CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Legislation which would have opened up Sunday hunting across West Virginia failed during the 2016 Regular Session of the West Virginia Legislature, but other bills of significance won approval and will impact the state’s hunting and fishing pursuits.
The most significant new law forbids removing fish from West Virginia public waters by a commercial enterprise. House Bill 4330 became known as the “catfish bill” to capitol insiders because it was heavily pushed by catfish anglers in the state. Cat fishermen were angered after repeatedly observing commercially rigged boats and trucks catching hundreds of Flathead catfish out of the Ohio and Kanawha Rivers. Indications were the fish were being transported to pay-fishing lakes, many times out-of-state. Although called the “catfish bill” the restriction extended to all species of fish in West Virginia waters.
The new law does NOT prohibit individual anglers from catching fish and placing them in a private pond, so long as nobody is charged a fee to fish there.
House Bill 4411 was another key piece of legislation aimed at protecting the state’s fish, in this case the native brook trout. The bill restructured the fines for illegal taking of native brookies. Currently the fine is $10 per pound of native fish. Advocates for the change accurately noted it takes a LOT of native brook trout to amount to a pound of fish and argued the fine barely rated a yawn. The new legislation will raise the fine to $100 per fish for all fish over the limit of six up to fish #12. If the violator has more than 12 fish, each fish above 12 will result in a fine of $20 per fish. The fine applies only to native brook trout only. Most consider the change a solid protection for West Virginia’s state fish which is already a fragile species. As of this writing, Governor Tomblin had not yet signed the bill.
Under another new state law passed this year coyotes and groundhogs will now be classified as furbearers in West Virginia. The change was made to encourage out-of-state residents to come here and hunt the critters. Under the old designation a non-resident hunter would have to buy the full year Class E non-resident hunting license. The change of the two species to “furbearer” status allows them to be hunted as small game. Visitors would only need a six-day small game hunting license.
Finally, the legislature created a five day resident fishing license. Such a license had always been available for non-residents, but any West Virginian who wanted to go fishing had to buy the full year resident fishing license for $19. The change created a license for those who may not be hard core anglers, but may want to fish for a day or two while on vacation. The five-day resident license would cost $8.