If you catch a few stripers while bottom fishing with small hooks, you should be fine.
The way it works is they do not want people targeting stripers in the spawning rivers in order to let the big ones spawn. Do not use anything that makes it look like you are striper fishing- big lures, big whole bloodworms, etc. Quite honestly, you are unlikely to hook a big spawner bottom fishing with small cut bait.
DNR has the striper regulation maps of where is closed and when. Basically, all rivers with real amounts of freshwater outflow are striper spawning rivers. On the western side, Magothy, Severn, South, and West Rivers are labeled as rivers (not much flow) and fish cannot be kept. However, since there is no successful spawning activity, C&R is still allowed (striper eggs need constant current to hatch). The Susky flats has certain areas as C&R and others as no striper fishing period.
Small stripers are sometimes everywhere and will attack any moving lure or bait like you experienced. If you happen to catch one, just promptly release it. These small stripers are resident fish and not spawning anyways.
