THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 28, 1996 TAG: 9607280102
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY NANCY LEWIS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: 98 lines
Landlubbing crabbers were in their glory at Harrison's Fishing Pier this week, with the sudden and unusual appearance of blue crabs by the thousands.
The pre-feeding human frenzy went on round the clock, with kids and adults reeling in crab-laden basket traps by day and scooping up dozens at a time by night, with nets from the spotlighted surface of the sea.
What the crab lovers didn't know was that they may have violated a new state law that aims to protect and conserve blue crabs by setting guidelines on the taking of females in the final stages of pregnancy.
Nearly all of the crabs harvested at Harrison's since Tuesday were ``sooks,'' as mature blue crab females are known, and many were poised to release their eggs from the brown or black ``sponges'' on their undersides.
The area at the mouth of the bay between Cape Charles and Ocean View is the ``nursery'' for the entire Chesapeake Bay, because the mix of fresh and salt water is just right for baby crabs, state officials say.
Roy Insley, director of fisheries, planning and statistics for the Virginia Marine Resources Commission in Newport News, said that this week's unusual appearances of egg-bearing blue crabs at Harrison's and elsewhere in the vicinity indicated that tighter controls on blue-crab fishing are working - that the species is being protected from overharvesting.
A law that went into effect on Feb. 29 limited the number of dark-sponge crabs an individual can legally possess to 10 per bushel or 35 per barrel.
The law, which also caps the number of traps a licensed waterman can set in the lower Bay and its tributaries, aims to protect and conserve the blue crab by doing more to ensure that females survive to propagate the species.
Many sport crabbers apparently didn't understand that the rules apply to them as well as to commercial crabbers. Nor did Harrison's management.
But whether the regulation bans altogether the taking of dark sponges or just sets limits is, apparently, a matter of interpretation.
Wilford Kale, senior policy analyst for the marine resources commission, said that even though crabbers can legally keep the limit on dark-sponge crabs, they should throw them back.
``This is the time - this is the hatchery stage,'' he said.
But Jeff Harrison, a manager at Harrison's Fishing Pier, said Saturday that he'd been advised by a game warden on Friday that dark-sponge crabs could not be taken at all.
``It was the first we'd heard of it,'' Harrison said. ``You're not allowed to keep any dark. They'll make them throw back less than 10, and give tickets for more than that. Eventually, they'll ticket'' for possession of any dark sponges.
Violation of the law is a misdemeanor.
On Saturday morning, about 20 crabbers were still ``hauling them in,'' said pier day manager Ed Ritz. ``We don't enforce it; we can't. We tell 'em, but we're behind the counter.''
And no one was counting Thursday, before officials visited the pier to discuss the law. Crabbers reported higher numbers of the species than they'd seen in a long time.
On Thursday, Phillip Woodard did a little sidestep to foot-pin a blue crab scuttling across the pier.
The crab's blue claws flailed, and the red-orange pincers snapped on empty air. The crab's swimming legs looked like a series of tiny, oval stained glass windows with metal frames. Woodard tossed his luncheon-plate-size catch into a 5-gallon pail nearly full of the crustaceans.
Woodard, 14, of Norfolk, said he had caught two dozen crabs between Wednesday night and Thursday afternoon and sold them for $5 a dozen.
``Usually you just catch small ones,'' he said. ``But these are big.''
David Trainum, 13, of Virginia Beach, said he planned to eat his crab catch. He already had filled one 5-gallon bucket in an hour and was working on his second.
``My mom cooks 'em up spicy,'' Trainum said.
Tom Davenport of Chesapeake, though, didn't like what he saw at Harrison's. The 38-year-old welder was fishing for flounder.
As he left the pier, Davenport stepped around the garish red and blue remains of a crushed crab, the egg-filled sponge now a brown smudge on the weathered gray boards.
``This is a good run, but see, what they're doing is depleting the population,'' he said. ``Should be a bushel per family. Somebody's making money.''
Liz Stephens, a 38-year-old assembly plant worker from Richmond said she had seen ``a guy with a little wagon full'' of blue crabs earlier on Thursday.
Charlie Woodard, Phillip's grandfather and night manager at Harrison's, has worked at Harrison's since 1961. He said that he had sold an entire case of 48 crab nets Wednesday as well as a dozen metal traps. Harrison's charges adults $4 and children $2.50 to fish and crab from the pier's rails.
``Till day before yesterday, I hadn't seen five bushels of crabs, total'' this summer, he said. And he said he'd never seen such a large number of crabs appear so suddenly. ILLUSTRATION: L. TODD SPENCER
Ed Wood, 14, left, and David Trainum, 13, both of Virginia Beach,
relish blue crabs. ``You can eat about 20 at a sitting,'' Ed says.
Color photo
PROHIBITION ON DARK-SPONGE CRABS
Female blue crabs with orange egg ``sponges,'' left, are legal to
harvest under a law that took effect in February. But crabs with
sponges that are darker than the one at center may not be taken. The
one at right is a ``dark-sponge'' crab, about to lay her eggs.
KEYWORDS: BLUE CRABS by CNB