[Maryland Marine Notes masthead] Volume 12, Numbers 1  •
February-March 1994 Table of Contents    Blue Crab in Winter
Battle over Blue Crabs: Capping the Last Great Fishery  Changes
in Regulations: Recent and Proposed  Managing Striped Bass  Also
visit: Bay Commission Asks: Are Blue Crab Stocks Stressed?
(Marine Notes Summer 1995)   The Blue Crab in Winter  By Michael
W. Fincham  Perhaps the only man legally fishing in Maryland's
icy waters for blue crabs early this winter was Tom Maurer. A
research assistant with the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory, he
began his crabbing in mid-December this year, usually meeting up
with Lonnie Moore at his workboat on calm mornings and traveling
with him out to the mid-Bay mainstem or up some of its major
tributaries. Moore is a watermen used to making a living
catching blue crabs, but he knows he won't see any of this
winter catch ever make it to market.  [blue crab]  For this kind
of crabbing, they aren't carrying crab pots or trot lines or
long-handled nets-the tools o