Outdoors Maryland; 28

Lord. A day on the bay. Swept along by steady breezes Lall by

the creak of the mast. A traditional Maryland pleasure. Enticed by the romance of wooden boats but finding them extremely rare. The thought might occur to you. I could build one. Of. The Chesapeake wooden boats will be glad to introduce you to this time on a raft. These numbers. And and Peter Steinmetz teaches a class in wooden boat building that's offered through Harbor County Community College. Putting the pieces together is not a complicated idea you have to be able to know what the building of the class has only one limitation on boat size. It's got to fit through the workshop door. You learn what it takes to tackle that 30 footer. The key is to start small new classes

form in February with an eye toward getting the boats in the water by summer as one of the instructors. The process of establishing the shape is the same whether a boat small or large. You have to understand the concept of establishing the points in space that define those curves. Once you understand that on a small boat knowing ahead of time that it's a lot more work and it's going to take you a lot longer you can really build a larger boat. Build a 25 foot crab skiff in his backyard literally from scratch. But because as is any boat not skip Jacks or pretty boats and I'd always wanted kind of wanted to build one. The neighbor next door he came in as I was bringing in this big chunk of oak for the Kielce and he saw it when he drove in the driveway and he came running over and said you're going to build us get back to what it was with me even telling him. You're.

These boats were originally designed to pull oyster dredges in the larger sizes that's why they have such a large sail this is a lot of sail for a small boat 25 and a half foot boat with over 400 square feet of sail it. Had a lot of fun with this boat I get a lot of compliments on it. People. Go by and take pictures of it. So I break my arm patting myself on the back when they do that. Tell me how pretty it is. We're. In a race with him that we're measuring the final placement of the ribs on the inside of the boat. So that we don't put a rivet through this side point at the location that the Ribble be so we mark these will be drilling holes for rivets will purposely avoid these marks.

We put it here we have 44 students and we have either under construction or have completed something both. Were preparing to glue the bottom of the boat. We've got blue on the frame itself and now we're putting some on to the piece of plywood that will go on as a bomb and then over top of that we will probably last about. Wooden boats. Enjoying a renaissance and there is a certain the speed and charm associated with wooden boats. There are probably more unfinished boat fiberglass and wood in the world than there are boats that have been completed. Our approach. Is. To do it with camaraderie instead of alone. We

tend to have more perseverance if you have some forward. Oh. We're going to do. Is to laminate the bottom and sides of the skin with fiberglass and toxic. It does two things. One is it gives tremendous abrasion resistance. The boat beached on the bottom and two it gives strength. Right over. Except for. Here. We've got the boats upside down The Mall. The next chance that we have is to do a little ferry. But more to that. This particular boat you must take it all. Right now. They have pretty. Well. There. Right now. In

June the class displays the finished votes and votes in progress at the antique and wooden boat show in Haverty Grace. I started from the beginning. I didn't know a whole lot about woodworking So now I've learned how to use the tools I'm going to build. It's called a Cavendish. That's 14 feet from the wall to three people. The glass allows you as long as you are able to build a boat and build it successfully. And the teachers feel you have the capabilities of it then you can build your own and they wholeheartedly agree that I can go ahead and build my own. So the next time you dream about a boat dream about the boat you're going to be. The reprobate. Through it somehow but it will begin there. It's brutally cold on Winter's bad. For

nearly 200 years the ritual of going on the water. To harvest oysters and earn a living. Has been preserved by Marilyn years. It's a harsh way of life. A legacy of the rugged individualist. Sadly. Perhaps the last of their breed. Is a way of life. You know I've been around here and say this I have a way of life you know not very myself you do it here and make you feel good. But the hand-over go by you in the morning with the globe want to go and fight them alone. And go to war. Because. Of this they bite the bullet and go to work. James gross and his uncle Captain Frank Gross are two generations of a large Waterman's family out of Shadyside Maryland. They have a big tradition in my family law found the norm of.

It's thought I can live with for the down to goo that provide great great grandpa you know I have no I dasn't all I've known all my life and everything on the left all of it all done it all my cousins do it I've got a brother to pay and moved down the older generation if you know your son they'd be warning you of all the stuff we're going to war you know that I Gotta love that you know that I would fail to love all the family. Thought I know this is all my family's ever done. You're a man I'm going to have to put up and down with your friend and want to go to school you know you did where you know it is. I mean basically you have to love the job.

