Manual and traditional shellfishing is not incompatible with the use of new technologies to optimize the exploitation of resources. An example of this is the razor clam sector, which has been working with scientific staff for years to develop tools that allow the extraction process to be optimized and made more sustainable. In fact, after a previous experience carried out in the Pontevedra estuary, the University of Vigo and the Ministry of the Sea joined forces in a three-year project on the spatial variability of the razor clam reproductive cycle in the Vigo estuary and its application to fisheries management.
In this project, led by the CIMA of Corón, researchers from the Marine Research Center, both from the EcoCost group and the Ecimat, and from the atlanTTic Information Technologies Group participate on behalf of the University of Vigo. The purpose is to support the management of the razorfish fishery, studying, among other biological parameters, spatial heterogeneity in reproduction through simple study methods that can be reproduced in the guilds. The data obtained through these methods, based on the macro and microscopic characteristics of the gonad, will be continuously entered by the razorfishers, technical assistance from the guilds and biologists and managers of the Department in an App. The aim is to create a tool, developed for both computers and mobile devices, that allows all those involved in the exploitation and management of the resource to visualize the reproductive status of the resource in the different banks and thus identify the best time and place to work, reducing as much as possible the closure periods and the discards of specimens produced by the breakage of the foot when extracting in the moments after the main spawning, a process known as capamento.
More than a year and a half since the start of the study, both the scientific staff of the University of Vigo and the sailors, the staff of the guilds, biologists from the Ministry of the Sea and researchers from CIMA are already collecting data, analyzing information, developing the computer tool and participating in training workshops, which take place at the Ecimat.
Sustainable exploitation for a strategic species
In Spain, razor clams are one of the six most important commercial species of bivalve molluscs, and are mainly exploited in Galicia, but most small-scale or artisanal fisheries do not have the detailed information necessary to understand the true state of the resource and lack scientific guidance to help in decision-making, which is why researchers insist that “it is necessary for us to provide the sector with simple management tools previously validated by scientific methods”. It is in this context that the project was born, which brings together the knowledge and efforts of the scientific community and the administration, which are currently studying the variability of the reproductive cycle, the size of the first spawning and the fecundity of razor clams in the Vigo estuary from the innermost banks (Rande) to the outermost (Cíes Islands). In parallel, atlanTTic researchers are developing a platform for visualizing the reproductive status of the resource in the different banks that includes a remotely accessible database server, a process server and input/output web pages for shellfish gatherers, technical assistance and area biologists, for Android and iOS mobile phones and desktop computers. “This tool will allow visualizing the reproductive status in the different banks that are being exploited in order to introduce this biological criterion in decision-making on the opening or closing” of each area.
Project based on a previous study
This project stems from a previous study carried out in the Pontevedra estuary and coordinated by Elsa Vázquez and Gonzalo Macho, from the Ecocost group, in which the researcher from the Marine Research Center Alba Hernández did her doctoral thesis. Part of the results of this study allowed “to develop a simple management tool that allows the gonadal state of the resource to be adapted to its exploitation, through the use of two fast, cheap and reproducible techniques by technical assistance that provide information on the reproductive state of the razor clam”, highlights the scientist. Its use allowed the closure to be reduced to one month due to the difference in the beginning and duration of the reproductive cycle between the different banks of the Pontevedra estuary. The results achieved in the Vigo estuary will allow the methods used in the Pontevedra estuary to be improved and validated. The tool may be taken into consideration for the application of these and other similar tools in the rest of the bivalve fisheries in Galicia.
Workshops at Ecimat
Within the project’s work plan, in addition to sampling and laboratory studies, a series of practical workshops are being developed. The last of these was held this Friday in Toralla with the participation of more than twenty people, including razorfishers from the Moaña and Ribeira guilds, technical assistance from several guilds in Galicia, area biologists and managers from the Consellería do Mar. During the day, the methods used to easily determine the reproductive status of razorfish were reviewed and explored in depth, the preliminary results of the biological cycle in the Vigo estuary and the current state of development of the computer application were presented. After the theoretical presentations, the participants debated the method and the App, in order to incorporate, as far as possible, all the aspects identified by the sector that improve resource management.
Two other workshops will be held in 2020, the first of which will focus on displaying and discussing the final data from the reproductive cycle study and presenting the generated platform, which will already be used by the sector as a test since the end of this year. The last workshop will serve to monitor the application in order to fine-tune it before it is made available to all its users. The platform will be open to all actors involved in the exploitation and management of the razorfish fishery throughout Galicia and will be managed by the Ministry of the Sea itself.
The research activity of the EcoCost group (CIM-UVigo) and the dissemination and transfer activities of the Center have the support of the Xunta de Galicia and the European Union, through their co-financing under the FEDER/FSE Galicia 2014-2020 Operational Program.
