Giant clams reappear off Eastern Samar

Giant clams reappear off Eastern Samar

By Ven S. Labro
Visayas Bureau
First Posted 08:29:00 03/10/2008

GUIUAN, EASTERN SAMAR—Giant clams are returning to the seabeds of Guiuan, an ancient town in Eastern Samar at the edge of the Pacific Ocean, several decades after the delectable bivalves disappeared, probably due to over-harvesting.

The comeback of the endangered clams (Tridacna gigas) was first noted in the early 1990s, when efforts to restore the coastal environment of the old town were started. Over-fishing and illegal fishing methods, like the use fine-meshed net and dynamites in the previous years almost wiped out marine life in this part of the country.

Drop

Alarmed by the resulting sharp drop in fish catch, the municipal government and the private sector worked together to save, restore and protect Guiuan’s coastal surroundings. One initiative was the establishment of the Guiuan Development Foundation Inc. (GDFI) in August 1988, which committed itself to rehabilitate the marine areas and develop the fishing industry of Guiuan and nearby towns.

The GDFI lobbied hard for the enactment by the municipal council of a fisheries ordinance that would identify marine sanctuaries.

“We started first at Bagong Banua,” recalls Margarita de la Cruz, a marine biologist who heads the foundation and teaches at the University of the Philippines in the Visayas in Tacloban City. She refers to an uninhabited islet where the GDFI established the 68-hectare Bagong Banua Marine Reserve and Fish Sanctuary in late 1991.

The islet, then devastated by dynamite fishing and other illegal fishing methods, could be reached by a 30-minute boat ride from the Guiuan town proper.

With a grant of about P200,000 from the Philippine Business for Social Progress (PBSP), the GDFI started enclosing the Bagong Banua area and seeding it with abalone, sea cucumber and tap shells, among others. “Our seeding was working, so we removed the enclosure so that marine life could spread out. After five years, the corals started to grow,” De la Cruz says.

Marine hatchery

After a few more years, many corals, including species that the foundation did not plant, appeared.

De la Cruz also brought to the sanctuary several giant clams from the UP Marine Science Institute in Pangasinan, where she took her doctorate. “These clams had come from the Solomons Islands,” she says, adding that more than a hundred of the yearlings were seeded in Bagong Banua.

She says it is easy to seed the clams because they stay put in their places. “At first, we thought the clams could be a livelihood of people’s organizations,” she says, referring to the groups that the GDFI formed in Guiuan and nearby towns. “But we found this to be not feasible because it takes years for clams to grow or mature.”

In 1993, the GDFI put up a marine hatchery and research station, in collaboration with the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources, at the BFAR compound in Guiuan. The facility has been spawning giant clams and abalone, among others.

Today, Bagong Banua is teeming with marine life. Sturgeons, butterfly fish and other species frolic in the clear waters. The giant clams are also reproducing.

Digging ban

Guiuan has regained its marine resources, and it is now widely known for its abundant marine products. But it has forever lost the indigenous giant clams that the early inhabitants consumed to extinction. Only their fossilized shells remind people of their existence.

Bigger than bicycle wheels, some of the shells were unearthed a few years ago off Calicoan Island in Guiuan and reportedly sold in town and even as far as Cebu and Manila for P500 to P1,000 each. Fortunately, the digging of the shells has been banned.

The shells are also used as decoration, jewelry and even as baptismal and holy water fonts in churches.

Giant clams usually breed after seven years, De la Cruz says. “The population of clams [may have] declined because it takes time for them to grow, but then it is easy to harvest or get them out of the sea. So, it easily became depleted,” she explains.

De la Cruz, who is married to a native and has been residing in Guiuan for about two decades, recalls a folk tale about “very big” clams that could even contain a newborn or very young calf of a carabao (water buffalo).

Giant clams can grow to more than 1.5 meters and weigh more than 250 kilograms. Although they are called “giant,” there is a need to protect the bivalve mollusks from people who seek their meat and shell.