Horseshoe Crab Protection

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has moved to protect horseshoe crabs, which have experienced a decline, by giving the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation extended authority for two years to limit the harvesting of females, those at beaches where shorebirds feed on their eggs, and those that are mating, a prevalent practice. The D.E.C. already sets a quota on the taking of the ancient creatures, which has been 150,000 since 2009.

Horseshoe crabs have been a topic of discussion this summer at meetings of the East Hampton Town Trustees. “Anybody who spends time on the water has noticed a decline in horseshoe crabs,” Tyler Armstrong, a Democratic and Independence Party candidate for trustee, said at the panel’s July 28 meeting.

While he called the decline “a red flag,” he also acknowledged that baymen here rely on them for bait. Nevertheless, he asked the trustees to consider a seasonal prohibition in waters under their jurisdiction and to advise the town board to do the same for waters in Montauk, which are not. It was noted that the Brookhaven Town Board had asked the D.E.C. to ban the harvesting of horseshoe crabs in its waters, over the objections of baymen.

East End fishermen use horseshoe crabs as bait for channeled whelk (conch) and eels. Elsewhere, they are harvested for a compound in their blood that is considered invaluable for the pharmaceutical industry. A quart of horseshoe crab blood, which turns blue when exposed to air, is apparently worth an estimated $15,000.

Horseshoe crabs, which have existed for more than 300 million years, typically come ashore to spawn at high tide during the full and new moons. “That’s a time when overharvest could occur,” Deborah Klughers, a trustee, said. “That would be an easy way to limit the take. We want them to be able to lay their eggs.”

Mr. Armstrong said the species is overharvested particularly in the spring. “We should at least have a season on their harvest.” 

At the trustees’ Aug. 25 meeting, Diane McNally, the clerk, told her colleagues and Mr. Armstrong that she had spoken with Arnold Leo, secretary of the East Hampton Town Baymen’s Association. He told her that the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission did a stock assessment of horseshoe crabs in 2013, she said, with the result that a number of states, including New Jersey, Maryland, and Delaware, enacted some restrictions.

The next assessment is to be completed by December, she said, and Mr. Leo had recommended waiting until the results were available before taking action. “Only harvesting males makes a lot of sense,” she said.

“That’s what I was going to recommend, after I read the governor’s bill,” Mr. Armstrong said. “It does put good restrictions in place.” Mr. Armstrong also suggested the town’s shellfish ordinance include a distinct section on horseshoe crabs. “They’re a unique animal,” he said.

Ms. McNally asked Mr. Armstrong for his assistance in drafting a proposed amendment to the shellfish ordinance for review by the trustees, who would pass it to the town board for adoption.

Any protection of horseshoe crabs would be a positive development, Carl Safina, an ecologist and author, said. “There does seem to be widespread depletion of horseshoe crabs,” he said. “The data shows it, and anecdotally almost everybody who can remember being a kid decades ago remembers they were much more abundant.” Napeague Harbor in Amagansett, he said, “used to be really a great horseshoe crab habitat,” but has suffered from overharvesting. In the past, 10 or 12 years ago, he said, “I went on a full moon in May and saw hundreds of them, but also saw guys taking as many as they could get. Within about two years, I was finding zero adults breeding.”

Fortunately, he said, “It seems they respond well to protection: In the places where they have had better protection, populations have recovered.” He cited a 2007 ban at West Meadow Beach in Stony Brook, “where a pretty meager population has built up into a really abundant, robust population in the last five to seven years.”