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@dantheclamman @dacig this area had underlying bed rock. The depressions that the clams were in had various but limited sediment depth. If someone came and dug out a hole and didn't put the sediment back, and took every clam, that pocket was done for 5 years or more before it could recover.

People thought I was unfriendly because I did not openly share my "luck". But I tended my spot like a human would, not a tourist, and sometimes spent an extra 1/2 hour filling in other peoples' holes.

@dantheclamman @dacig I very purposely did not talk to people who approached me, because they viewed what I did as random luck and the resource as requiring no maintenance. Sometimes I found pockets that were devastated. Dead clams, broken shells. A pocket of gravel that is now too shallow to support growth, while the clams under the next pocket where they dumped the sediment have suffocated.

Theoretically the clams will always make a come back, but this spot was the one I could access readily.

@dantheclamman @dacig it required maintenance to continue to be productive. If a human was going to harvest here, it required human care to recover.

I planned on continuing this into my old age.

There is, of course, a tragedy here. Butters hold onto paralytic shellfish toxin for as long as a year. It was discovered in that species. The area of the coast I can get too has had significant warming, and a significant toxin out break every year for the past 3 years.

@dantheclamman @dacig the state I live in doesn't even test bay clams anymore. And they almost never tested butters. But if mussels or razor clams have been closed near my bay, in the last year, the butters are probably still holding the toxin, longer than any other.

So other people got me anyway, through global warming. Unsustainable excess, imagining no consequences.

I have been poor my whole life. I was legit counting on that protein and my expertise to help me through my retirement.

@dantheclamman @dacig oh. And the cockles have run out for most people too.

@dantheclamman another story, just for you, but written so anyone can share it.

How on Earth did they run out of cockles? Cockles are a fairly mobile clam. They hide an enormous foot in their shell, have almost no 'neck' (siphon), and are found either just barely buried in the sand and mud, or they are on the surface on their side. The later is because they use this enormous foot to push themselves around when they feel conditions are not perfect.

@dantheclamman I have followed a 15 foot trail on a mud flat leading up to the cockle who made it. And I have seen this foot extended as a clam tried to push its way out of a bucket. It can extend to 3 times the width of the shell.

They should be able to repopulate themselves on this clamming bed fairly rapidly. Cockles feeling crowded in deeper water could push themselves to shallower water and rebury themselves.

Places humans can't access should be able to repopulate places where they can.

@dantheclamman well, good sized butter clams, my favorite, are a fairly low tide event. -1 ft at least.

Tides on days of -.6 are clamable, but poor. And those days are more common. I realized that our ancestors (I'm white, but we all had ancestors) would have adapted their hunting technique to what was accessible.

So I looked at the tools available, bought a clamming rake with a built in basket, took my waders, and started clamming on marginal low tide days for cockles. Wading and digging.

@dantheclamman standing in 3 feet of water with waders and a digging rake is something that is harder to hide than tending a particular patch of gravel with a shovel. And my clamming bag, hanging around my waist, showed other people the number (20 is the local limit) and size of what I was getting. And I was digging in deeper water than the people just surface gathering at lowest tides could reach.

So I was doing really well, well above average, and it created a lot of imitators.

@dantheclamman so clamming rakes with a basket, for digging and scooping cockles from well underwater, became a trend. Gear that was recommended at the local sporting goods store. In a year they were up to $65.

Other people started wading and hitting the cockles hard, in groups of 4 people or more, and they were not gathering on marginal tides. On the deepest tides they were still wading and raking cockles out of the eel grass, where cockles like to snuggle up against the roots.

@dantheclamman so, the wadder people were harvesting cockles in deeper water, & digging up the eel grass, in unsustainable numbers. It spread as a Facebook trend, bragging. I saw 20 or more people doing it on tides where I was focusing on butter clams.

And after 3 years, the local population of cockles collapsed. I couldn't even fill a 20 cockle limit on a -1 foot tide.

I'm sure it will recover. But the number of clammers also collapsed, & I hope the city doesn't close & sell the parking lot.

@Urban_Hermit @dantheclamman Cities don't usually work that fast ;) Hopefully this is not an exception.

@dantheclamman when people do not earn their experience the hard way, they rarely take the time to consider sustainability.

The eel grass is making a comeback.