Maryland Coastal Conservation volunteers seined St. Leonard Creek on Saturday.
According to Ken Hastings, yellow perch coordinator, results were similar to “seinings everywhere this year: some really interesting species but not much in the way of traditional species and quantities.”
Normally, volunteers expect to see dozens of white perch in each haul, some of them nice size, but not this time. Hastings was excited about getting one nice white perch even though the fish has been too common to warrant much attention in the past.
“We did get a nice haul of silversides, some killifish and a few mumichugs but only one juvenile striped bass,” Hastings said. “Making up for the common ones we didn’t catch (sort of) were sheepshead minnows too numerous to count in some hauls, one naked goby (my first), gobs of grass shrimp, several mosquito fish (females) and two pipefish.
“I wish I had paid more attention to the pipefish because the pictures indicate there may have been two different species,” he said. “In the past, I have been happy just to recognize they were pipefish but one of the pictures shows two different head/snout proportions.”
Hastings found the gizzard shad exciting because they kept jumping over the float line to escape and making a big splash. “I could feel them hitting the net long before they jumped it, he said. “We didn’t try to count all the ones that jumped out.
Bill Curry, chairman Coastal Conservation Association of Maryland; Pam Merkle, Tom Gilmore and Sandy Hastings joined the team on Saturday. Volunteers are scheduled to seine at Port Tobacco, Saturday, Aug. 23, if Hurricane Fay doesn’t interfere.