Catch Fish

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. -- Catching fish in Virginia waters has gotten a bit more challenging: You can't shoot them anymore.The Virginia Marine Resources Commission voted yesterday to outlaw immediately the use of guns to kill fish, to keep fishermen from accidentally shooting other boaters.Spears, spear guns, and bows and arrows can stay in the fishermen's arsenal, the commission decided.Shooting fish gained popularity this year largely because of the comeback of the cobia, said Erik J. Barth, the commission's deputy chief of fisheries management.

Fifty-one striped bass are sporting the latest in outdoor apparel as they swim the waters of the Chesapeake Bay: thin, green plastic tags announcing that they are the money fish in the state's annual fishing contest, which begins at 5 a.m. today. One of the fish, nicknamed Diamond Jim, is worth $10,000. The 50 others are worth $500 each. "The Maryland Fishing Challenge" is in its fifth year, with Diamond Jim just one component of the event. Anglers also are encouraged to enter their catches of citation-size fish in more than 60 species - freshwater, tidal and saltwater - for a chance to win a boat, motor and trailer, a guided fishing trip or prizes worth $7,000.

There's nothing more exciting than watching a youngster catch his or her first fish. It's often a memorable event that both you and the child will cherish for years to come.Unfortunately, there are circumstances that can make that first fishing trip a disaster.Here are a few steps you can take to insure your youngster's first fishing adventure is one they'll always treasure.There are three basic steps to keep youngsters happy on their first fishing excursion -- have fun, keep it simple and catch some fish.

Until last weekend, Jada Fulton had never caught a fish. The 9-year-old from North East was more interested in her soccer team, Cecil Fire, than what swam in the water not far from her home. On her first cast, she didn't catch a fish. She caught two. And then she caught two more. By the time she reeled in her line for the last time an hour later, Jada had landed nine yellow perch. Her soccer teammate, Rose Benjamin, caught six. Jada was hooked. "Better than a soccer win?" someone asked.

With striped bass (rockfish) season well under way, it didn't take long for the Maryland Natural Resources Police to find a few lawbreakers.Five fishermen were cited during a weekend of surveillance at Conowingo Dam on the Susquehanna River. NRP officers charged three anglers with allegedly taking more than the one-fish daily limit and two with operating without proper navigation lights.Police said John Thomas Stonesifer, 28, of Aberdeen was found with four rockfish in his possession, three over the legal one-fish daily limit.

Almost everything an angler needs to know about the three bodies of water owned by Baltimore City in Baltimore County can be found in the annual guide published by the city's Department of Public Works. The 2008 Pocket Guide to Boating & Fishing is a 34-page guide filled with helpful maps and charts to tell you what kinds of fish are hanging out at Loch Raven, Liberty and Prettyboy reservoirs and cool facts about the fishing holes. The booklet won't catch fish, but it will get you pointed in the right direction and help avoid trouble with the watershed police.

I received a call from a reader Wednesday who said he usually launched his boat at Sandy Point State Park but lately hadn't had much success trolling for bluefish or bottom-fishing for white perch at Belvidere Shoals.He hinted that he could use some information on where to go and how to catch some fish.How do you learn to catch fish in the Chesapeake Bay? There is aneasy answer, but unfortunately, it is costly.Fishing in the Chesapeake has become terribly technical. The old saying about 10 percentof the water holding 90 percent of the fish is more than true.

ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Hydrilla, originally feared as the scourge of the Potomac, hasn't lived up to its ugly reputation. Let the sailboaters and pleasure cruisers gripe, but bass chasers are finding this exotic growth a boon for largemouths.There's a half-mile-long patch of the matted vegetation just below the Woodrow Wilson Bridge that is lovingly referred to as "Bass Hotel," and it lives up to its name. It just may be the hottest bass spot in Maryland.Located off Belle Haven Marina where Scott Sewell and I boarded bass outfitter Ken Penrod's bassboat, Bass Hotel is hammered hard daily, but there are always more fish to bust through the thick dark brownish weeds to grab the next bait.

It's the dead of winter, and hundreds of Harford County anglers soonwill be participating in a favored pastime if the weather turns chilly: ice fishing.Instead of casting dry flies to rising Deer Creektrout or plugging for largemouths in the shallow Susquehanna Flats, they'll be enduring brisk weather to catch fish most folks would tossback in midsummer. This dedicated group of individuals looks forwardto January weather.In fact, they're hoping we'll have one of the coldest winters on record.

What are corals and coral reefs?Corals are animals, and their skeletons create reefs. The corals have microscopic, single-celled plants living in their tissues. The plant cells, or algae, give the coral extra nutritious compounds. The algae's energy prompts the coral to secrete a calcium carbonate skeleton. When many living and dead skeletons fuse over time, a coral reef is formed. Reefs are the largest structures made by living organisms.What's wrong with the reefs?Mostly, humans are what's wrong.

