Largest Clam Countdown

    The East Hampton Town Trustees will hold the 23rd Largest Clam Contest on Sunday at noon at the Donald Lamb Building in Amagansett.

    The annual event will include a clam chowder competition, judged by writers from The Star and featuring both Manhattan and New England-style variations on the delicacy, chowder and clams on the half shell for all, and a display of the Dongan Patent, the 1686 document that created the trustees and granted them authority over the Town of East Hampton.

    A prize will be awarded to both the adult and child submitting the largest clam dug from each of four waterways — Lake Montauk, Accabonac Harbor, Three Mile Harbor, and Napeague Harbor. An additional prize awaits the holder of the largest overall specimen.

    Through Saturday, contestants can take their entry to the Seafood Shop in Wainscott, Stuart’s Fish Market in Amagansett, or Gosman’s Fish Market in Montauk. Documentation including their name and the date and waterway from which the clam was harvested will be recorded. On Sunday, the trustees will weigh and measure each quahog. Following the competition, the bivalves will be returned to the waters whence they came.

    The competition’s intent, said Diane McNally, the trustees’ clerk, “is to promote local shellfish and encourage the next generation to go shellfishing.” The trustees will take a moment before the winners are announced, Ms. McNally said, to introduce themselves and explain their role in the town’s governance.

    Will a larger quahog than last year’s winner, the two-pound-nine-ounce behemoth dug from Napeague Harbor by Linda Calder, be unearthed? The answer will be known on Sunday.