§ 4-719. Fishing restrictions -- Dorchester County

   (a) Seine or put net. -- A person may not set a haul seine or seine of any description, or what is commonly called a put net, to catch fish in the following waters of Dorchester County: Transquaking River and Chicamacomico River and their tributaries, Big and Little Blackwater Rivers, White Hall Creek, Hurst's Creek, Shoal Creek, and Jenkins Creek.

(b) Twine weir, pound net, and hauling seine. -- A person may not set a patent twine weir, or any other twine weir, a pound net and hauling seine of a length greater than 350 feet in Blackwater River and its tributaries except Little Blackwater River. A person also may not fasten or stick a stake in the part of Blackwater River lying between a line drawn from Grog Point to the opposite side of the river and a line drawn from Berg's Ditch to the opposite side of the river, except in the bends of the river where stake weirs now exist.

(c) Gill nets; distances nets may extend from shore in certain waters. -- A person may not set a gill net in the waters of Fishing Bay or Transquaking River north of a line drawn from Blackwater Point to Irish Creek, up the Transquaking River to Destroys Creek, or set any net whose farther end extends more than 1200 feet from shore or more than one third the breadth of the water at the place where the net is fished, or closer than 600 feet of another net in the Transquaking or Chicamacomico River. A person may not set any net whose farther end extends more than one half the breadth of the water at the place where the net is fished or closer than 600 feet of another net in the waters of the Transquaking River above Decourcey Bridge or placed in or across the channels of these rivers. In the waters of Fishing Bay south of a line drawn from Blackwater Point to Irish Creek and north of a line drawn from Roasting Ear Point to the northwesterlymost point of the entrance to Duck Island Cove, a person may not set any weir more than 1200 feet from shore, or set any gill net or weir closer to each other than 1200 feet, or set any row of gill nets more than 1200 feet in length. A person may not set any weir beyond a depth of 18 feet in the waters of Fishing Bay south of the line from Roasting Ear Point to the northwesterlymost point of the entrance to Duck Island Cove.

(d) Nanticoke River. -- A person may not place pound nets, weirs, or hedges less than one third of a mile apart in the northwest branch of the Nanticoke River, from Walnut Landing to the place known as Chimney Landing, on the west branch of this stream.

(e) Cabin Creek, Warwick River, Goose Creek, and Indian Creek. -- A person may fish only with hook and line, eel pot, or gill net with at least a three-inch mesh in the following waters:

   (1) Cabin Creek above a line drawn from the residence of Joseph Era in a northeasterly direction to the residence on the opposite side on what is known as the Travers Farm;

   (2) Warwick River above a line drawn from the east end of a sand bar extending from the Hughlett Farm in a northerly direction across the river to the nearest point of marsh on Warwick Manor; and

   (3) Goose Creek and Indian Creek.

HISTORY: An. Code 1957, art. 66C, § 276; 1973, 1st Sp. Sess., ch. 4, § 1.