There was a time when oysters from the Nansemond River were some of the best to be found in Virginia. But with periodic closures of the river to the oyster harvest going all the way back to 1933, many of those who consider oysters one of the commonwealth’s greatest treats have never tasted a Nansemond River oyster.

The Nansemond River Preservation Alliance, along with local watermen and more than a few area restaurateurs, would love to see Suffolk oysters once again become a staple of menus at discriminating restaurants, and they’re working together to get the word out about what must happen for the Nansemond’s oysters to once again be regularly safe — and plentiful enough — to eat.

A state health official who specializes in shellfish sanitation will be the guest speaker at the Nansemond River Preservation Alliance’s River Talk on April 19. Keith Skiles, director of the Virginia Department of Health’s shellfish sanitation division, will speak from 7 to 8 p.m. at the CE&H Ruritan Community Hall. Local waterman Robbie Johnson, co-owner of Johnson & Sons Seafood, will also make comments.

Skiles plans to explain and field questions about the role of the state’s shellfish sanitation and water quality programs. He will also discuss his agency’s history of monitoring water quality in the Nansemond River.

The Nansemond has suffered from pollution pressures for years. Those pressures are a result of everything from pet waste to pesticide usage to runoff from downtown streets to the changes the river experienced when the dam was built to create Lake Meade.

Since oysters clean the waters in which they live, any pollutants that find their way into the river eventually wind up in the oysters. That’s why the Virginia Department of Health often closes portions of the Nansemond and other waterways following nor’easters and other major storms, when great volumes of pollutants are washed into the area’s rivers and streams.

Only through a concerted effort by everybody in Suffolk will the Nansemond become clean enough to support an oyster population that can be counted upon for regular harvesting. Getting to that point will take sacrifices and hard work by folks who work on the river, by those who live along it, by people whose homes and businesses are in areas that drain into the Nansemond and by city officials making land-use policy decisions that determine how and where storm runoff winds up in the river.

The Nansemond River Preservation Alliance exists to help influence those decisions and to encourage better stewardship of the river by all those with a responsibility to preserve it for future generations.

One day, folks could once again walk into a local restaurant and be confident they’ll be able to enjoy Nansemond River oysters. But there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done before we get to that point.