My father never really told you know it was more expansive when I with him and just learning the trade. You know as you went along you know you get on a boat with him in the morning he might say you know just watch the POV of make sure you know exactly which way you go. And there was a light and I may have been a little bit on the boat as well. The spirit of the Chesapeake Bay Waterman is inspiring Folkways lots of optimism a strong family creed independence are the sustenance that drives them through their hazardous work. They are a central part of Maryland's economic and cultural fabric. We first brought all the noise. Tony had. Called it is always the tar like this. Although I hate the part of what we all felt we were younger than we did then about you know like I do that a lot.

So we went through a pattern called after that which is that you automatic rig now you're working and you're more. Efficient through than what we refer. But it's same time we got there we don't have an election. So we just have to work with the guy. Over the years Maryland has had more of its citizens making its living from oystering than any other state. Regulated by the Department of Natural Resources oystering season extends from September to March. In Maryland oystering is a public fishery open to anyone with a license. Fifteen bushels is the maximum daily catch allowed per license and the run is like a business this is not playing around the money down your pocket. You know run it like a business market problem. You know. You just have basic problems of every day small every day a good anywhere from four to five boys. If you're lucky you're lucky that

that's the price. There have been many different types of commercial boats in use on the bay. Their design origins are vague and no fancy plans were used to build them to the watermen they're all work boats platforms from which to harvest the Bay the water everything. Me What I did but this has sentimental value and I probably won't get another apologist rebel just fall right apart. You've been around for probably rebuilt as you probably ran all of it. 1057 an unknown parasite called M.S. X or multi nuclear sphere unknown nearly destroyed all of the oysters in the Delaware Bay. The following year it added the Chesapeake from the south and began to affect the oysters in Virginia. Since then industrial waste and drought summers

have raised the salt and pollution levels of the northern Bay causing the parasite to spread northward into Maryland's waters. It's having a devastating effect on Maryland's oyster industry and the waterman's way of life. Is deteriorating. You know nothing they can do to bring it back like it used to be 25 years ago right here. Anywhere that yourself or you want it you can forget it and there's no sign of anyone thinking that they're ever going to come back like that and I kind of think you know. Speaking out on the issues surrounding oystering is another part of the Gross family tradition a legacy continued from father to son. Now in a war there's a lot of politics and you know just does not go there you know do what you going to do and come back in. Expect to go to work in those days.

You don't have to go to make sure that if you can't go to work and I mean boredom didn't have declined for want of flannel want to count and you have to go you know what you're leaving me leave let a load of you here today the legacy on winter's day is in jeopardy. Turning a profit is difficult. Each year. Fewer and fewer. Are going on the lot of we started and have always thought I don't want to go low. You know we started here one night basically by one of the youngest here right now. I don't know of anyone coming out right now and they would say war. I don't think you I don't think when you're not going to come back bad so all of that. You're. Blue sky beautiful

green fields with water. I get some time off from my labors and. This is just great. I mean this is living. If you can do this. On one else you would want to do in life. Yeah Bill Paul's been bitten by the sailing bug so house wife Carolyn and daughter Rebecca. This is it. This is a. Boating is Bill's hobby competitive boating is his passion for great adventure. Really when we leave the creek in the ring with the sound and off it's going to be a safe trip. You're going to find. That. Most people like them have passion and it is a passion. Just. So hard to stop. Thorough.

Were the days when the final days were. Like. I don't know how and if you get any more out of the boat than we do. On. The boats away from the pier. More than it's here during the since summer season it seems and we race it hard cruises hard and really have gotten my money's worth for the bang for the buck. Now we got it. Now we're husband and wife team that's that's kind of unique in the bay. You won't find too many Husband Wife things like that last. We keep doing it and we really enjoy it together. I taught my daughter had a stillness give me great great joy and and she's taken to it has been a great pleasure to me. So it's you know parents fullfillment to carry something they like to their children and they pick up on it which my daughter has it's a real satisfaction.

