New Haven Register (Sunday) (New Haven, CT)
State imposes new restrictions on whelk harvest
Carnivorous snails known to many shore-dwellers for their spiraled shells and use in scungilli salad are on the decline in Long Island Sound, regulators say. That has prompted Connecticut to impose new harvest restrictions on whelk — and drawn the ire of local fishermen.
The new regulations set to go into effect in August include the state’s first-ever size requirements on whelk, which fishermen say will require them to toss roughly 40 percent of the smaller snails they catch back into the water. The Department of Energy and Environmental Protection is also setting new standards for the kinds of traps used to harvest whelk and prohibiting fishermen from setting or tending traps at night.
Fishermen say the new rules represent a stark turnaround for state regulators, who have historically applied few limits on the fishery and even treated whelk as pests that harmedthe state’s shellfish industry by preying on clams and oysters.
“We never had any regulations,” said Bart Mansi, a fisherman in Guilford who has harvested whelk for over 45 years. “As a matter of fact, when we first started, it was against the law to throw them back. So no matter what we caught, what size they were, (it was) the law that they had to be taken out of the water.”
DEEP officials, meanwhile, contend that populations of the slow-growing snails have been depleted by unregulated fishing in the Sound, and that similar size limits in other Atlantic coastline states have proven successful at managing whelk populations. In New York, fishery regulators proposed a similar set of size limits to go into effect this summer as part of a coordinated effort between officials in both states.
Bill Lucey, the soundkeeper at Save the Sound, said there is lack of scientific research on the health of whelk populations off the coast of Connecticut. But data from fishermen shows that the snails brought to market in recent years are declining in size, indicating that the overall population may be in danger.
“The bigger whelk are more valuable, so if you create a fishery that has bigger whelk and more of them in the future, then you’re making an investment for down the road by putting some restrictions in now,” Lucey said. “But, of course, the shellfishermen don’t like them … because all those (whelk) like to eat their product: oysters, clams.”
The new regulations will allow licensed whelk fishermen to remove whelk below the legal catch size from commercial shellfish beds, so long as they release the snails back into the water in areas not used to cultivate clams, oysters or other shellfish.
Whelk fishermen questioned the data that went into crafting the new regulations, but they were successful at getting DEEP to phase in the most restrictive size limits over a period of several years. Still, fisherman like Mansi said that officials have failed to consider the regulations’ impact on their businesses.
“With the rising cost of fuel and everything, I don’t even know if we’re going to be able to stay on the water,” Mansi said.
A spokesman for DEEP did not respond to a request for comment Monday seeking data on the existing whelk fishery in Connecticut.
Under the new rules, fishermen will be required to toss back whelk whose shells do not measure at least 4.75 inches in length. That requirement will eventually increase to 5.5 inches beginning in 2028. The rules apply to both species of whelk commonly caught in the Sound, channeled whelk and knobbed whelk.
Both species of whelk can grow to a maximum length of 8 or 9 inches, weighing several pounds.
Bob Guzzo, a fisherman from Stonington, focuses on catching whelks — or conchs, as he calls them, using the name for warmwater relative of whelks. The fishery is “hit or miss,” he said, depending on the year, but the whelk population in the Sound is mostly stable, albeit at a smaller scale than what it once was.
“Thirty years ago, sure, there were a lot more, you know, because no one was doing it,”
Guzzo said. “Lobsters were worth more money. No one would go after conchs for $3 a bushel.”
Beginning in the late 1990s, however, the lobster population cratered in the Sound, decimating the commercial fishery in Connecticut. Around the same time, demand for whelks began to grow in China, prompting many lobstermen to switch to catching the slow-moving snails using traps that work similarly to lobster pots.
Today, a bushel of decent-size whelks weighing 50 pounds can sell for up to $200 at the docks, Guzzo said.
“They started paying a little bit more, a little bit more, and it became a viable market for us to fish for because there was nothing else to fish for,” Mansi said. “I guess like anything else, when somebody finds out that you’re making money doing something, a predator became something that they had to manage.”
In addition to new rules pertaining directly to whelk, fishermen say they are also squeezed by other regulations that sharply limit the annual harvest of horseshoe crabs, which are one of the main sources of bait used in whelk traps.
Under the new fishery regulations adopted by DEEP, daily catch limits for horseshoe crabs will be slashed from 500 to 150, while harvesting will be prohibited altogether around the first full or new moon in June, when high tides bring the horseshoe crabs to shore in their highest numbers to spawn.
Even with the stricter regulations, fishermen avoided a possible complete shutdown of the horseshoe crab fishery that was state lawmakers had proposed, after time ran out on the legislative session before the Senate could vote on the bill.
While Guzzo said he and other whelk fishermen would likely move on to cheaper sources of bait, the new regulations on a once largely ignored fishery signaled a larger shift that Guzzo said would make it harder and less desirable to join the industry.
“I’m too old to do anything else,” said Guzzo, who is 65. “Hopefully I can fish for a few more seasons before this all goes to hell.”