Maryland Looking to Protect Wild Native Brook Trout
While New Hampshire backslides, Vermont inches slowly forward at the back of the pack, and Maine benefits by citizen-led initiatives when it comes to protecting wild native brook trout, Maryland joins New Jersey in leading the charge.
“Results from the Department’s 2016 wild trout angler preference survey indicated 85.7 percent of respondents support more restrictive regulations to conserve brook trout, and catch-and-release was the most popular option -MARYLAND DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES”
A change that will impose catch-and-release restrictions on brook trout east of Interstate 81, home to much of the states wild native brook trout, will go into effect January 1, 2021. Similar regulations were imposed on much of the Savage River system, Maryland’s best wild native brook trout water, in 2007.
“Recent results from a 5-year Statewide brook trout survey (2014 - 2018) indicate a 27 percent additional loss in occupied brook trout watersheds since 1987. The central part of the State, east of I-81, experienced the greatest decline, with a 20.1 percent loss in the Catoctin Mountain region and a 50 percent loss in the Piedmont region. -MARYLAND DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES”
The proposal also applies catch-and-release restrictions on brook trout in so-called “put-and-take” waters. Why protect brook trout in stocked waters you might ask? Because Maryland does not stock brook trout, and they are therefore wild regardless of whether the water is stocked with brown trout and/or rainbow trout.
These changes move Maryland to the head of the pack along with New Jersey when it comes to brook trout conservation. With any luck, New Hampshire and Vermont are paying attention here, and might reconsider their reluctance to protect their wild native brook trout.