They started teaching. And I just. Learned how to do that. Now I do it you know I did it for that. It's just great I mean I love everything about it you know a lot of teenagers are placed or their parents are like this and sailing brings a side together. We're making five point six that's what. We're star going to go off at 6:30. OK. Like you're. It's an ego trip. Grayson being in command being in charge you're in you're in command you know the great sea captain in the world and you're in control you know this and we all pretend to be great sea captains like you know as the start of the race draws near many boats school around the starting line. Bill has no trouble detecting the scent of competition for the moment nothing else including a relaxing cruise seems important. Yeah I get really psyched up when I'm racing right here.

That's actually a real account like a die hard racer and I think our time cruising that would really be relaxed maybe I was at anchor with we go cruising. If you get anywhere near another boat it's an automatic race. Almost any credible really insensitive that here on the maggoty river as elsewhere. Races are staggered so that every five minutes a new classification of boats starts a new race because the exact moment of the start of each race is known to all Cruise beforehand. Each boat tries to cross the starting line at full speed. Without jumping the gun. One side the five minute Danielle innocence. Of this calm excited more heartfelt and competitive with the side. Yeah like to be anchored up a nice glass of wine you seen it would be nice. But not going. There is a favored side of the starting line depending on which way the wind blows. You don't want to stay behind other boats at the start of the race but you also don't want to be beside them if they're stealing the wind. The result

is many boats competing to occupy the single best spot as they cross the starting line 20 seconds. Before they go they are about. 15. 10. 9. 8. 7 0. 0. 0 0 for support and war on the other. One. OK let's go we got it we got it we got it we got. It. Right. OK OK hold it like this in love Barcelona. Gonna get we got we got we got a guy comes and I'm coming. I've turned down job offers. Just to be able to have this lifestyle. Look here is. What. You get on the water in minutes. I just think. You know I've got got a little niche in life when I was younger that anything. Is really pretty hungry that's the. Problem. With some members or something just to keep.

The crickets. They will begin had a really bad. Attack now. They saw green at the start but now we're headed back to what is acutely aware that. As we get up towards hispanic or more when we look shifty and know we're in pretty good shape and that third. Cup a couple willing chefs and maybe attacking one time to many. And we ended up here. In the room Mark. As each boat drowns the mark and sets it spinnaker for another attraction to this feverish pastime manifests itself. That's ready to go. OK.

Can't be. You've got to be kidding. You say going to work. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You said. 35. 50 shoots a year and you know you're going to have two or three as far as you know having your point I guess you're right. Right. You know. I have a Wednesday night crew and together. Maybe seven or eight years. Q Your team from what I remember right hi. Very little communication everybody knows their jobs. Just an occasional little coaxing from me more about the timing perhaps selling with a key on my end and I want

something done with their usually prepared to do it. It's your journey nine seconds a mile for mile race. Thirty six seconds from the time wrong we cross the line and all the time I see the beautiful 30. 36 seconds that we have people. Life and I have a dialogue that that's has been life but it's not a crew talk to me. OK let's do a spinnaker take down drill. Calm down. It's over guys. Good race guys and then we finish the race and we see a win and won't have one have something refreshing and sure by moving the boat and just enjoying enjoy the sunset and kind of close at the bay like that and then we do that once a week in and throughout the summer we had some just excellent

beautiful sunsets we look forward to. For Bill being passionate about sailing encompasses more than his sailboat a cool stiff breeze and the Chesapeake Bay. His vision of sailing includes others with a shared experience. The most meaningful. Need a humble Eastern Shore town a trap a team of state underwater archaeologists staff members of the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum and local

volunteers gather at Dickerson Marina. They know that several months ago while beachcombing for arrowheads Allen sleeper a trap native found what he thought was a dugout canoe an ancient one its bow jutting from the sand. Now scientists hope to rediscover the site and deliver the canoe from the Chesapeake splotches State Archaeologist Bruce Thompson who leads the team and it was founded. Now let's have a break. As you go into the tough time. The reason. We decided to go to this effort. Is because. It is because. The. Site. Has been break within 20 30 years but no one's ever discovered this going over. The trap Creek is one of the top bank robbers money marshy in London extensions with what are fast approaching the race is on to save the canoes fragile remains.

