Senior Consolidated Fishing License

[Guest]

If, in the end, I pursue my current intentions, the local fishing use will end up being the most expensive part of the project. I’ll need a Maryland non-tidal fishing license ($20.50) and might as well drop the coin on a Bay and Tidal license ($15)

Wrong again McCrea. I went on-line and discovered that being old(er) finally paid off. To wit:

“Resident Senior Consolidated License (available to MD residents only) allows a Maryland resident who is 65 years of age or older, or will become 65 years of age in the current calendar year, to fish in the fresh waters of Maryland (including trout) and in Maryland's tidal waters of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries, Atlantic coast and coastal bays 365 days from the date of purchase. Resident $5.00”

I turn sixty five this calendar year. Five bucks? I’m in like Flynn and have already bought, printed out and laminated my senior “everything” license to tuck in my PFD pocket. FIVE BUCKS! HELL YEA!

I need to put some new line on the reels (the existing monofilament is 30+ years old). And buy a couple of the lures here recommended for fishing the Conowingo Pool.

https://news.maryland.gov/dnr/2017/09/22/fishing-at-conowingo-reservoir/

So, smallmouth prefer hopping weighted, soft plastic baits along the bottom, or casting and retrieving diving crankbaits, large mouth go for weedless surface lures, and the dang invasive flat head catfish like live wiggly bottom bait.

Doesn’t sound like the Tony Accetta spoons of my youth are the thing anymore. I still have some Accetta spoons, and will cast one just for old time’s sake and thinking about fishing with my dad.

It will all be catch and release, except the flat heads, which will be catch and kill (.38 to the head?) and. . . . .discard the carcass how?

But...but...but I really want to see a picture of you fishing out of it!

Head this way with your camera, I’m gonna give it shot.

I still have a few questions for when I inevitably encounter the Pennsylvania DNR. Can I sit on a sandy beach in a comfy chair, read a book and cast, or better, inattentively bottom fish or, as a Maryland resident, do I need to remain afloat in a boat?

It’s a dang comfy canoe. How much of the boat needs to actually be in the water?

 

[snapper]

I'll be 68 this weekend and still have a couple of years to wait here in NYS before I see a reduced rate on my license. Good luck to you and enjoy the fishing.

That's all for now. Take care and until next time...be well.

snapper

 

[lowangle al]

I have a lifetime fishing, hunting and trapping license for Alaska since I turned 60. Too bad it isn't good for every state like a drivers license.

 

[lowangle al]

I have a lifetime fishing, hunting and trapping license for Alaska since I turned 60. Too bad it isn't good for every state like a drivers license.

 

[PeteStaehling]

Here in Florida once age 65 you just have to show your resident drivers license.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

This topic reminds me of my important reason for renewing my fishing license. Now, I have detested fishing since I was 10 years old, having been dragged every day of every summer since age five by my grandfather onto that lake in Maine that had no fish.

But I do like my knives and machetes.

But Big Brother in the People's Republic of Nutmeg says you can go to jail for three years if you carry, on your person or in your vehicle, a knife with a blade over four inches long. Orwellian but true.

UNLESS . . . .

. . . . you have a (hunting or) FISHING LICENSE. And fishing licenses are free if you are over 65. So, I just renewed my fishing license for 2021 online, so I can carry this . . .



and these . . .




Thank you, Mike McCrea, for literally fishing me out of future jail.

 

[PeteStaehling]

This topic reminds me of my important reason for renewing my fishing license. Now, I have detested fishing since I was 10 years old, having been dragged every day of every summer since age five by my grandfather onto that lake in Maine that had no fish.

But I do like my knives and machetes.

But Big Brother in the People's Republic of Nutmeg says you can go to jail for three years if you carry, on your person or in your vehicle, a knife with a blade over four inches long. Orwellian but true.

UNLESS . . . .

. . . . you have a (hunting or) FISHING LICENSE. And fishing licenses are free if you are over 65. So, I just renewed my fishing license for 2021 online, so I can carry this . . .

What a bizarre law and work around.

Florida is pretty non-restrictive about knives. I will have to remember to be careful when I travel since I am in the habit of open carrying a knife and don't give it a thought. I guess I could be arrested in some states. You can open carry pretty much any non ballistic blade and concealed carry pretty much any non ballistic blade under 4". Since I have the easy to obtain concealed carry firearms permit which also covers other weapons I can also concealed carry knives over 4". I really never gave it much thought that it might be an issue in the US to carry a regular folding knife of reasonable size. I knew that a switchblade might be a problem in many states.

