Baymen enjoy clamming in Hempstead Harbor

Veteran Greenlawn bayman Bill Olsen usually rakes for clams in Huntington waters, but for the past two months he's traveled every weekday to Hempstead Harbor.

Olsen and other clammers have been drawn to the waters between Oyster Bay and North Hempstead after the state Department of Environmental Conservation in June opened 2,500 acres of shellfish beds for the first time in 40 years. The opening followed years of efforts to mitigate pollution from sewage treatment plants, sand mining and heavy industry.

"The area has been closed for a long time, so the amount of clams coming out of there was ridiculous," Olsen, 62, said Wednesday after he and a helper brought ashore almost 4,000 clams in 35 bags, despite conflicting winds and tide that hampered their efforts.

The lure of untapped clambeds was so strong that on the first day 80 boats were out on the harbor. Some state-licensed baymen even flew in from Florida for the first day.

"It was a good run for about a month, and then it slowly dwindled" to the point that a half dozen to two dozen clammers are still working the area, said James Schultz of Bayville, president of the North Oyster Bay Baymen's Association.

The downside of the long-unworked waters was that many of the clams had grown very large because the area had been closed so long, Schultz said.

"The market doesn't want big clams this time of year," he said. "With the heat, most people want littlenecks on the half shell as opposed to top necks and cherrystones that people use for chowder and sauces."

Olsen, 62, a bayman for 30 years, said, "There was such a glut of large clams [from Hempstead Harbor] that after two weeks a lot of the buyers didn't even want to buy them because they couldn't sell them. Now it's thinned out and the glut is over. I stayed here because I can still do pretty well, and it's still better than Huntington."

He said he works with his daughter's boyfriend, Joe Jackson, who culls and bags clams so Olsen can continue to rake.

The DEC has not been tracking the number of clams taken from Hempstead Harbor but will do so eventually, agency spokesman Bill Fonda said. The towns of Oyster Bay and North Hempstead, City of Glen Cove and Nassau County Police Department have created a Clam Enforcement Task Force to monitor activity.

Mal Nathan, North Hempstead senior bay constable, said task force members have been checking permits and ensuring the baymen are not violating minimum-size limits. There is no limit on the number of clams that can be taken if they are of sufficient size.

Olsen said he will continue raking in Hempstead Harbor, at least into the fall, when higher winds and seas may become a problem.

"There's still plenty of clams to stay there," he said. "It's all working out very well."