BDN, WVII interview Beal about Maine’s clam industry

The Bangor Daily News and WVII (Channel 7) spoke with Brian Beal, a professor of marine ecology at the University of Maine at Machias, for reports on the state’s soft-shell clam industry. Beal, who also serves as director of the Downeast Institute for Applied Marine Research and Education, has worked over the past few years with clam diggers and the Maine Clammers Association to try to identify specific causes for the decline in soft-shell clams, the BDN reported. A study co-written by Beal indicates that predators are the biggest reason why Maine’s soft-shell clam population has declined sharply in recent years, the article states. Raising clams in enclosures that protect them from being eaten by other creatures could go far in boosting the number of clams harvested in the state, according to researchers. “Clammers today are hunter and gatherers,” Beal told the BDN. “[The future of clamming] doesn’t look like hunting and gathering. It looks like farming.”