State officials began an effort yesterday to forge a consensus on how to deal with the oyster crisis in Chesapeake Bay.
Natural resources officials met behind closed doors with watermen, scientists, legislators, environmentalists, oyster growers and packers in a bid to break the political logjam over how to revive the shellfish industry.
More than 30 people from both shores of the bay attended the all-day "roundtable" talks, arranged by the Department of Natural Resources and held at a yacht club near Annapolis.
It was the first in a series of brainstorming sessions being held over the next two months. The goal of the meetings, run by a hired mediator from Washington, is to find some common ground.
"It's not going to be easy," said Dr. Donald F. Boesch, director of the University of Maryland's Center for Estuarine and Environmental Studies.
For years, environmentalists, fisheries managers, scientists and watermen have been at odds over what ails the bay's oysters -- and what to do about it.
"Some of the parties have been at this a long time, and their positions and relationships have been a bit hardened," Dr. Boesch said.
The industry suffered through its worst oyster season ever last fall and winter. With shellfish beds ravaged by two parasitic diseases the past five years, only 120,000 bushels were landed last season, just a fraction of harvests a decade ago. The diseases, MSX and Dermo, have "ended oystering as we know it, in 80 to 85 percent of the bay," said W. Peter Jensen, DNR's fisheries director.
Over-harvesting, destruction of oyster reefs and water pollution also have whittled away at shellfish stocks during the past century.
"Nothing is out of bounds for discussion," said Mr. Jensen, alluding to such controversial proposals as a moratorium on oyster harvests, and the introduction of Japanese oysters into the Chesapeake. Those oysters, now grown commercially on America's West Coast and throughout much of the world, may be able to fend off MSX and Dermo, but also may overwhelm the bay's native oysters.
Before yesterday's session, several participants said they hoped some middle ground could be found among the feuding factions.
"You can't sit around that round table and talk [oysters] back into the bay, but maybe we can come up with some ways to solve this situation," said Levin F. "Buddy" Harrison, a Tilghman Island businessman who runs an oyster packing house.
