THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, September 26, 1994 TAG: 9409260110
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JAMES SCHULTZ, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 115 lines
Trying to avoid the specter of a Chesapeake Bay without oysters or crabs, state regulators Tuesday may slap unprecedented restrictions on crab harvesting and further limit the oyster fishery.
Oysters have been dying off for more than a decade from two mysterious diseases, and a new study suggests that the blue crab is headed for trouble as well because of overfishing.
An official with the Virginia Marine Resources Commission said the agency may have little choice but to impose further regulations.
``Anyone that asks for restrictions gets beat up. We're always the bad guy,'' said James A. Wesson, a former waterman who is now the commission's chief of oyster conservation and replenishment.
``I want them (the watermen) to stay in business, but there's a point that you've got to protect what you have, to bet back to a real industry,'' he said. ``A 7,000-bushel oyster industry that brings in $140,000 won't make a lot of people their wintertime living,'' he said, citing 1993-94 harvest figures.
While the oyster industry has been declining rapidly since the late 1980s, blue crabs resist pollution so well and reproduce so rapidly that until recently they were thought invincible.
In the past, watermen have been bitter and assertive foes of fishing limitations. This time out, almost on the eve of the 1994-95 season opener on Oct. 1, a tentative consensus on the need for oystering restrictions appears to be forming. But recommendations curtailing crabbing could be headed for rough water.
``Most of the watermen have gotten out of oystering and into crabbing,'' said Stephen Perok, a marina owner and the chief spokesman for the James River Waterman's Association. ``They're wondering, `Where are the crabs?' ''
A just-completed study by the Virginia Institute of Marine Science reveals a 61 percent decline over the past 20 years in the number of crabs taken by trawlers on the James, York and Rappahannock rivers, compared to a 19-year period beginning in 1956. Winter dredge landings are also down, from an annual average of 10.8 million pounds from 1960 through 1974, to 7.2 million pounds per year from 1975 to the present.
``This is indicative of the fishery being overharvested,'' said Romuald Lipcius, VIMS associate professor of marine science. ``We are not on the verge of a collapse just yet. But we need to be cautious. If we overfish the spawn stock we could cause a major decline.''
Marine resources commission scientists, in concert with colleagues from VIMS and industry representatives, will meet late this afternoon in subcommittee to finalize crabbing recommendations for the Tuesday meeting of the marine resources commission.
Their most controversial recommendation, according to Roy Insley, director of the resources commission's fisheries planning and statistics department, will be to require crabbers to return to the water all sizes of egg-bearing, or sponge, females that they trap in crab pots.
Other limitations include the establishment of a crab pot season April 1 through November 30; the season now runs year-round. To allow small crabs to survive, escape hatches called ``cull rings,'' may be required on crab pots. A committee may be established to study restrictions on the numbers of hard crab licenses.
``It's been quite an exercise, pulling together information from different states to come up with this recommendation,'' Insley said. ``Based on experience you take your best shots. We have hard data. In the end, with input from all involved, we'll come up with a good proposal.''
The major oyster proposal would be be the closure of all public Chesapeake Bay public oyster beds, which Wesson recommends. However, the oyster proposals won't change other curbs already in place, such as a maximum oyster tong length and three-inch minimum harvest size.
Exempt from the new restrictions would be the 2,000 or so acres of public oyster beds on a five-mile stretch of the James River, from Deep Creek to the anchorage of the mothballed Steel Fleet above Fort Eustis.
Perok's waterman's group is not ready to endorse any oyster plan before reviewing the fine print, saying only that this year may be the first in which ``I think that the watermen and the VMRC will agree.''
Nonetheless, the watermen remain skeptical of the scientific findings relating to oysters, believing that weather conditions and better cultivation practices will do more for oysters than any research project or commission.
``Get up in an airplane and see if one man or one organization can make a difference,'' Perok said. ``It's pitter-patter. When Mother Nature wants to bring them (the oysters) back, she'll bring them back.''
A former president of the same organization for which Perok now speaks, Wesson has withstood the angry verbal assaults of the former fishers whose interests he once represented. When asked what the outcome of the Tuesday meeting will be, Wesson shakes his head, smiles and looks down to the ground before he replies.
``It took us 100 years to get to this point,'' he said. ``It will take a long time for us to get back.''
Commissioners will begin deliberations on restricting blue crab and oyster harvests no earlier than 12 noon Tuesday on the fourth floor of the NationsBank building at 2600 Washington Avenue in downtown Newport News. The hearing is open to the public. ILLUSTRATION: Color illustrations
Crab
Oyster
Possible Limits
FOR CRABS:
Requiring that egg-bearing females be returned to the water from
crab pots.
Setting crab-pot season as April 1 to Nov. 30.
Requiring escape hatches in pots for small crabs.
Creating a committee to study limiting the number of hard-crab
licenses.
FOR OYSTERS:
Closing all public oysters beds in the Chesapeake Bay, except
2,000 acres along 5 miles of the James River.
KEYWORDS: CRAB OYSTER
by CNB