
DATE: Sunday, August 31, 1997               TAG: 9708310094

SECTION: FRONT                   PAGE: A1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY SCOTT HARPER, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NEW CHURCH, VA.                   LENGTH:  103 lines

ON POCOMOKE, PEOPLE GIVE PFIESTERIA A WIDE BERTH THEY'RE NOT EAGER TO TANGLE WITH THE POTENT ORGANISM.

Just west of this sleepy town near the Maryland line, past chicken farms and cornfields and not much else, the brown-colored Pocomoke River empties into Pocomoke Sound and its rich commercial fishing grounds.

As Labor Day beachgoers whizzed down Route 13, most locals spent Saturday doing what they usually do - fixing up a chicken coop, cutting the lawn, taking care of the kids.

But ``the bug'' or ``that damned thing,'' as the vicious Pfiesteria piscicida micro-organism is being called around here, seemed to be on most people's minds. Especially since the governors of Maryland and Virginia took the remarkable step Friday of closing the lower Pocomoke River to swimming, fishing and crabbing until scientists determine that the waterway is safe again.

``Sure, we're swimming today - but in the pool,'' said Tim Abbott, who lives near Pitts Creek Landing. It's one of the only public boat ramps and access points to the river in this remote part of Accomack County on Virginia's Eastern Shore.

No warning signs were posted at the landing Saturday. But the recreational outpost was as empty as a crab pot in winter. On an end-of-summer holiday weekend that would normally attract fishermen, water skiers and other pleasure-seekers, few people seemed interested in getting near a river known to harbor a mysterious organism that attacks and kills fish and can harm humans.

``Are you crazy? Who wants to take a chance of waking up in the morning with lesions on their body?'' asked Susan Fletcher, owner of Susan's Seafood market in New Church.

She was referring to the bloody sores that pfiesteria leaves on the fish it attacks. The organism, which seems to thrive in warm, nutrient-enriched waters, is suspected of killing more than 13,000 fish this month in the Pocomoke in Maryland and Virginia. It has killed nearly a billion fish in North Carolina.

Despite consumer fears about eating seafood from the Pocomoke River - or from the entire Chesapeake Bay, for that matter - Fletcher said her business is ``doing just fine.'' Her store deals exclusively in fish caught from the nearby Atlantic Ocean, where pfiesteria has not been found.

``I tell you what, though,'' she said, ``everybody asks questions about where the fish came from. But when we tell them, they seem just fine. So we're in pretty good shape - unlike some of those markets who deal with Chesapeake Bay seafood. I understand they're taking a beating.''

Maryland, especially, has reported a downward spiral for seafood sales since the word ``pfiesteria'' was first uttered as a possible cause for fish kills in the Pocomoke River, which straddles the Virginia-Maryland line. But Virginia merchants, too, are beginning to feel the public relations sting of an organism with such a barbaric streak.

According to marine researchers rushing to better understand this speck of life, pfiesteria spends much of its time innocently in bottom sediments. But it quickly becomes highly toxic - like Dr. Jekyll becoming Mr. Hyde - when it detects fish secretions under certain environmental conditions.

The organisms then band together and attack fish, injecting a neurotoxin into their victims. If hit with enough toxin, fish can die within minutes. Lesser concentrations leave fish chronically sick with deep, bloody lesions.

Frank Daniel, regional director for the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality, said Saturday that ``there's no indications of further kills'' on the lower Pocomoke.

``Visually, things are pretty much back to normal,'' Daniel said. ``Hopefully this is it. But this thing can come out of the sediments and go back in, so we just don't know.''

In Virginia waters, about 2,000 fish were reported dead Tuesday, most of them menhaden.

Two Virginians have complained about complications from what they thought was contact with pfiesteria - one for respiratory discomfort, the other for a rash - but those cases have not been confirmed, Daniel said.

Thirteen people in Maryland - including watermen and state officials - experienced slight memory loss and fatigue after exposure to the Pocomoke River. Medical experts from Johns Hopkins University and the University of Maryland believe that pfiesteria or a similar organism is to blame.

Virginia Marine Patrol officers, meanwhile, are keeping a 24-hour watch on the affected parts of the Pocomoke ``until we're told not to,'' said Randy Widgeon, area captain for Virginia's Eastern Shore.

He said watermen, would-be swimmers and water-skiers and tourists alike are abiding by the closure. On the Maryland side of the river, he said, a couple crabbers had to be shooed away from their traps early Saturday morning.

``There's been no activity on the river at all'' for most of Saturday, Widgeon said. ``I guess because people are scared.''

So, too, are patrol officers. They have been instructed not to touch the river and, if forced to, to wear plastic gloves and then to wash their hands immediately, Widgeon said.

``Like everybody else, we're staying clear of contact,'' he said. ``It's a little eerie out there now.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

BETH BERGMAN/The Virginian-Pilot

Susan Fletcher owns Susan's Seafood in New Church, Va., on the

Eastern Shore. Consumers worry about eating pfiesteria-tainted fish,

but she says her business is OK because her catches come from the

ocean.

Photo

BETH BERGMAN/The Virginian-Pilot

Pitts Creek Landing is a public boat ramp to the Pocomoke River in

Accomack County - and it was deserted Saturday. The day before, the

lower river was closed because of an organism called pfiesteria that

is toxic to fish and people.