Only Crab Harvest Moratorium Can Save Shorebird
Red Knot and Horseshoecrab, originally uploaded by b52starr.
In the early 1960s, Rachel Carson wrote “Silent Spring,” an important book that helped increase public concern for the environment. The work was most directly about the dangers and effects of irresponsible, uninformed pesticide use. Carson’s broader message — the one that resonated with the public around the world — was about the failure to take care of the environment with which humanity has been entrusted.
Carson painted a picture of a silent spring — devoid of the beauty of bird songs because of society’s widespread use of deadly pesticides. The moral of her story had many layers: about humanity’s responsibility to care for the Earth and its resources; about the duty to be informed about our choices; and about the consequences of putting short-term, profit-driven desires ahead of our obligations to future generations.A parallel story to Carson’s cautionary tale is being played out today along the shores of the Delaware Bay. The horseshoe crab, a creature more than 350 million years old, is the trademark inhabitant of Delaware Bay; the bay is the epicenter of the horseshoe crab population. This ancient mariner is a keystone creature for the estuary. Many other animals thrive because of its presence. It is the foundation of a globally unique ecological relationship with migratory shorebirds.
The Delaware Bay is one of four major shorebird migration stopovers in the world. Just a decade ago, more than 1.5 million birds congregated on the bay shores. One of these birds, the red knot, makes an incredible 10,000-mile journey from its winter home at the tip of South America to the Arctic. This shorebird depends almost exclusively on horseshoe crab eggs to complete its migration. The horseshoe crab obligingly lays its eggs on the bayshore beaches at the time of the birds’ arrival.
The red knot population visiting the Delaware Bay has been steadily declining since the 1990s. In the 1980s, they numbered more than 150,000. In 2004, there were a mere 13,315. This rapid decline is due to a shortage in their food supply, resulting from excessive and unrestricted harvesting of the horseshoe crabs for fishing bait. At this rapid rate of decline, leading shorebird experts believe the red knot will be extinct by 2010 without immediate action to protect the horseshoe crab, also on a course of decline due to the overfishing.
While a series of steps has been taken over recent years to address this ecological crisis, state and federal decision-makers, including state Environmental Commissioner Bradley M. Campbell, have stopped short of fully protecting the horseshoe crabs and migratory shorebirds. Only by taking the definitive step of enacting an ongoing moratorium on the harvest of horseshoe crabs until science tells us that both species are recovered can we secure their future.
State and federal officials have failed to take this action because they have put the short-term, profit-driven desires of a small number of part-time, commercial crab harvesters ahead of their obligation to protect the horseshoe crab and red knot. When the overharvesting results in a silent spring along the Delaware Bay, the commercial operators will simply move on to another target, oblivious to the lesson Carson tried to impart and leaving the rest of us with a life diminished by the absence of these intrepid travelers.
Acting Gov. Codey and Campbell have an opportunity to fully protect one of the irreplaceable natural resources of the Delaware Bay by enacting a full moratorium on horseshoe crab harvesting. Money can compensate fishermen for lost revenue — an action supported by the American Littoral Society and other environmental groups. Only a strong public demand for Codey and Campbell to take this action will make it happen. Once the ancient horseshoe crab and intrepid red knot are gone, no amount of money can bring them back. Extinction is forever.
By Timothy P. Dillingham, executive director of the American Littoral Society, a coastal conservation group based in Highlands.
Asbury Park Press – June 22, 2005