The question of its origins looms large in the mind of Thompson. Was the canoe constructed by African-Americans. Perhaps plantation slaves. Archaeologists had previously discovered slave quarters nearby. Or as some evidence suggests was the dug out abandoned by early adventurers whose visit to the site predates colonial history. Either way the canoe is a one of a kind find for archaeologists. The team's arrival at the site is met with disappointment. Stormy weather and high tides have again buried the canoe with sand. Armed with shovels and an array of excavation gear the digging waiting and guessing began. To work out our measurements. And try to pluck to dig down and see if we can locate it. For more sediment here away with us a bit of. What we want to do as a narrow little trench right across their. House suspecting it set right in here. So that's right because they're

very narrow and be very gentle with yourselves. It was Alan sleeper who discovered that the NO I WAS speech comment on this speech and at that point it was not nearly as car with sand would in the eye wash with the sand it was at low tide and. It caught my eye and looked like something it had been like an artifact. So I. Started. Pulling away the sand. Look at a little bit more and as I did that I realized that in fact it was a end of a dugout canoe. I think. It's.

OK. As Thompson expected the new lies perpendicular to the beach line who must dig in a new direction. What we're going to have to bear is we're going to have to have space on the other side of this thing about like that. We're going to dig now I'm outside of that part. So this is our. Let's make sure our back on tomorrow one day that they don't get in the way when we come out of. What with. The starboard side of that is that. They. Were this side of the notify list

as the crew prepares for excavation. A cradle is set up near the site to support the dugout when and if it's finally moved to a pump removes water from the canoes interior. All right. But the new is visible but not yet free of the sun. Would continue. Thompson protects the dugout from further damage. But here I may have been your problem president. Thompson thinks he's found a hitching post further evidence the dugout is African American. Built and owned by slaves perhaps as early as the 17th century.

Not surprisingly more than a century of exposure to the elements has weakened the dugout. Coming down. From. Like OK people on this earth. Christmas record here you're here.

Thompson and through finally raise the dugout with just minimal damage the remaining portions are taken to the crater. Once the dugout is cushioned the vessel is ready for transport. The water. Rises about under it. Most people have a surprising letter from a slave a canoe during this period that they were going to take off but they failed to remember. That. That was the whole little social cultural network. Some other families were working on other farms so they had a reason to be visiting each other they had no reason to be getting together a sign of them and their mode of transportation was akin to. The dugout now goes to the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum. There it will be preserved so scientists can further study its construction and attempt to pinpoint its age with this ancient dugout be a key to a further understanding of African-American life during

slavery. Thompson and his team hope so believing it may help rediscover the stories of men and women who spent their lives laboring on Maryland's marshes. On the surface it all seems quite simple to the North American to the south Virginia. If you're a crab or look hard to the east or west find another marker and know for sure which side you're on. But beneath the surface it's not that simple. But there lies a tangled mass of regulations resentment. And a history of violence. Forty five minutes by fast boat from Chris Field isolated by the waters of the Jets a peek is Marilyn's only inhabited offshore island.

First settled in the sixteen hundreds the residents of Smith Island have long depended on the surrounding waters for their livelihood. Resenting outside interference the watermen of the island have long followed the seasons in the ever changing dynamics of the bay. The Virginia state line cuts across the Southern Marshes of Smith Island drawing the Maryland Waterman into the centuries old territorial dispute between the two states over the resources of the Chesapeake. The original line is granted to Cecil Calvert in 16 32 has twice been moved once in the time of George Washington and again in the late 1800s when oyster men an oyster police from both states fought over the immense wealth that lay on the bottom of the bay. During the years of the oyster wars. The waters around the line ran red with blood. At the time the uninhabited marshes and shallow waterways of Smith Island were considered

worthless choke to during the summer months with aquatic grasses a poor bottom for oysters to the arbitrator's of the day. It seemed a safe place to position the line. But as the oyster population decline and the crab replaced it as the money from the underwater Meadows became valuable territory. Being the favorite hiding place for the molting blue crab. Disputes along the line erupted again this time over crabs in 1900 a teenage boy from Tyler John was shot in the back by the Virginia police for crabbing below the line. Numbered by the islanders as if it happened yesterday. The incident set fire to. The principal method for catching crabs on Smith Island is scraping. For generations the water men have dragged their scrapes across the grassy bottoms going after the