Almost everything an angler needs to know about the three bodies of water owned by Baltimore City in Baltimore County can be found in the annual guide published by the city's Department of Public Works. The 2008 Pocket Guide to Boating & Fishing is a 34-page guide filled with helpful maps and charts to tell you what kinds of fish are hanging out at Loch Raven, Liberty and Prettyboy reservoirs and cool facts about the fishing holes. The booklet won't catch fish, but it will get you pointed in the right direction and help avoid trouble with the watershed police.

WASHINGTON -- In a move being cheered by recreational anglers, President Bush will announce today new conservation goals for a popular Chesapeake Bay fish that include stricter limits on commercial hauls of rockfish but greater access for outdoor enthusiasts who enjoy catching the species. The new federal policy - largely advisory in nature - will come through an executive order the president is scheduled to issue during a visit to St. Michaels on the Eastern Shore. After signing the order, Bush plans to go fishing on the Chesapeake, he said in a weekend radio address recorded yesterday.

Stomach clenched and legs wobbly, I climb hesitantly to the launch platform of the Dragon's Flight Zipline, discovering that it's a ledge, really, and not much of one. The metal cable that will carry me half a mile at 50 mph is a slim silver line. And I wonder: What in the world was I thinking? This had seemed like a good idea. I wanted a new experience, and the Dragon's Flight, a new Vitality adventure excursion on Royal Caribbean's stop at Labadee, Haiti, its private beach resort, promised me that.

Richard Kelly, 81, a Florida politician who became the only Republican congressman convicted in the Abscam corruption scandal a quarter century ago, died Aug. 22 at a nursing home in Stevensville, Mont., where he had moved in retirement. Mr. Kelly, a former federal prosecutor and judge, was elected to Congress in 1974 and was re-elected twice from a central Florida district that stretched from Orlando to Clearwater. He lost a bid for re-nomination in 1980 after he and six other members of Congress were caught in the Abscam undercover bribery investigation, in which FBI agents posed as Arab sheiks buying influence.

With the rockfish trophy season upon us, the state Department of Natural Resources wants to lure potential anglers onto the water with a little online bait. The agency that manages more than 17,000 miles of Maryland waterways has recently completed an enhancement of the fishing content on its Web site: www.dnr.maryland.gov. One of the principles behind the reorganization is to encourage more people to fish. "Anyone from an experienced angler to a novice can learn about fishing in Maryland, including how and where to fish," said Gene Deems, the agency's eGov and online services manager.

Out of options and facing stiff fines from the Maryland Department of the Environment, the Carroll County commissioners voted yesterday to spend nearly $2 million on equipment that will slightly lower the temperature of treated discharge from the Hampstead wastewater treatment plant. The county has "followed good science" in trying to address the seasonal temperature increases, which are rarely more than 1 degree, said James E. Slater, the county planning department's deputy director of environment and resource protection.

There is a growing movement toward catch-and-release sport fishing in waters around our country, and in Maryland this year, the Department of Natural Resources and Fishing In Maryland magazine have agreed to work together in an attempt to further conserve selected species.This catch-and-release program will award patches and citations fishermen whose catches equal or surpass established lengths and are released alive after being measured and photographed when possible. If a photograph is not possible, catches, measurements and releases must be witnessed by another person.

Teach a kid to fish. It's a romantic notion, combining Norman Rockwell's "Catching the Big One" and Norman Thayer's "On Golden Pond." The reality is, you'd be better off with a copy of Norman Vincent Peale's "Power of Positive Thinking." Start a kid too early, and you might turn him or her off forever. Overwhelm them with equipment and "helpful" advice, ditto. Yet, somebody must be doing something right. I mean, how else do you explain the propagation of the angler species? Some kids are born to fish, and before too long they've had enough of you holding them back.

WESTERNPORT - On Monday, I floated over a Fortune 500 company's effluent - a brownish-green industrial ooze gushing from underwater vents that looked like they'd been planted in the streambed by fiendish aquatic trolls of Middle Earth. But this was not Tolkien fiction. This was 21st-century pulp reality. And it occurred in broad daylight - as it has for decades, with our government's permission - in the North Branch of the Potomac River, just off the banks of this town. Here, MeadWestvaco, one of the world's largest producers of fancy, polished paper - the kind on which magazines and catalogues are published - "clarifies" and dumps its waste.

ON LAKE WINNIPESAUKEE, N.H. - Hmmm, the shoreline seems farther away. The Ugly Restaurant is gone. And the cold is definitely biting more than the fish. But the bottom line is, it's still the same old neighborhood. Thomas Wolfe be damned. You can go home again. Last weekend, I joined 6,300 of my closest friends to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Great Rotary Ice Fishing Derby, sponsored with civic pride by the cabin-fevered zanies who run the Meredith Rotary Club. Mrs. Paul never saw so many frozen fish sticks.