 

[Guest]

What a bizarre law and work around.

There are other rights and privileges that come with having a valid hunting or fishing license.

Backpacking in the Rockies we always bought a temporary Out of State fishing license so we could supplement our carried foodstuffs with trout. One of the privileges, at least in Wyoming, and IIRC in Colorado and Montana, was that possessing a valid hunting or fishing license meant that we were covered for any search & rescue costs. Never needed it, but was glad to have it as a benefit tacked on the fishing license.

It makes me wonder what other peculiarities are afforded with a valid State hunting or fishing license in different States.

I am in the habit of open carrying a knife and don't give it a thought. I guess I could be arrested in some states. You can open carry pretty much any non ballistic blade and concealed carry pretty much any non ballistic blade under 4".

Local or city ordinances may vary. I was arrested in 1978 in New Orleans for carrying a (not very large) folding knife on my belt. Paddy wagon, lock up, court the next day. The judge asked me to describe the knife. I replied “Well your honor, it had peanut butter on the blade”.

He laughed and dismissed the charges.

 

[Guest]

Being all catch-and-release I may prefer the activity of catch-and-kill targeting invasive species, and may set up at least one rod for that purpose; 3 attended rods per fisherman allowed in PA, two will be plenty. I don’t need to rip bass lips, or tear out fish guts if hook swallowed.

“Recently, invasive flathead catfish have become established in the lower Susquehanna River and have moved downstream into the Conowingo Reservoir. Native to the Mississippi River, flathead catfish are large, fast-growing predators, which are considered invasive here due to their predatory habits. Anglers have reported catching some individuals exceeding 40 pounds. At that size, no fish is off the menu. The population continues to increase, and it is unclear what long-term effects they will have on the rest of the aquatic ecosystem. The department’s Fishing and Boating Services requests that anglers harvest, rather than release, any flatheads they catch in order to help control their numbers.”

I’m not sure about the “harvest” part, or what to do with them after the “kill” part.

In the shallow maze of rock pools above Wildcat Island there are massive carp, large enough that people fish (hunt?) them with bow and arrow. I bet they would be fun catch and release on light tackle.

I gotta admit, lazy me is smitten with the idea of sitting in a comfy chair and reading a book, with some bottom bait and bobber cast out for invasive flathead catfish.

Quite honestly, when fishing high alpine lakes for trout, that was essentially my methodology; a grasshopper, or even a dry fly, cast out on an adjust-a-bubble bobber and ignored. Sit on a sunny rock, read a book and, look up and say “Well dang, there be dinner”.

Sometimes casting and retrieving was less productive, or at least less enjoyable - cast and reel and repeat and repeat - than just chucking some fly or bait out into the lake.

Best Wind River trout fishing memory ever, and we ate a lot of Wyoming trout over the years. I was backpacked in with my not-yet wife and camped on a high saddle beside a small lake that proved to have zero fish.

We day hiked down to a lower lake, less likely to have iced-out, to try our luck, intending to hat-slap grasshoppers in the meadow as bait, a la Hemmingway’s Nick Adams. Nothing worked as well as an enfeebled grasshopper on a hook. Nick didn’t have the advantage of a zip-lock baggie for grasshopper storage, and we didn’t have a Coke bottle in any case.

(I think those tales, Big Two Hearted River, and The Last Good Country, are the best of Hemmingway’s Nick Adams short stories).

There were no grasshoppers.

There were bees, flying between clusters of meadow flowers. Caught in a baggie along with the flower, semi-crushed so as not to sting when put on a hook, we could barely cast out a bee before a trout rose to glumph it down. Caught our limit in short order.

That was good, but the best part was that a group of fly fishermen, who had likewise backpacked in, were on the other side of the lake, tres elegante wafting line, getting not so much as a strike or nibble. We were in their plain sight 100 yards away, pulling in trout as soon as a bee hit the water. They eventually gave up and returned to their camp.

Our trail back up to the saddle just happened to take us directly past their camp. It really did; they were camped way too close to the trail. As we passed I called out “How’d y’all do today?” and received a chorus of “Too windy” and “Nothing’s biting”

What else could I do but hold up our stringer of trout?