For those of you that could not get the attachment on the situation with
the state shell of Texas here it is:
BROWN'S BILL WOULD PROTECT STATE SHELL
by Peggy O'HARE
There's a serious effort in the works to save our seashell.  That's
exactly what Sen. J.E. "Buster" Brown, R-Lake Jackson (Texas) is trying
to do.  He has introduced a bill to prohibit shrimpers from retaining
the lightning whelks caught in their trawls.  The lightning whelk, which
happens to be the official Texas state seashell, is declining in
population, according to Texas Parks and Wildlife Department surveys,
but the causes are unknown  Brown said a game warden told him some
shrimpers are selling the whelks for food.  "While there can't be a
whole lot of meat in those shells, someone has developed a market for
it," Brown said.  "My bill goes along the line with not picking
bluebonnets and not killing mockingbirds, " he added, referring to the
official state flower and bird.  But several local shrimping interests
say a bill protecting the lightning whelk is preposterous. "I've heard
everything now." said Wright Gore Jr., president of the local shrimping
company Western Seafood, the home base for about 140 boats.  "I think
that's probably one of the most absurd things I've ever heard," Gore
said. "I've never ever known of one of those to have been sold for any
purpose--and certainly have not known of anyone with enough lack of
taste to eat one."  In fact, Gore said the issue is probably so
insignificant that it probably never occurred to anyone to think about
it. " I think I can say with all confidence that there's not a single
person involved in the shrimping industry who would object to an edict
that prohibited or would forbid the sale of that, because I frankly
don't think it's ever happened." Gore said. " This is the first I've
ever heard that anyone thought about consuming the innards of a shell."
Freeport shrimper Roy Crook III said he doesn't allow anyone on his boat
to keepseashells anyway, due to ever-changing regulations.  " You never
know what's legal and what isn't, so we just don't keep them,"  Crook
said by cellular phone from his shrimping vessel near Key West, Fla.  "
I don't even know what a whelk is."
But county Judge Willy knows the seashell very well. He was the state
representative who introduced a resolution making the whelkthe official
seashell of Texas in 1987.  Brown incidentally, carried it in the
Senate.  " We did make the whelk the state seashell because it is so
common to the Gulf Coast area," Willy said, " If in fact its population
is declining, and if in fact people are selling them for food, I don't
think that's proper.  If that's going to be our state seashell, I would
hate to see it go out of existence."  But Crook said Brown's bill will
just be the latest mandate in a stream of heavy-handed legislation in
recent years.  "Seems like every time you turn around, there's some new
regulation coming down the pike," Crook said.  "It's getting to the pint
that every year, it's something new.  First it was the turtle excluder
devices, then it was the fish exluder devices, now it's something about
some shell that I don't even know what it is."