how big they were, but they felt like about 20 pounds the way they pulled on the line!!" (Translation - he was fishing near Thomas Point, caught a dozen spot, tried livelining with no success, then caught 4 14" Croaker and took them home.)