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Clam harvests in the Great South Bay were in steep decline by the time brown tide arrived on Long Island in 1985, but this year's historically most widespread algae bloom has generated renewed concern and an unprecedented attempt to involve the federal government.
Speaking today at a Patchogue dock against a backdrop of water darkened by brown tide, Sen. Charles Schumer and Brookhaven Town Supervisor Brian Foley called on the federal Commerce Department to provide disaster relief for the Great South Bay.
Declaration of a commercial fishery failure could provide greater access to federal money for research and restoration of a bay that has still not recovered from the collapse of the hard clam population.
Congress set aside $13.9 million for research and assistance to New York and Connecticut lobstermen after the Commerce Department declared a failure of the Long Island Sound lobster fishery in 1999.
What makes the declaration sought by Schumer, Foley and local baymen different from most issued by the department is that the initial crisis here occurred more than 30 years ago. Typically, declarations are sought by state governors in response to sudden crises such as the toxic red tide blooms in 2005 that shut down New England shellfishing.
Back in its 1970s heyday, the Great South Bay was second only to the Chesapeake Bay for harvesting clams, eels and crabs, said clammer Florence Sharkey of Patchogue. "We watched it diminish so that only one of us [in her family] are still working on the water out there," Sharkey said.
Schumer said clam landings had since declined by 95 percent in the Great South Bay, dropping from 100 million bushels in 1985 to less than 5 million in recent years. He, Foley and local baymen seek the declaration based on that decades-long decline, which Foley said had cost the local economy as much as $63 million.
They also cited recurring blooms of brown tide algae, which produces a chemical that makes it hard for clams to feed and shades out the light needed by aquatic plants that provide critical habitat for young fish. Researchers are concerned that this year a bloom of unprecedented scope and intensity that has clouded waters from Massapequa to Shinnecock could do further harm to the shellfish that remain.
"If we don't act fast, the damage could be irreversible," Schumer said.
No statute of limitations exists for declaring a fishery failure. But officials with the National Marine Fisheries Service, the division of the Commerce Department that reviews such requests, said they were revising the rules to clarify the parameters for determining disasters.
"I would say back when the trend was first noticed, that's the time to request some kind of assistance with the commercial fishery," said Steve Aguzin, a fisheries service management and program analyst. "Over the course of 10 to 20 years, if it [fishery landings] drops significantly and it's never returned, I'm sure that these fishermen probably found another livelihood."
Bayman George Rigby, 49, of Moriches, said the number of clammers working the South Shore had dwindled to little more than a handful since he began fishing commercially in 1974, when thousands had permits to clam. Those who remain in the business have had to expand their horizons, harvesting in waters all along the North and South shores.
He said he wants Commerce to declare a fishery failure because it could provide grant money for more research. The letter Schumer's office faxed to Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez yesterday is just the first step in the process. It also involves an extensive review of harvest and economic data to determine whether the declaration is warranted.
Aguzin of the National Marine Fisheries Service said such data are usually supplied by the state seeking the declaration. A Schumer spokesman said his office had not yet sent those numbers but would supply them as requested.
6 years ago
