Scott: Louisiana's Gulf Coast anything but dead

The thousands of people who earn their living in the shrimping, fishing and tourism industries along and off the shores of the western two-thirds of Louisiana’s Gulf Coast would like you to know that the oil hasn’t wiped out all the fishing.

I wanted to learn the whole truth about how much and in what ways the Louisiana coastline was being affected.

My first call was to the Cajun Coast Visitors and Convention Bureau (cajuncoast.com), which is located about an hour’s drive southwest of New Orleans in St. Mary Parish.

In a display of the honesty I’ve come to expect from the folks at the Cajun Coast VCB, I was given the bad news first.

Oil has made landfall in a number of places in Lafourche, St. Charles, Jefferson, Plaquemines, St. Bernard and Orleans parishes, all of which are either on or adjacent to the Mississippi River delta.

The federal government has closed all commercial and recreational offshore fishing in this part of the state, and legally accessible inshore recreational fishing, shrimping and crabbing opportunities are limited at this time.

The picture begins to brighten in Terrebonne, St. Mary and Iberia, the next three parishes to the west. A constantly shifting portion of the area offshore from Terrebonne Parish is closed to recreational angling, but little inshore angling has been affected by oil in any of these three parishes.

A Cajun Coast VCB spokesperson told me that “the charter boat captains’ phones simply aren’t ringing.”

That’s truly a shame, because fishing in the area is great right now.

A Southwest Louisiana/Lake Charles Convention and Visitors Bureau spokesman told me Louisiana’s westernmost parishes, Vermillion and Cameron, are completely outside of the disaster zone, and they will remain out of it.

Offshore angling, which, ironically, is centered around oil drilling platforms, is going great guns for a variety of tackle-straining species, and inshore angling for redfish, speckled trout and flounder is exceptionally good this year.

Blue crabs are plentiful in the estuaries along this part of the coast, and they’re always willing to provide entertainment and fine dining for those who’d like to try a different kind of fishing.

Is eating saltwater fish or shellfish caught in Louisiana waters during the oil spill safe? That’s a fair question if  asked in a rational manner.

Rationality is soon in short supply anytime there’s an ecological crisis as visible and as long lasting as the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon.

Because of the daily testing mandated by the USDA in response to the oil spill and the closing of areas in or near potentially contaminated areas, seafood commercially harvested and processed in Louisiana is safer right now than ever.

That’s a good thing, because Louisiana supplies about one-fourth of the fresh seafood consumed in the United States.

Recreational anglers don’t submit their catches to government inspectors.

However, fish, shrimp or crabs caught in areas that are open to recreational angling are safe to eat, absent any local advisories to the contrary.

I admire the people who’ve sacrificed their vacation time to help clean up the beaches of eastern Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida, because what they’re doing is environmentally vital.

The best thing most of us can do to help the people who live along Louisiana’s Gulf Coast is to go down there, stay in their motels, eat at their restaurants and go fishing.