The baby is impossibly small at 3 weeks old. Even after one year, the small figure hardly seems near the adult size it will reach. Just holding that baby in your hands, feeling it move, fosters a sense of responsibility. Naming it increases that connection. You must protect this small creature, in any way you can.
That is the rationale surrounding baby clam nurseries, where visitors can come weekly and hold the small organisms in their hands, see them eat, and, hopefully, feel a connection to the ReClam the Bay efforts going on around Barnegat Bay.
"We all have to be stewards of the bay, and we have to think about what we put into the bay," shellfish gardener Charles Brandt said.
After realizing that these are living beings, visitors often ask what they can do help the oysters and clams, Brandt said.
According to Brandt, in 2005 a version of the ReClam the Bay initiative was started by Evan Washburn, who was working toward his Boy Scout merit badge. Since then, the Rutger Marine Extension Division and the Department of Environmental Protection formed the Barnegat Bay Shellfish Restoration program, which is a more sophisticated version of what Washburn did.
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