An estimated 40 to 45 million Americans are recreational anglers, and more than 2 million of these people have some physical disability. While a disability itself can be a significant barrier to outdoor activities, there’s another hurdle that can keep disabled individuals from pastimes like fishing: finding the right equipment.

The basic fishing pole, for example, requires two working hands and arms. But if you’ve lost the use of a hand or arm, how do you retrieve your line? Or, if both arms can function at only the most minimal level, is fishing even a remote possibility?

Don Krebs has some answers to such questions. A Californian, Krebs became a quadriplegic in 1978 as a result of a water-skiing accident. Afterward, he returned to college and took a class on becoming an entrepreneur while working on his MBA. “For a final project, we had to write up a plan,” Krebs remembers, for a unique business operation. So Krebs detailed an idea that had been growing in his mind ever since his accident: a company that would provide products to help physically challenged people participate in outdoor recreation.

The professor was impressed with the business plan. “He said I’d be a fool not to do it,” Krebs says. “So I dropped out of college and founded Access to Recreation 15 years ago.”

Access to Recreation sends out 100,000 catalogues each year, offering products from more than 150 manufacturers. The selection includes everything from specially designed wheel chairs for outdoor use, to exercise machines, swimming aids, and even gardening tools created with the disabled in mind…and fishing equipment.

“I really like the outdoors, and the water especially,” Krebs says, though he admits he’s not much of an angler. “But I have a lot of customers who are,” he adds. “Come fishing season, my phone’s ringing off the hook.” Many of his clients are in wheelchairs. That can make boating difficult, but if they’re fishing from a dock or pier they aren’t at a real disadvantage, Krebs argues, “as long as they’ve got the right equipment.”

The Access catalogue offers a variety of electric reels that can both cast and retrieve. Anglers who can move their arms but have trouble using fingers to grip the small handles found on most fishing reels might benefit from Reel Eze, a long, large-diameter handle extension for the popular Zebco 33 reel. Or, a disabled angler’s needs may be answered by something as simple as the fishing pole holder that mounts onto a wheelchair.

Krebs notes that many of his customers are stroke victims who have lost the use of one arm. For these anglers, there’s the Strikefighter, a rod holder that firmly anchors your fishing pole in front of you, by belting around your waist and one leg. When a fish bites, by shifting your body weight from one leg to another or slightly raising the leg the Strikefighter is attached to, you provide the needed pumping action to bring in the fish while reeling in the line with your working hand. Standing and wheelchair models are available, and both can be used for freshwater and ocean fishing.

These products, though, can be pricey. Some of the electric reels, for example, cost $300 to $400 apiece. That price tag reflects the fact that an existing brand name reel is first purchased and is then mated to a battery-operated motor, plus a joystick or push-button control. Even relatively simple items — like a pole holder that attaches to a wheelchair — may cost $40 or more, for they’re made in limited quantities by small manufacturers.

Though he’s selling more fishing aid items than ever, Krebs admits that product selection is limited and few new offerings are coming onto the market. “There’s a little more [selection] than there was 15 years ago,” he says, “but not much.”

That’s no surprise to Robert Cartlidge of the Paralyzed Veterans of America (PVA), a Congressionally chartered organization that acts as an advocate for US military veterans who have suffered spinal cord injuries. Among PVA’s goals is to help its members live as independently as possible, and that includes being able to enjoy all manner of outdoor recreation.

To this end, PVA hosted its first bass fishing tournament for disabled anglers in 1987. The event eventually led PVA to establish the National Bass Trail, directed by Cartlidge, which introduces even more PVA members and other disabled people to competitive fishing through a series of bass fishing tournaments held around the country. In 2002, Bass Trail will hold five tournaments in five states.

Aiding Bass Trail participants in operating boats and fishing equipment “are probably 25 different adaptive devices,” Cartlidge notes, “but most are homemade. That, or they’ve taken their idea to a friend or machinist and had them make it.”

“There are 40 million people out there with disabilities, and 2.2 million of them fish,” he continues. “It’s absolutely a barrier not to have the right equipment available. We get calls daily with questions like, ‘I need a way to get in and out of my boat. Can you help?’”

Among the best pieces of PVA-endorsed adaptive equipment is a seat-on-rails system designed by Ranger Boats. The seat contains three electric motors, and it sits atop a series of metal rails. The motors can tilt the seat in various directions, plus can move the seat and angler up and down the length of the boat on the rails.

Among those fishing in Trail events is Richard Warwick of Newark, Delaware. A former tow-truck driver, Warwick was injured seven years ago in a work accident that left him unable to use his legs. Though confined to a wheelchair, Warwick became interested in fishing and began entering tournaments, winning his first in 1998.

In November 2001,Warwick won PVA’s Bass Trail Grand National Championship in Kissimmee, Florida. That win allowed Warwick to participate in the April 2002 CITGO BASS Masters Classic in Shreveport, Louisiana, the world championship of professional bass fishing, where he finished 48th in a field of 52.

Among the equipment Warwick uses is a device called a T-Handle. “It allows him to run a foot-controlled trolling motor with his hands,” Cartlidge explains. The trolling motor is an important piece of equipment for competitive and recreational anglers alike. Smaller and much quieter than the main, gasoline-powered engine, the electric trolling motor allows an angler to glide almost silently into prime fishing spots like weed beds or around submerged tree trunks. This motors’ steering control lies on the bottom of the boat and is operated by foot to keep the hands free for casting. So, to be competitive in tournaments, Warwick uses the adaptive T-Handle.

Cartlidge wishes that fishing product manufacturers and inventors would realize that disabled anglers actually represent a large and lucrative market. If additional products were available, he believes the market for such equipment would really expand as more and more of America’s 40 million disabled citizens realize that fishing is indeed a possibility.