Fishing for dollars | pnj.com | Pensacola News Journal

Fishing for dollars | pnj.com | Pensacola News Journal: "Despite only having about 50 miles of coastline, Alabama fisheries are some of the most productive in the Gulf of Mexico.

'On the Alabama coastline, they catch almost 40 percent of all the red snapper for the entire Gulf because of the artificial reefs,' Beard said. 'They work.'

Artificial reefs are permitted in more than 1,200 square miles of water off the coast of Alabama, and it is easy for private companies and individuals to get permits to sink their own reef.

Perkins said that Alabama makes it easy and affordable for private charters to deploy their own artificial reefs, but Escambia County is a different story.

'We're under a different Army Corps of Engineers here, and the one here is about 20 times more difficult to build a reef than the ones in Alabama.'"