Many are unaware that the Delaware Bay is a sight of one of the most amazing bird migrations in the United States. Very spring, from mid-May through mid-June, Red Knots arrive from their winter home in northern Brazil to stop and eat horseshoe crab eggs on their way to their Arctic spawning grounds, flying almost 9,000 miles. Right now, decisions are being made that will affect their success in migrating and surviving.
A little known agency called the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission (ASMFC) sets the limits of horseshoe crab harvesting. For 2022 the quota has been set at 500,000 males and zero females, because they lay the eggs. However, there is pressure to up the quota and to permit the harvesting -- great word – of females.
Looking at a horseshoe crab, I’ll bet you are wondering how it’s possible to tell the difference. Flip it over and look; female crabs have larger appendages and the first two are pinchers. What that means is that anyone harvesting them must go crab by crab. Sounds exhausting!
Prayer for the Day
The light of your revelation grows among us, O God,
A gleam of sunlight given us in the chill of February’
Forgetful of your sovereignty over our seasons and our fears,
We remain bundled in our coldness of winter days.
May we overcome our dusky gloom and erase the habits freezing our hearts
And learn the joy of compassion and the warmth of love,
We ask this in the name of him who was love itself,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
Horseshoe crabs are “living fossils”, the last survivors of a group of organisms that first appeared in the fossil record some 350 million years ago.
- The Wetlands Institute
Conservation of any endangered species must begin with stringent efforts to save its habitat by the enforcement of rigid legislation against human encroachment into parks and wildlife habitat.
- Dian Fossey, naturalist (1932- murdered 1985)
Let the sea roar, and all that fills it; the world and those who live in it.
Let the floods clap their hands, let the hills sing together for joy
At the presence of the Lord, for God is coming to judge the earth.
God will judge the earth with righteousness, and the peoples with equity.
Psalm 98: 7-9