BRUNSWICK
The Brunswick Marine Resource Committee on Wednesday extended the closure of the town’s clam flats to commercial harvesters of quahogs and softshell clams to both Saturdays and Sundays until next year.
It will be unlawful to dig, take or possess more than one peck — or two gallons — of the mollusks from Brunswick waters. The town’s ordinance had already prohibited harvesting on Sundays, which the committee extended to Sundays through June 1 earlier this year.
Wednesday’s decision bans weekend commercial harvesting until April 2015.
The closure will also give the clams additional time to reproduce. For commercial harvester Chris Green, the decision is a short-term sacrifice for a long-term gain.
“This is a direct result of Mother Nature,” said Green, who is a member of the committee, on Friday. “This is a management decision at the committee level that considers the shell stock available for the coming years.”
Most of the roughly 30 fishermen attending Wednesday’s meeting were in agreement of extending the closure, Marine Resource Officer and Harbor Master Dan Devereaux said on Friday. However, a few thought that quahog harvesting ought to have remained legal on Saturday, he said.
“The consensus is we don’t know enough about the quantities of quahogs, and it’s better to lean on the conservative side, rather than risk over-harvesting,” said Devereaux.
According to Devereaux, Brunswick had a period of between 40 and 50 years where there wasn’t a large quahog population. Changes in the ocean, however, has led to a quahog increase in the town’s intertidal waters.
There hasn’t been a scientific method to estimate the number of local quahogs, though.
The committee is now undertaking a sur- vey of quahogs in Brunswick, funded by grants totaling $25,000 issued in 2013 by the Brunswick Development Corp.
“There are so many unanswered questions,” Devereaux said. “Brunswick has really relied on softshell clam surveys to keep the population sustainable, and there’s a methodology built to determine what the harvestable quahog population is. But that’s never been done locally. We don’t know what the local growth curves are.”
That may soon change. Cursory surveys have already been conducted, said Devereaux, and excavation of the flats to measure quahog population will occur from May 17 to May 19. It may be an eight-month process to determine what the harvestable population looks like.
The committee has been exploring bringing quahogs to the shellfish markets to offset the decline in softshell clams.
Commercial diggers are usually able to bring in about two to two-and-a-half bushels of softshell clams per day. Prices for clams are typically about $75 a bushel, or about $2.50 per pound.
The softshell clam population appeared to spike in 2011, when 29,612 bushels, or about 1.5 million pounds, of softshell clams were taken. Overall, though, softshell clams in Brunswick have been declining. In 2013, the harvest fell to just over 17,000 bushels, or 850,000 pounds.
Green said that, in the long run, the extended weekend closure will make harvesters more money.
“We’re looking at longevity, as opposed to here today, gone tomorrow,” said Green.
Softshell clams under 2 inches may not be taken. Brunswick flats are facing a dearth of juvenile clams, which are unable to burrow far enough under the sand to escape the predatory and invasive green crab.
In response to a recent survey of the clam population, the Marine Resources Committee voted Feb. 11 to set the number of commercial licenses at 50, down from 57 in the previous year.
The acidification of the ocean is also having a detrimental impact on the clams.
In March, the committee decided to ban the commercial harvest of quahogs in Brunswick from December to April each year, in order to protect the species during cold months when the quahogs are most vulnerable.
Brunswick manages about 500 acres of shellfish growing areas, according to the town’s website. Commercial harvesters and recreational harvesters take more than $2 million worth of shellfish from Brunswick waters annually.
Commercial harvesting is legal year-round in Brunswick, although only a few hardcore harvesters brave the colder months, said Devereaux.
jswinconeck@timesrecord.com
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