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Health & Fitness

Hempstead Harbor

Shellfishing in Hempstead Harbor

As a person who enjoys of our local waters to boat, fish and swim, I am aware of the improving water quality of the Long Island Sound. The opening of the waters outside of the Hempstead Harbor jetty to shellfishing after forty-years is a confirmation in our belief in the ability to restore our environment. I am pleased that the New York State DEC has certified our outer harbor to have been remediated to a level safe enough to allow the harvesting and consumption of shellfish. This is the reward of hard work by the surrounding municipalities and by environmental groups, like the Hempstead Harbor Protection Committee. Coastal bottlenose dolphins have revisited our harbor. Our children can swim reassured that the water they play in is getting cleaner and healthier.

Yet, the opening of our area to shellfishing has brought about a clam-rush as commercial fisherman beset our waters to reap this newly available bounty. Since New York State has jurisdiction of our harbor, anyone who pays a NYS permit fee may harvest shellfish (clams, oysters, mussels and scallops). Over eighty commercial fishermen, from all over the Sound and out of state, were reported onsite after the opening of our clam beds. New York State regulations require commercial fishermen to use a hand rake to sieve the bay bottom for clams; this only restricts the size of the clams collected. There is no limit to the amount of legal sized clams a commercial fisherman may take from the Long Island Sound.  In a recent Newsday article, the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation stated they have not been tracking the number of clams taken from our water. A commercial clam fisherman stated that they were harvesting so many clams that the market has been glutted with large mature clams. A large portion of the clam population is now being removed from the Hempstead Harbor. How can the managing entity, New York State, assure the proper maintenance of the shellfish population and to the health of the entire Hempstead Harbor ecosystem without supervision or knowledge of the harvest?

These clam beds have been untouched for decades, allowing the shellfish to grow to maturity. A large and mature population of shellfish contributes to the quality of the water. Clams feed on plankton by filter feeding. Each mature bivalve can filter up to three-gallons of seawater per hour. By processing water from the surrounding environment, the clams remove sediment, nutrients, and algae which can degrade our local waters. The shellfish filter these impurities and either eat them or pass them as waste that is deposited on the sea bottom. There the natural waste is harmless. The large shellfish beds contribute to the quality of water we enjoy in our harbor. They are connected to the improvement and the new certification of Hempstead Harbor. By allowing the commercial fishermen unlimited, unsupervised, year-round harvesting of shellfish, we are removing the same shellfish that contribute to a healthy ecosystem. Will we achieve certification of the outer harbor just to see the classification eventually removed by excessive over fishing?

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This clam-rush could have a direct impact on our quality of life. By removing the population of shellfish that naturally filters our waters, I fear we are returning the harbor to the conditions that contributed to the original restrictions. What will be left when the commercial clam fishermen depart because there are no more profits to be harvested from the Hempstead Harbor clam beds? Are any commercial fishermen even Glen Cove residents? Are the revenues from our waters benefiting our local economy? New York State should be actively monitoring the shellfish harvest. If the NYS Department of Conservation is not able to supervise the clam harvest, then a commercial fisherman who works in Long Island Sound coastal water should have the same restrictions that are applicable to recreational shell fishermen, one-hundred legal sized clams per day.

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