weird port connections when panel crashes

[listrec munchkin magd ox ac uk (Ganesh Sittampalam)]

Every time the gnome panel crashes and takes fvwm down with
it, it produces a weird flood of port connections to the
local machine. A total of about 20-30 connections spread
across a set of ports about 30-40 wide, but a different set
each time. 

Any reason for this? The applets I have on it are the gnome
fish, a few app shortcuts, the web launcher, the bus sign,
the logoff button and a clock.