Hunting And Fishing

By December, the sale of fishing and hunting licenses at 400 sport shops will be handled through a computer system called COINS (Customer Oriented Information Network).The Board of Public Works recently approved $2.7 million over the next five years to purchase the system, which is expected to eliminate paperwork now required for each and some 900,000 license and boat registrations issued each year.COINS will produce wallet-sized, waterproof licenses, up-to-date changes in hunting and fishing opportunities and allow the Department of Natural Resources to more closely follow hunting and fishing trends statewide.

POLICE LOG* Ellicott City: 5000 block of Centennial Lane: Someone broke a window to a Centennial Park maintenance building Friday or Saturday and stole a safe containing cash and hunting and fishing licenses, police said.

Too often, perhaps, hunters and fishermen are seen in the wrong light by ultra-conservationists and wildlife preservationists, who view the killing of game or the catching of fish as dubious activities at best.But those among us who neither hunt nor fish but enjoy nonconsumptive pastimes out of doors such as wildlife photography, wilderness hikes or watching a trout feed in a cold mountain stream should understand there are sides to hunting and fishing that should be noted and appreciated.

The two-week firearms season for deer in Maryland is when hunting in the state is most apparent to anyone who ventures even a short distance from the state's urban areas.It also represents the time of year when a hunter, coming home from forest or field, is most likely to be questioned by a nonhunter on the need to hunt, or on what purpose is served by killing a deer.The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, aware that hunting has come under increasing fire from nonhunters, commissioned C three-year study to determine the degree of acceptability of hunting across the United States, and to identify the concerns of the nonhunting public.

The fall striped bass (rockfish) season got off to a spotty beginning this past week, but look for that to change quickly once the water cools to more fall-like temperatures.The best rockfishing of the week probably took place in the area of Pool's Island, above the bay bridges, according to reports coming from local anglers.Another reasonably good spot was the lower bay, in the area of Point Lookout. Captains Eddie and Stevie Davis took limits three of the first four days of the season."But, you had to chum," Eddie Davis said, "for some reason trolling was a waste of time, we discovered."

Last week Dick Broden and I launched his boat at Sandy Point for a few hours of carefree fish finding.Fishing from one end of the Chesapeake to the other is as good as I have seen it in some years.For example, while fishing with Captain Eddie Davis recently in the area known as the Middle Grounds, we filled the fish box with speckled trout weighing 3 to 6 pounds, hardhead averaging 3 pounds, jumbo spot, tasty blowfish and schools of breaking snapper blues.The bottom fishing minutes out of Annapolis, Chesapeake Beach and points north, south and east is simply fabulous.

Cabin fever raged in Maryland yesterday -- and not just the kind you get from being cooped up at home by snow and ice.Call it hunting cabin fever. And cabin cruiser fever.The diseases ran their course at the Baltimore Convention Center where crowds took in the Chesapeake Bay Boat Show, and at the Maryland State Fairgrounds in Timonium where the Mid-Atlantic Hunting and Fishing Show had the outdoors set eager for action.Of course, they were indoors.Outdoors, temperatures were hovering in the low 30s and snow flurries were beginning -- not so bad by the standards of the deep freeze earlier this month.

PRESIDENT CLINTON, whose "top five" pastimes are, officially, golf, running, the card game hearts, reading and bowling, went duck hunting last week.Why? To make the point that you can be pro-hunting and pro-gun control both. It was a staged event, a "photo op," a perfect example of how presidents can send a message to the public by clever activity.What interested me about the president's activities that day was not the hunting message but the eating message. Here is what he had to eat at breakfast at the Eastern Shore farm where he hunted: "Eggs, scrapple, bacon and ham."

Did you know that the best deer taken by an Anne Arundel resident this year is the 200-pound, 31-point giant nailed by Whitey Matthews in Queen Anne's County?Other good whitetails taken over the last couple of weeks include bucks carried home to Glen Burnie by Gary Johnson and Rich Landon.Johnson's was 178 pounds and carried 12 points, and Landon's trophy hit the scales at 176 pounds and wore a wide 11-point rack. Both deer came out of Anne Arundel County.Ben Crawford, 14, of Crofton carried home a 166-pound, eight-pointer taken in Frederick County during his first deer hunt.

SHOWSThrough next Sunday: Chesapeake Changes, a natural history exhibit that focuses on the geology, geography, wildlife and human settlement in the 64,000-square-mile watershed of the bay, at Explorers Hall of the National Geographic Society, 17 and M streets NW, Washington.Saturday and next Sunday: 28th Annual Governor's Invitational Firelock Match at Fort Frederick State Park in Washington County. Team and individual competition with musket, pistol, drilling, artillery and tomahawk. Period cooking and dress.

