Maryland Ending Crab License Buy Backs

Commercial Crab License Buyback Ends March 11

ANNAPOLIS (March 3, 2011) — The Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is ending the Limited Crab Catcher (LCC) commercial license buyback program after retiring nearly 700 LCC licenses in about a year and a half. DNR is no longer offering to purchase LCC licenses as of March 11.

"The Chesapeake Bay blue crab is part of what makes us Marylanders," said DNR Secretary John Griffin. "With the support of Senator Mikulski and blue crab disaster funds, we were able to reduce the amount of latent licenses with this buyback.”

The program reduced the number of commercial crabbing licenses in order to ensure effective management of a sustainable blue crab fishery.Last year, DNR's winter dredge survey showed a dramatic 60 percent increase in Chesapeake Bay’s blue crab population.

DNR bought back LCC licenses for $2,360 beginning in August 2009. Funding for the program came from a Federal Blue Crab Fishery Disaster Grant, which was secured through the efforts of Senator Barbara Mikulski with assistance from the Maryland Congressional Delegation. The funds were issued by NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service.

So, basically the Federal government paid for the state to buy out the licenses.  I'm kind of ambivalent about this, not the buy out, but the fact that the federal government (and thus us, and in reality our children) are paying the bill (with interest).  There was too much fishing effort being extended on crabs, and this will help that by decreasing the number of people who can crab commercially.  At the same time, most of the licenses sold were undoubtedly among the least active ones, belonging to part time watermen, so we may have paid a lot of money for not much. 

As for the federal government doing the paying, the blue crab is a migratory species, that crosses several state lines during it's life cycle, so it may well be appropriate for the feds to take a strong role in it's management.