valuable soft crabs and peelers that hide there. If they pull up some hard grabs or Jimmy's in their scrapes and so much the better for the day's take. The line is such an unnatural boundary that the crabbers can easily turn into law breakers just for pursuing their catch. The remote Waterman's communities always don't like any kind of outside interference and what they do in this case it's rather acute interference with the state line cutting across the lower end of their island. If they want to utilize those waters then they have to get a Virginia license and they basically have to know the laws and requirements of two separate states to work in their local waters they don't really care what state waters they're working in all they're trying to do is crab. Each side has its own agencies of enforcement Marilyn's natural resources police are based in Christy.

Biggest thing with the crab scrapers in Virginia. The crabs Graber are not allowed to keep it a hard grams. They have to throw those back where marijuana grabs Graber can keep those crabs and so on. So consequently all this with owners when they go down or the crabs great bottom try to save their hard crabs and they go back over the lines they can sell. The good. The real thorn in the side of Smith Islanders. Is the Virginia Marine patrol officer out of ten dear Peter Crockett. Journey as he's known by the Waterman has been a fixture on the line for a dozen years. Just. Heard them both. Good bye Stan you have stay right on it. You got her breakers on both sides you got them up here and we. Got them down times your tour. Yeah when I when I first took the job. H met dollars had me in a diamond shape. You know on both sides and

back I mean I think your idea was try to run me I'm that tallish break which we're not jealous break but I didn't back off for. A job like this. You got to treat everybody like when I start taking over. That's when they were practical. It's an early very early August morning in Tyler to the Smith Island town closest to the line. The clubbers check their Peeler floats for those that have shed overnight collecting the soft crabs for shipment later that day. They head out in first light to the shallow waters of Tyler's creek and hogs an egg. Just a few minutes ride through the waterways of the southern island. Here they'll spend the rest of the day scraping for crabs. Flirting with the line.

The boats are equipped with single scrapes and hydraulic rigs to help haul the catch. These rigs are illegal in Virginia. Only a handful of scrapers can be licensed to crab there. As they circle about the creek within sight of their homes. The true source of their resentment becomes apparent. Denny Bradshaw remembers how it was always going to Gotham vs. getting bread for our back door used to be we could go all the way down to Virginia about halfway between here and day and year to grab the JQ place but when they would come they would slow down a little bit. Let us get up toward the burglar to jail on. But now this place is going to look like for dogs. As the morning wears on the boats gradually move north in anticipation of the daily arrival of Virginia police. Wow wow

wow. But today the police come not my boat. But by playing. Wow. There no one was numb. All the boats turned back and forth from all across the line. Wow wow wow wow wow wow. Wow. They got the lady didn't talk about taking her lawn over did anyone when they got jammers in probably GA might gain their voice. So he goes overboard. As for his name he would go on. Believing coming coming in force. The old half way. And so goes the daily drama of life on the line. Everyone involved doing their

job as their conscience and feelings dictate. Just trying to make a living. The rules of the game been written elsewhere. There have been legal challenges with the watermen of the island won the right to grab in Virginia though there are still restrictions and the constant threat of increased feeds for the privilege a privilege that Smith Islanders view as their God given right. Why the resentment is real and the potential for violence remains. Especially as the resources of the bay dwindle and the economy of the island and a way of life. Is threatened. One solution is to begin to look at the bay's resources as a single entity. William Goldsboro of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. We have one Chesapeake Bay population of live crabs. Moves throughout the bay and in the jurisdictions of two states and yet two states have different regulations on crabbing. We ought to have as much as possible uniformity in the regulations on the fisheries. Throughout the bay. I'm not sure if there's a way to

resolve that in the short term but I hope we can do it without some kind of a crab war like we've had in the past. It's a hot summer morning on Solomons Island time for Devon days of rod and reel. At Captain Bucky Connors Bait and Tackle Shop head boat standby to take on their daily allotment of the hopeful Solomons as a magnet for sport anglers especially those serene and unhurried practitioners of the gentle art of the fishing. Bait fishing at its simplest. And perhaps finest. With 25 years of experience at Solomons dedicate himself to delivering to his customers an exciting day of fishing on his head bowed the my show. The object is to catch bottom feeding fish with a baited hook and then lower it usually on

