CLAMS FOUND DEAD IN MUDFLAT

[Anchor Lead]

A large number dead clams washed onto shore has turned a mudflat in Chungcheongnamdo Province completely white. Local authorities suspect the influx of pollutants or the breakout of some kind of disease and have requested the National Institute of Fisheries Science to look into the cause.

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At low tide when the water recedes heaps of clam shells appear on the shore.
Dead clams have been washed in by seawater. The situation is the same deeper inside the mud flat. Since last week, many dead clams began to be found on this wetland in Seocheon-gun County, Chungcheongnamdo Province. The decay has caused a nasty stench. Seocheon-gun County believes some 80 percent of the clam population that inhabited the one million square meter mudflat site along the coast have perished. Local fishermen who made their living from gathering and selling shellfish or operating wetland experience programs lost their income source overnight.

[Soundbite] Im Gyeong-soo(Seocheon-gun County) : "An average fishermen used to always gather around 100 to 200kg of clams but now that's stopped. The loss is huge."

County officials have collected samples and requested the National Institute of Fisheries Science to examine the cause of the bizarre incident.

[Soundbite] Lee Don-yeob(Seocheon-gun County Fishery Affairs) : "Water temperature change may have caused a disease which brought the inflow of contaminants. We have requested a number of tests be conducted to look into the matter."

The county has also banned the poaching of dead shellfish for the time being.