I'll never forget the big old buck with a hairy eyeball that used to stare down at me from above the mantel at my great-uncle Walter's fishing and hunting cabin. Or the eggs fried in 30-weight oil and coffee from the Mister Mud Machine that jump-started every morning. Or the copperhead snakes that used to hide in the outhouse or under the rickety dock that hung out over the Susquehanna River. Good thing the bats kept them from getting too comfortable. Memories. I have them. You have them.

Yesterday, I got a big bang out of being at the Associated Gun Clubs of Baltimore campus just outside downtown Marriottsville. So did lots of others, from Boy Scouts to office workers. Ellen Radliff, a Frederick resident who works at a mortgage company, experienced the powerful kick of a 50-caliber rifle and the fun of hanging out with her father, Gene. "I'm enjoying it," she said, after handling several of the guns. "I'm hoping this will become a regular thing for my father and I to do."

RED STATES? Blue states? How about camo? Mainstream media latched onto the "sportsmen's vote" for a nanosecond this fall. But the urban warriors quickly dashed any illusion of a serious discussion by getting lost in the superficial underbrush: Was Kerry wearing the right clothes for hunting? Were they borrowed clothes? Do hunters crawl on their bellies to stalk deer? Who's the better shot, Bush or Kerry? Ugh. Luckily, big-city political reporters have the attention span of the average house cat, so no actual harm was done in their drive-by journalism.

By December, the sale of fishing and hunting licenses at 400 sport shops will be handled through a computer system called COINS (Customer Oriented Information Network).The Board of Public Works recently approved $2.7 million over the next five years to purchase the system, which is expected to eliminate paperwork now required for each and some 900,000 license and boat registrations issued each year.COINS will produce wallet-sized, waterproof licenses, up-to-date changes in hunting and fishing opportunities and allow the Department of Natural Resources to more closely follow hunting and fishing trends statewide.

The two-week firearms season for deer in Maryland is when hunting in the state is most apparent to anyone who ventures even a short distance from the state's urban areas.It also represents the time of year when a hunter, coming home from forest or field, is most likely to be questioned by a nonhunter on the need to hunt, or on what purpose is served by killing a deer.The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, aware that hunting has come under increasing fire from nonhunters, commissioned C three-year study to determine the degree of acceptability of hunting across the United States, and to identify the concerns of the nonhunting public.

Too often, perhaps, hunters and fishermen are seen in the wrong light by ultra-conservationists and wildlife preservationists, who view the killing of game or the catching of fish as dubious activities at best.But those among us who neither hunt nor fish but enjoy nonconsumptive pastimes out of doors such as wildlife photography, wilderness hikes or watching a trout feed in a cold mountain stream should understand there are sides to hunting and fishing that should be noted and appreciated.

POLICE LOG* Ellicott City: 5000 block of Centennial Lane: Someone broke a window to a Centennial Park maintenance building Friday or Saturday and stole a safe containing cash and hunting and fishing licenses, police said.

The fall striped bass (rockfish) season got off to a spotty beginning this past week, but look for that to change quickly once the water cools to more fall-like temperatures.The best rockfishing of the week probably took place in the area of Pool's Island, above the bay bridges, according to reports coming from local anglers.Another reasonably good spot was the lower bay, in the area of Point Lookout. Captains Eddie and Stevie Davis took limits three of the first four days of the season."But, you had to chum," Eddie Davis said, "for some reason trolling was a waste of time, we discovered."

Last week Dick Broden and I launched his boat at Sandy Point for a few hours of carefree fish finding.Fishing from one end of the Chesapeake to the other is as good as I have seen it in some years.For example, while fishing with Captain Eddie Davis recently in the area known as the Middle Grounds, we filled the fish box with speckled trout weighing 3 to 6 pounds, hardhead averaging 3 pounds, jumbo spot, tasty blowfish and schools of breaking snapper blues.The bottom fishing minutes out of Annapolis, Chesapeake Beach and points north, south and east is simply fabulous.

Cabin fever raged in Maryland yesterday -- and not just the kind you get from being cooped up at home by snow and ice.Call it hunting cabin fever. And cabin cruiser fever.The diseases ran their course at the Baltimore Convention Center where crowds took in the Chesapeake Bay Boat Show, and at the Maryland State Fairgrounds in Timonium where the Mid-Atlantic Hunting and Fishing Show had the outdoors set eager for action.Of course, they were indoors.Outdoors, temperatures were hovering in the low 30s and snow flurries were beginning -- not so bad by the standards of the deep freeze earlier this month.