Clam digger Chris Warner inspects the net protecting one of the 70 clam-growing plots at his experimental clam farm at Heal Eddy in Georgetown.

Clam digger Chris Warner pulls newly dug softshell clams from the mud of Heal Eddy in Georgetown.

Hatchery-born clams like this one betray their ancestry. The white section of the shell dates back to when clam was still in the hatchery, where the mineral content of the water differed.

John Hagan, president of the Manomet Center for Conservation Sciences, says of the clam farm in Georgetown, “Turns out the technological problem wasn’t that big – I think we solved it – but then we bumped into a social and cultural challenge we didn’t see coming.”