Scallop season opens with a whimper: But scientists see glimmers of hope for better days
On Monday, at Shelter Island’s Congdon Creek, a Great Blue Heron flew over the dock against the pink sky at dawn.
The weather was perfect for scalloping, but when opening day for bay scallops in New York State waters commenced at sunrise, there was a problem; the absence of scallops in the Peconic bays.
The die-off of adult, and even some of the juvenile scallops, was so pronounced that commercial baymen didn’t even bother putting dredges on their boats, and the few who did venture out were fishing for something else.
Tim Sweat, a bayman out of Greenport who over the years developed a reputation for doggedness and determination that resulted in at least an opening day bushel or two even in terrible years, was defeated on Monday.
“I’m not scalloping, not until everything dwindles down,” he said, referring to the sentimental, recreational fishermen who fill the bays on opening day in hopes of catching enough for dinner.
This year, from Orient Harbor to the Cedar Light, even scallopers for auld lang syne came up empty.
Wayne King is well into his 80s and says he may be the oldest bayman on Shelter Island still able to haul a dredge.
Mr. King and his wife Donna set out a little bit after sunrise on Monday to see what they could find, unloading about three-quarters of a bushel when they returned to the dock around 3 p.m.
Ms. King estimated only one out of every four hauls produced any scallops, but the sun was shining, and it was pleasant on the water. Mr. King said it seemed like a greater haul-to-scallop ratio to him, but was pleased that they made it home with enough for dinner. They planned to go out again on Tuesday.
On Shelter Island, Sawyer Clark is one of the very young baymen to make a living catching fish in much the same way as his father, uncles and grandfather did. For most of the 20th century and two decades of the 21st, scalloping was a welcome income boost in the winter months. This year, Mr. Clark said he didn’t know of any commercial baymen scalloping on opening day. He made the rounds of his conch pots instead.
At Southold Fish Market, owner Charlie Manwaring needed two words to describe the single bushel of scallops he was able to get by Monday afternoon, “It sucks.”
Keith Reda, manager at Braun’s in Cutchogue had no Peconic bay scallops at all, although he expects to see some out of Moriches later in the week.
“A fisherman gets up every day to make money, to get fish, he said. “I feel like if bay scalloping looked promising, you’d get a few guys to go, especially because the weather was pretty nice.”
Mr. Reda is skeptical about efforts to restore the bay scallop population in the Peconics. “I think we should stop trying to help because we are obviously not doing the right thing,” he said. “Maybe it’s just Mother Nature making a correction. I hate to be that guy, but maybe we should just quit meddling.”
Biologist Harrison Tobi at Cornell Cooperative Extension (CCE) in Southold and Dr. Bassem Allam at the Marine Animal Disease Laboratory (MADL) at Stony Brook University see their bay scallop restoration efforts as working hand in hand with nature to understand why some scallops survive long enough to be harvested.
The collaborative research conducted by CCE and the MADL have identified the parasite responsible for the die-offs — Bay Scallop Microsporidia (BSM) — and are starting to understand the genetic differences between the scallops that are killed by the parasite, and those that survive despite it.
Mr. Tobi says he’s optimistic, “I think we are going to have scallops again with resilient genetics,” he said. “It worked with oysters and with clams in the Chesapeake. We are taking what is already there in wild groups and I think it is going to work.”
