{"id":35855,"date":"2022-03-30T08:30:41","date_gmt":"2022-03-30T12:30:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/?p=35855"},"modified":"2022-03-29T20:27:18","modified_gmt":"2022-03-30T00:27:18","slug":"marylands-recreational-crabbing-season-begins-april-1-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/2022\/03\/30\/marylands-recreational-crabbing-season-begins-april-1-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Maryland\u2019s Recreational Crabbing Season Begins April 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Traditional Opening Day for State\u2019s Iconic Crustacean<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

\"Photo

Photo by Christine Edwards, entry in the 2018 Maryland Natural Resource Photo Contest<\/a><\/p><\/div>\n

The Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announces the recreational crabbing season in Maryland officially opens on April 1 for the Chesapeake Bay and tidal tributaries as well as in the Atlantic Ocean, coastal bays, and their tributaries.<\/span><\/p>\n

Recreational crabbing in Maryland is an exciting opportunity for anyone interested in discovering one of the state\u2019s most iconic and recognizable crustaceans. Fishing for blue crab can be done in a variety of ways, with or without a license depending on the equipment and location. However, <\/span>licenses are required<\/span><\/a> for anyone who uses a trotline, collapsible crab traps, net rings, seines, or eel pots.<\/span><\/p>\n

A license is not required for anyone using hand lines or dip nets. In addition, waterfront property owners, lessees, or tenants of a private shoreline property can <\/span>register<\/span><\/a> to crab license-free using up to two crab pots.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

To protect other aquatic species, all crab pots used by waterfront property owners in Maryland must be fitted with a <\/span>bycatch reduction or turtle excluder device<\/span><\/a> in every entry funnel. Pots must also be marked with the owner\u2019s name and address or <\/span>DNR identification number<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A recreational crabbing license is not required in the Atlantic Ocean or coastal bays and their tributaries. Additionally, any passenger of a boat with a valid crabbing license doesn\u2019t need an individual license to crab.<\/span><\/p>\n

All recreational crabbers are prohibited from selling crabs or possessing an egg-bearing (sponge) crab or any female hard or peeler crab.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

More information on crabbing licenses, restrictions, possession limits, and size limits is available in the <\/span>2022 Maryland Guide to Fishing and Crabbing<\/span><\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Traditional Opening Day for State\u2019s Iconic Crustacean The Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announces the recreational crabbing season in Maryland officially opens on April 1 for the Chesapeake Bay and tidal tributaries as well as in the Atlantic Ocean, coastal bays, and their tributaries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[957,11],"tags":[4933,2995,3905,2982,4335],"class_list":["post-35855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-appnews","category-fisheries","tag-atlantic-coastal-bays","tag-atlantic-ocean","tag-blue-crab","tag-chesapeake-bay","tag-crabbing"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35855"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35855\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35858,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35855\/revisions\/35858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/dnr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}