They're mad as hell and they're not going to take it anymore.
We're talking about salt water fishing enthusiasts from every coastal corner of the country, fed up with what many see as the haphazard and ineffective way in which our fisheries are managed with the unwelcomed implementation of unreasonable minimum size requirements, diminishing creel limits, shorter seasons, and total closures in the case of some popular species.
In what organizers hope will be a historic show of solidarity, recreational and commercial fishermen will gather together on the steps of the Capitol on Feb. 24, from noon until 3 p.m. in an organized demonstration against the unintended negative impacts of the Magnuson Stevens Conservation and Management Act (MSA), the federal fisheries law which was revised in January of 2007.
Those of us who spend our summers fishing the mid-Atlantic coastal waters of neighboring states like Delaware, New Jersey, and Maryland have felt the grip of these federal regulations squeeze ever tighter over the past few years. I've been fluke fishing the back bays of Maryland for decades now, and I've seen first-hand how the minimum size requirement has increased to the point where catching a legal flounder is a rare feat indeed.