By Angela Marshall
George Carman's great-grandfather was an oyster dealer, his grandfather a fisherman and his father a bayman, doing many jobs to make a living off the water. But when it came time for the Baldwin native to take up the family trade in the late 1960s, he felt the bay industries were dead, so he joined the Marine Corps instead.
Three decades later, most of the industries are still alive -- Town of Hempstead water-related industries earned $313.5 million in 1995, according to a report by the South Shore Estuary Reserve Council -- but they are not much more than a remnant of the glorious past that shaped the South Shore.
The decline of the bay industries can't be attributed to a single problem. The causes have been numerous: overharvesting, brown tides, stormwater runoff, the creation of reservoirs, the building of bridges, recreational boating and more. Some combination of these factors led to a depletion of shellfish and finfish in Hempstead Bay and the nearby Atlantic Ocean that was so severe that many baymen were put out of business or forced to become jacks of all trade to stay afloat.
When Carman was a kid in the '50s, the oyster farming that dominated Hempstead Bay industry in the 1800s, producing 2 million bushels of oysters in 1880 alone, was already dead. "I remember running into a bay oyster or two," Carman said. "But they were infrequent and small little things. Not ever enough to bother with."
Carman watched as the marshes in south Baldwin were filled in and built up with houses. Similar expansion took place in many towns along the South Shore. He saw the dredges dig up the silt of the previously undisturbed bay bottom, and then came the signs. The area where he used to play and work -- digging for clams to pay for the prom -- were littered with signs saying the water was polluted and shellfishing was prohibited. "I remember how sad I was when I first saw one of the signs," he said. "My family had been digging clams out of those waters for hundreds of years, and now it was all over with."
Over the years, the Town of Hempstead has been able to open back up significant portions of the bay. One reason for the reduction in pollutants, according to Ron Masters, commissioner of the Department of Conservation and Waterways, was the closing of the Freeport sewage plant.
Masters also believes the situation is better monitored now that the town is able to check the water for pollution by performing tests in its own laboratory. There are 38 stations throughout the bay, which are monitored twice a month and more often after heavy rainfall. Stormwater runoff contains pesticides and other pollutants like car transmission fluid, which are washed into the bay through street drains during hard rains.
Unlike the old days, when clammers could take to the waters whenever the tide and weather permitted, they must now wait for the all-clear that the waters are once again safe from pollutants. After rains of three inches or more, all clamming areas are shut down for seven days. At other times, clammers are advised to call 897-CLAM to see if there have been closures. One of the prime functions of the Department of Conservation and Waterways is to make sure the shellfish are healthy to eat, Masters said.
Jerry Bracco doesn't believe pollution is the problem. The owner of Bracco's Clam and Oyster Bar on Woodcleft Avenue in Freeport, Bracco has been fishing the bay and the Atlantic Ocean since he was a teenager. Bracco's was once known as Captain Ben's Fish Market. Founded in 1929, it became one of the East Coast's largest operations and a supplier of the Fulton Fish Market in New York City.
When asked what he thought of the current state of the bay industries, Bracco pointed to the water behind his business, where a fishing boat lies mostly submerged. Its owner abandoned it more than a decade ago, when he could no longer make a living, and it's been there ever since. Bracco said the bay industries are "sunken and broken" just like that boat, and have been for the past 10 to 15 years. "It really got bad," he said.
Bracco blames the fallout on clamming and fishing restrictions that came too late and that have remained in effect too long. He said that if restrictions had been instituted earlier, before most of the supply was gone, they wouldn't have had to be so severe. He said most of the small fishermen and baymen were put out of business. "Only the big boats have been able to survive," Bracco added.
However, for the first time in years, Bracco has hope for the future of the bayman. "It's starting to get better now," he said. "The people that have survived the storm of conservation are starting to reap the benefits."
The fish and clams are coming back, he said. They are not at the levels seen during their heyday, but there's been enough progress to make Bracco optimistic. Now he'd like to see a lessening of the restrictions -- not to the point they once were, but enough for people to make a good living.
Albert Tuzzolo, co-owner of the Hudson Point Marina in Freeport, agrees. His father started the business in 1970. Tuzzolo and his partner, Dave Hoffman, bought it five years ago.
Tuzzolo said the continued strictness of the regulations "governs most of the hardship" faced by the bayman. "What you used to be able to catch in two or three days is now what you're allowed to catch in a whole season," he said, "which makes working on the bays very hard."
Masters said the debate about what the appropriate restrictions should be has always gone on and probably will always go on. "We consider ourselves good stewards of the bays," he said.
There are about 100 commercial clamming permits issued in the Town of Hempstead, and there are currently no restrictions on the number of permits to be issued. Each clammer is allowed to bring in six bushels a day. The clams, which start out the size of a grain of rice, must measure at least one inch from top to bottom to be harvested.
About 15 years ago, the town created a seeding program to augment natural shellfish stocks. The town purchases seed clams each year, which are grown in a nutrient-rich, predator-free environment and then transplanted to the bay. The program has been so successful, according to Masters, that the Hempstead Bay Shellfishermans' Association has donated additional seed to the town.
New York State works in a joint effort with other states and the federal government to set fishing regulations. Byron Young, a marine biologist with the state's Marine Resources department, said he is not unfamiliar with complaints about the regulations and understands the frustrations. But he believes that the state is working to balance the needs and wants of fishermen with the continued health of the different species. "Having too many fish harvested at too small a size is what got us in trouble in the first place," he said.
Young said that many of the species have been built back up here and in other nearby states, but he maintains that most are still not at self-sustaining levels. One success he pointed to was striped bass, whose catches, he said, were once restricted to fish 38 inches or larger, but the legal minimum has been lowered to 28 inches. The season has also been extended for striped bass.
Summer flounder or fluke, which has a 17-inch minimum requirement, is nearing a point where its regulations can be given another look as well, Young said. But that is not a decision that will be made overnight. He said the impact a potential regulation change might have has to be careful accessed.
Jack of all trades
Meanwhile, fishermen like Tuzzolo are branching out. He said diversification has become the key to survival for the bayman.
Tuzzolo began bait clamming about the time he took over his father's business. He called that move a home run, saying there's always a market for the clams.
Every other day, Tuzzolo's crew boards the "Papa Bear," his clamming boat, at 2:30 a.m. and heads out into the darkness for the 2 1/2-hour journey to the clamming area. They work for two hours with a dredge attached to the boat, and then make the return trip, arriving home between 10 a.m. and noon. Then a second crew takes care of processing and washing the clams, which is usually finished about 7 p.m.
"It's a tough gig," said Jack Buckman, one of Tuzzolo's crew members. Buckman, of Rockville Centre, doesn't just work for Tuzzolo. He does a bit of everything -- clamming, crabbing and net fishing -- in order to get by. He used to be an electrician, but always felt that he needed to work on the water.
"We do it because we love to do it," said Tuzzolo. He knows of people who've tried other jobs, but he just can't do it himself. "You fight a lot of aspects in this business," he said, "but we don't want to do anything else."
