DATE: Saturday, April 26, 1997              TAG: 9704260275

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY SCOTT HARPER, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NEWPORT NEWS                      LENGTH:  112 lines

STATE, CLAMMERS AT ODDS OVER MOLLUSK THE STATE PLANS TO REOPEN CLAM BEDS CLOSED BY CONTAMINATION SINCE THE '20S. CLAMMERS WANT THE BEDS TO STAY CLOSED A WHILE LONGER TO PROTECT THE POPULATION.

The dark green waters at the busy junction of the James River, the Elizabeth River and the Chesapeake Bay hold perhaps the best clam beds in Virginia. Just one problem: Bacteria and pollution keep them closed most of the year, with only a limited harvest allowed in late spring and summer.

Until now.

The state Health Department, citing major improvements in water quality, has announced plans to open nearly 2,500 acres of clam beds along Newport News that have been closed due to contamination since the 1920s.

Good news for the environment, commercial fishermen and seafood lovers? Depends on whom you talk to.

In a surprise move, clammers on Tuesday urged the state to keep the beds closed for much of the year to protect their sagging industry as well as clam populations in the lower Chesapeake Bay. Their recommendation breaks from a cynical stereotype of watermen, who often are portrayed as greedily demanding more and more fishing rights, regardless of the ecological consequences.

In this case, watermen warned that declaring open season on the Newport News beds would ``start a gold rush'' and ``make things dramatically worse'' for important clam stocks in Hampton Roads and for the robust men and women who gather these bite-sized, high-dollar shellfish for a living.

Equally surprising was how government officials and scientists reacted. Where state experts and scientists usually press for greater conservation of fish stocks, this time they recommended that the beds be opened.

``This speaks to everyone that the Bay is cleaner - and we should capitalize on it,'' said Roger Mann, a shellfish researcher at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science.

The topsy-turvy debate - with fishermen asking for more protections, and government advocating more fishing - played out Tuesday before the Virginia Marine Resources Commission, the state agency that regulates seafood harvests.

Tommy Leggett, a commission member and clammer, described the issue as ``one of the most serious things to happen to the clam industry'' in years, with profits and state policy directed toward its second-most valuable fishery at stake.

Nearly 1 million pounds of hard clams were grabbed from state waters last year, worth nearly $5 million, said Roy Insley, a fisheries manager with the marine resources commission. Insley said only blue crabs generate more income.

But clam landings have been sliding for three straight years, and clammers are getting edgy that their livelihood, like the blue crab and countless finfish, may be headed for trouble.

In the end, the debate Tuesday was settled in a compromise. The commission voted unanimously for a split season in Hampton Roads. It will work as follows: The Newport News beds will be opened without pollution restrictions during the slow winter season, from Dec. 1 to March 31. Clam beds to the east, from the Monitor-Merrimac Memorial Bridge-Tunnel to Willoughby Bay, will be opened for a limited ``relay'' season from May 1 to Aug. 15.

A relay means that clams collected from this sprawling easterly area must be carried to cleaner waters elsewhere in the state. After 15 days of purging themselves of contaminants, the clams are considered safe and can then be sold to seafood markets.

The Newport News beds, some of which front the huge industrial docks at Newport News Shipbuilding, have been harvested for decades under these relay rules.

But recent surveys show that levels of fecal coliform, a bacteria capable of harboring diseases, have dropped by half off the Newport News coastline, said Robert Croonenberghs, director of shellfish sanitation for the Virginia Health Department.

Croonenberghs attributed the cleaner conditions to fewer big ships dropping anchor in the lower reaches of the James River and to a ban on overboard dumping of boat sewerage in the Bay.

``We feel very comfortable opening up this area again,'' he said. ``It's been a long time coming . . . and really is a tribute to some of the actions we've taken to control overboard discharging.''

Scientists are comfortable with the re-opening for another reason. Most of the clams on Newport News beds are not important to reproduction in Hampton Roads. The big clam nursery for the lower Bay lies farther to the east, along the Hampton shoreline.

There, large clams can be found in shallow waters. These chowder-type clams are not worth as much on the open market as the smaller ones, and watermen throw them back when grabbed by accident.

But the big clams are incredible spawners, producing enough larvae to re-populate the waters of Hampton Roads, explained Mann, the shellfish researcher.

``If you harvest upstream, as proposed, and leave the brood stock alone on Hampton bar . . . we're of the opinion that you can utilize this resource and still conserve it,'' Mann said.

To protect against overfishing the Newport News beds, the state approved new limits on clammers. They can only fish until 2 p.m., instead of until 5 p.m., and must stay off the water on weekends.

As a conservation tool in key spawning grounds to the east, the state also will create a 100-acre clam sanctuary. The borders of the no-clamming zone will be settled later.

Heeding clammers' concerns, state officials agreed to revisit the new rules in Hampton Roads next year. If too many clams are collected from the newly opened Newport News beds, officials could close them again for the 1998 season.

Left unresolved, however, is a pet peeve among many clammers. They believe that dredging - especially the big, annual projects that help make Norfolk one of the best deep-water harbors in the country - destroy too many clams.

``They continue to dredge our resource and dump them on Craney Island,'' the huge sandy waste yard at the northern tip of Portsmouth, owned by the Army Corps of Engineers, said commission member Leggett.

Leggett suggested that the corps tell clammers in advance of their dredging plans, so that clams can be grabbed before marine contractors start scraping up bottom material.

The state and corps already exchange information about most projects. But ``we certainly can do a better job communicating that to the clammers, and the corps can probably help get the word to us earlier as well,'' said Insley, the state fisheries manager. KEYWORDS: CLAM CHESAPEAKE BAY

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