Here's the complete story on the Chesapeake Bay blue crabs from yesterday's Sun.

Here's what the Washington Post had to say about the crabs in a short story on page B3.

And here's WTOP, via the AP, via the Richmond paper, on possible Virginia restrictions. I think we had a blog about this very subject last month.

late yesterday, after my deadline, I was talking to Rob O'Reilly, deputy chief of management for the Virginia Marine Resources Commission. Here are a couple of points worth considering, based in part on what he said:

1. Virginia had zero crabbing regulations at all until 1994. That meant no limits on pots, on hours, on days you worked, etc. You fished until you were done.

Maryland did not have that many restrictions, either. In 1995, after some emergency restrictions were put into palce, someone burned a shed on Smith Island belonging to the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, a group that supported the limits. When asked who could have done it back in 1995, one waterman told Tim Wheeler that "every waterman on the bay" was angry enough to reasonably be considered a suspect.

Times have changed, and though watermen aren't exactly going to jump for joy about new restrictions, they are far more likely this time around to work with the state to make sure they can live with them.

2. As early as the 1940s, Virginia enacted temporary sponge-crab bans, prohibiting watermen from taking pregnant females out of the bay. They tried another ban a few years ago, but watermen found that if they released a sponge it would die anyway, from the trauma of being in the pot. Now sponges get very limited protection for only a small part of the pregnancy. O'Reilly said they have considered two-week sponge bans, but haven't done it yet.

3. There is no thought to ending the winter dredge fishery, but Virginia officials do not want it to grow beyong the 79 people who are fishing now. It accounts for about eight percent of Virignia's catch. There is, however, some talk about making uniform rules between the two states.

4. Virginia is also seriously looking at raising the size limits of its crabs, from 3 to 3 and 1/4, and making crabbers in the bay's mainstem keep their cull rings open so that undersized crab can escape.

On another note, several people have asked me about a possible moratorium, and if the state was considering it. I've never heard that.

 Crabs are not oysters, a species long in free fall that is now at 1 percent of historic levels. Crabs have been fluctuating for most of the century between 20 and 30 million pounds. There are terrible years, such as 1942's 15 million lbs., and there are great years, as in 1981's nearly 60 million pounds.

But keep in mind that, even in a low year like 2007's, watermen still caught more than 20 million pounds of crabs. That is a lot of college tuitions.