to the shallow shelves and bars of the Chesapeake and its rivers. Crowd. Hard here. Probably got a couple of. People around then you know. Go on look after this round on. What you find. Dynamite. While each fisherman has his or her own favorite solution to the problem of dressing the rig for optimum results the preferred bait for bottom fishing is the lowly bloodworm. Prized for its irresistible underwater aroma. This morning the marshmallow heads for a place on the docks and river called green alley. Local reports say that spot also known as the white perch are congregating nearby. The small but feisty fish is a favorite in these waters and their Connor's bread and butter.

It's not as though there's no real fight. You'll. Meet in bed it like that. It's my money. You talk to people here they come down here they get about a guy that can't get taken by. Get this five grew to be fifty. Five pounds of paper. He would get about. That chemical fire you're going to smile but it's I think. That was my goal con man will. Make us. As lines drop over the side of the marsh Eldrick. It's with the current. You're right it's the morning's rhythm subtle as the engines murmur the lapping of the water the whirring click of spinning released with homing delays only with snatches of conversation.

You have to have a lot of patience. To battle. Maybe now you know but you've got to be patient and am patient individual can do better than. The waters off Solomons Island off our prime fishing giving anglers the choice of the broad deep river or the nearby bay. You've got a lot of nice Dorset North Carolina area. That deep or shallow or. Enough to grant. The wind. They're going to rough it if they think you're really here. Ronnie White. Right. Around here spot. Route something or the bar. You can still make a name right here. In this area. The marshal moves from place to place trying to find the best spot.

Ship to ship radios crackle as the captains confer with each other. You know that I cried. As the patterns of the day's fishing in my boats converge on the spot most likely to yield success. We didn't know about that night. If you look at the pic. For the call for you I mean that bottom fishing and all its quiet simplicity has the added in lieu of being part of the fabric of family life. Techniques are passed from father to

son. From grandmother to granddaughter. I'm from nothing but I know my father taught me how to I mean it was about me and I'm still not what he meant no offense and imagine if he would have he had a war that Bertie Allen had up for girls and for me and that when he did he taught all the kids that he. Passing on the love for fishing is an integral part of life on Solomon's Island. Captain Bill Adams is taking the morning off to treat a neighbor's son to a few hours of serious fishing. We're going to pull up a little bit and you know take it take it and take it with us so you can get way deep feeling

to much and I just a little bit that way will debate around for the first crack to fish to it. Because I going is learning what it means to grow up on the water. Bill Adams a lifetime of experience makes every nuance of dropping a line second nature to an instruction as wise informed and patient. You know I don't know. How to get it down. But you can feel. When you're feeling giving your. The day goes by. But there's scarcely on mobile. I mean it's no cause for concern and Bill Adams knows that sudden triumph may lie just beneath the surface. We're. Going to give me one good I mean anyone coming on I don't.

Want their ships to screw around and try to spot not far from the Governor Johnson bridge. It works. That the wily craft of a better an angler that has won again. Of course a rank beginner had just as much luck and so could little Colby. The true measure of the day is not taken by the size of the catch but by the quality of the time spent out on the water to be like you fingering. We were to look at people fishing the bay may lack heart pounding drama but it excels as one of the most satisfying and relaxing forms of recreation yet devised. And it's simple qualities I would dearly love to comfort for those who cherish the water and its mysterious ability to restore our

souls. This to use for I. Think it's almost our. Symbol it's our state custody. It's what everybody thinks of when they come here. Takes soft and hard. We're talking about a fishery that's the most valuable fishery in the state of Maryland and in Virginia are both commercially and recreationally. It's enough to say well we're catching a lot of. Crabs But the point is we are catching a lot of graft. And. That effort appears to be. In the past of the start that we really have very little control. Over what the population of most of the blue crab was. And that's just not the case. We would advise caution to sustain this last valuable resource and just be a. Sunrise on the Chesapeake. Time for watermelon pickers to go to work. From

April through November. They harvest crafts. Fair taste good. So. There's. Something different all the time for Bonnie with. The Auster industry is in total decline right now and I don't really think it's going to come back. The pressure put on especially now with how many women have. Thank you in one of time. Travis it's been good to us. The product is in demand both in the retail stores as a fresh canned product or as a carry out item for steamed crabs soft shell crab is in great demand. But. The crate can only be depended on for for income from sometime in mid mid April until maybe about. Around Thanksgiving. And this really impacts. The thoughts of the younger woman and then makes him wonder what am I going to do this one.

