THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, April 19, 1996 TAG: 9604190002
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Another View
SOURCE: By OSCAR ADAMS
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
I have read much about the management of Chesapeake Bay, especially the blue-crab population, by the Virginia Marine Resources Commission. The threats to the Bay are complex and difficult to counter.
Natural resources are not inexhaustible. To maintain them, natural resources must be used with care and restraint.
I am a retiree with a cottage on the Eastern Shore. I spend much of each year there. My education and training have been in civil and sanitary engineering, and my total work experience worldwide gave me an insight into environmental management. I fear for the future of the Bay.
Chesapeake Bay's many beneficial uses include shipping, sewage disposal, recreation (such as boating, sailing, fishing), aqua farming (clams and oysters) and commercial fishing and crabbing.
The Virginia Marine Resources Commission is misnamed; its primary efforts are to protect the seafood industry. It could be called the Waterman's Protective Association.
The VMRC doesn't make a decision without consulting seafood-industry leaders for their approval. What we need in Virginia, as well as in all Bay states, is a state agency that represents all interests, not just the commercial users of the Bay.
Additionally, the mission and focus of VMRC should be changed. It should become an organization for the conservation and management of the entire resource and for the benefit of all users. VMRC membership should be changed to eliminate the bias toward the seafood industry, and its management should be headed by a professional with a background in resource management. We don't need a political appointee who knows how to be politically correct. We need someone with training and willingness to truly manage the resource and informed about the environmental complexities of the Bay.
The big problem now is that the watermen and the seafood industry form a very powerful political lobby. It is difficult to make any beneficial change against the desires of the lobby.
A proposed reorganization of the missions and responsibilities of various state agencies in regard to Chesapeake Bay is worrisome. Under Virginia's present Republican regime, which favors relaxation of environmental controls, this may be a way around existing regulatory controls and could result in letting the seafood industry rape the Bay and take more out of it in the name of retention.
A solution to the shortage of blue crabs in the Bay is more complex than the number of pots and the size of crab-pot escape openings. While these measures may ameliorate the damage to the crab population, they won't remedy the problem. The crab is part of the biological mix in the Bay, and man has upset this mix and the food chain linking the different species of fish and other marine life.
Years of overharvesting have reduced the crab population to such extent that we face a real threat that because of the natural die-off by nature and predators, there may never be a build-up in the population to its historic levels.
A few years ago, when the price of crabs reached $30 per bushel, I counted 65 crabbers working in the stretch of the Bay from the ``cell'' to Cape Charles. This past year in April, four or five were out there but they didn't last long; one lone crabber lasted through July or August.
Regulations alone won't put watermen out of work. The waterman is working himself out of a job. If he doesn't soon realize that there is a very real possibility that crabs will disappear from the Bay and if he doesn't change his opposition to realistic conservation measures, then he really will be out of a job because there will be nothing for him to catch.
We should seriously consider the extreme measure of a complete ban on the taking of crabs until the population can be built up. Apparently this worked for rockfish, which may be part of the problem (juvenile crabs are a prime source of food for rockfish).
Another complexity to consider is that the diminution of the crab population may be the result of a disruption in the food chain plus the overharvesting. The menhaden industry may be a big part of fewer fish and crabs in the Bay because it is taking too much of the food supply. The fish population appears to be less; certainly fewer fish are being caught by recreational fishermen.
I have seen as many as seven menhaden boats working at the same time south of the ``cell.'' Also, I have seen them working at night using their lights. These boats diminish the number of menhaden in the Bay, thereby reducing the available food supply. These boats should not be allowed to operate in the mouth of the Bay. We cannot look at the Bay in segments, such as crabs, gray trout, rockfish or speckled trout, etc., but we must consider it as a whole. Each interest group must have respect for the Bay as a whole. MEMO: Oscar Adams is a resident of Richmond.
by CNB