Waterman had a good life. Then the baby was seized by repeated traumas some related to overharvesting some to bad luck. Politicians environmentalists and scientists intervene or watermen a part of the problem or part of the solution. One woman see the need for conservation in the bay but they resist regulation. They believe resisting crab harvests may further damage the seafood industry. Besides they ask how can you write a law that satisfies the very different needs of water men in the upper bay middle Bay and the lower Chesapeake. I just trust. The State. And the different environmental groups to control their industry. The woman had done a pretty good job in the free market system. I just don't want to pay my bill managed either by state federal bureaucrats or if.

They'd like to find a problem so they can solve. The mystery works and I think if we didn't catch him some years we'd have enough income assure the people of. The Department of Natural Resources works with Waterman but has a different point of view. He what most people don't understand is that. My job and the state's job is to be fair to the Crab not to the water to be fair to the waterman or the recreational gram really catches all the crabs and you get it and it's a privilege to have. It's not a right it's not a right for you to take what belongs to everybody until you damage it. Has to be regulated to reduce the risk. At media events in 1903 proposed crab regulations were discussed in 1904 protective measures were approved. The idea is to cap the fishing pressure on crabs at current levels by controlling the

amount of crabbing you're allowed to and how it is you missed the goal also includes time limits for commercial and recreational crabbers policy makers simply hope to keep crabs more plentiful in the bag. Instead of waiting until the crab is in trouble like we did with the shared rock in the park. We started ahead of time and we've put regulations for you that limit the amount we can take. And theoretically we believe if we keep these regulations I mean for some. Commercial effort and the recreational effort will not increase and the crab will be fine. Scientific data has been collected from around the Chesapeake that indicates it takes more time and effort to catch the same number of crabs each year. That's what convinced lawmakers to pass new legislation. Many people assume that because the crabs have a large reproductive

capability that their reproductive capacity is is infinite and that's simply not true the mortality rates are very large for those larvae and your balls are produced as well. And it's important to understand which Reg what regulates the mentality. Of those guys. And how. All that. Can be managed in a way that will help provide long term stability for that evolution. Scientists aren't willing to limit their wish list for the continued success of the Jessop explode graph. They now know the old model of fisheries management which assumed that abundance is determined each year by the number of lives by settling in the lower bay doesn't tell the whole story. Availability of habitat for various stages of crab. Growth throughout the bay is vital. Understanding currents and climatic conditions that might affect the number of law by coming back into the bay is important. Predation and cannibalism as well

as the availability of food are also strong factors. And increasingly scientists see ominous signs on the horizon. If management isn't enforced. The last 20 years the last two decades have been decades of relatively new years in terms of our cash for you know effort so our abundance is according to the false are relatively low our juvenile services are only over the past 10 years so historically we're in a period now. Where pierced us that abundances can be on might be fairly low. So what looks to be an average year is actually over the long term are fairly low. And it's one of population is in its lows and in particular at the low part of a fluctuation. That be given the right conditions of poor environmental conditions intense fishery harvest when all that comes together then you

can potentially collapse of a cause a long term and severe decline in a fishery similar to what's happened in other fisheries. Whatever happens this much is certain watermen are no longer a part. Fifteen million people live in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. It has become our collective responsibility to maintain our bounteous bay its heritage and fisheries. To do it. Regulations and management seem necessary and a few rules are worth it if it means we'll all be able to crack open a steamed crab wharf side on a hot summer day for a good many years to come. Outdoors Maryland is a production of Maryland Public Television which is soley responsible

for its content. Please write with your comments or suggestions to outdoors Maryland Maryland Public Television Owings Mills Maryland 2 1 1 1 7.