Shared concern for a healthy estuary
Soft-shell clams in the estuaries of Plum Island Sound have been struggling for decades, but recently, shellfishers have had an increasingly hard time pulling a harvest. Shellfishers noticed these losses from their low catches. Through long term surveys of food web structure, LTER scientists were also aware of changes in clam abundance and even absence at some monitoring sites in the estuaries and marshes that fringe Plum Island Sound. But until recently, these two groups – those who study the estuary and those who work in it daily – had little direct communication, even though they were both aware of the changes in the estuaries.
The Plum Island Ecosystem (PIE) LTER hosted its first listening session to try and bridge the gap between these groups. In October, over fifty attendees, including shellfishers, scientists, and resource managers, gathered in a local pub to acknowledge one another’s’ concerns, insights, and needs for issues in the Sound. This meeting put shellfishers at the center of the conversation while researchers sat back and listened. For many, it was their first introduction to the PIE LTER. For scientists, it was a hard sought and rare opportunity to hear directly from those working in the estuary every day.
The session was part of a larger effort supported through the Advancing Public Engagement Across LTERs’ (APEAL) project to strengthen connections between LTER scientists and the communities living in and around the ecosystems scientists work so hard to study.
Credit: Erin Johnson
The need for connection
The Plum Island Ecosystem LTER site is the largest expanse of intertidal marsh in New England and it’s home to a huge variety of birds, fish, and shellfish, including commercially important soft-shell clams and oysters. Scientists have been living near and collecting data on the marshes, estuaries, and ocean ecosystems since 1998 when the LTER was established. Soft-shell clams have been harvested in the same area for thousands of years by the Pennacook-Abenaki Peoples and shellfishing remains a prominent activity and livelihood in the local community today.
However, despite sharing space and deep connection to these waterways, communication between LTER scientists and local shellfishers has been scarce. “We realized that we had little direct interaction with the community that actually works on the waterways of the marshes and estuaries we study,” explains Jane Tucker, a researcher and outreach professional at PIE. Shellfishers are a critical group to connect with because they are an important part of the local economy, neighbors to the local ecosystem, and “they also have a strong interest in what happens out there,” says Jane.
To address this gap, Jane Tucker and Anne Giblin, the lead Principal Investigator for the site, drafted an idea to host a listening session with the hope that LTER scientists could better understand local concerns and identify common ground where connections could be made. The listening session was made possible with seed funding from the Advancing Public Engagement Across LTERs (APEAL) project which supports a Public Engagement with Science (PES) Working Group that PIE LTER and several other sites across the network are a part of.
As part of the APEAL project, PIE worked with other sites and an advisory team to develop and test evidence-based public engagement with science strategies (PES) strategies within the LTER. The overarching goal of APEAL is to develop common strategies that can be used in other STEM research organizations. To do so, the APEAL project funds events such as the PIE listening session. Then, they use these events as case studies, studying their effectiveness and impact. With this track record of demonstrated impact, APEAL hopes their work will expand engagement efforts across LTER sites by encouraging scientists to build meaningful connections with local communities.
The community comes first
“Our goal”, Jane explains, “was to get some of the shellfishing community together in a room with us (the scientists), as well as representatives from management and regulation.” Engaging with an entirely new group of people is nerve-wracking and introducing multiple new groups to each other is even more so, as Jane shares, “Going in there’s a fear that you would just open it up and there’d be silence”. But Jane remained determined because, she explains, “We were told if we pulled this off, it would be the first time anyone had managed to get all of these groups in a room together”.
Engaging a new community isn’t easy. Knowing this, Jane recruited local expertise and brought together a diverse planning team to ensure that their listening session was culturally responsive and conducive to discussion. The group was made up of PIE LTER scientists, resource managers, oyster farm owners, and a local entrepreneur.
Following the recommendation of Brenden Doyle, an oyster farmer, they booked The Lobster Trap, a pub and local favorite among shellfishers for the meeting venue. The date was also sensitive to their schedule, Jane explained, “we picked a day and time when the tide would be high in the evening – when the shellfishers would presumably not be working.”
Because some of the commercial shellfishers didn’t have active email addresses, Jane and her team mailed over 200 invitations and posted flyers at public boat landings and community hubs.
Credit: Jane Tucker
A last-minute surge in registrants
For weeks, registrations were slow to trickle in, raising concerns about turnout. But on the final day before the meeting, there was a flood of registrants. “At one point, I started to panic”, Jane recalls. “One person told me, ‘I tried to register this morning, but I couldn’t.’ and I said ‘I know, I had to close it’. He just said ‘Well, I came anyway!’”
In total, about 50 people showed up, which was even more attendees than Jane had hoped for. The session was designed as an open conversation, encouraging participants to ask questions, share concerns, and exchange stories. Instead of immediately presenting data, scientists took a listening-first approach, which allowed new insights to emerge naturally which might have been lost if attendees were treated as passive participants. By recognizing shellfishers as subject matter experts and potential collaborators, rather than recipients of information, everyone left having learned something new.
The outcomes are for everyone
For many attendees, this event was an introduction to the PIE LTER and for scientists, it was one of their first times listening directly to the people who work on the water every day. “It was fun”, Jane reflected, “and it was gratifying to reach out and have them become aware that we’re here and that we can be a resource to them.”
Shellfishers shared observations and concerns that were unfamiliar to researchers, including changes in local conditions and challenges affecting their industry. “They brought up things we weren’t aware of or hadn’t heard about before”, Jane recalls, “some of them are collecting and recording their own long term data, which is pretty cool”. Having a broad range of expertise in the room created a space of vibrant discussion which inspired new ideas for research that address some of the issues brought up.
Beyond the science, the event highlighted that, despite being a critical part of the local economy and ecosystem, clammers feel left behind and unsupported. While oyster aquaculture is gaining a foothold in the area, clams are facing a sudden population decline with no single known cause. Understanding whether the decline is caused by heavy predation, disease, or water quality can help inform management strategies and map out other potential effects. “We hope that our collaborative approach will help identify what those differences are and help guide efforts towards solutions”, Jane recalls.
Although clammers and LTER scientists aren’t exactly asking the same questions, the answers are still deeply intertwined and have implications for all who study, rely on, and appreciate the “Great Marsh”. In an exit survey, attendees shared that they felt heard, that the event was useful to them, and that they were interested in further engagement with PIE LTER. As Jane recalls, “The event has generated excitement across the range of stakeholders that there is new energy being directed towards support and maintenance of the shellfishery in the Plum Island Sound estuaries.”
What’s next
The event sparked ideas for research projects and collaborations that then grew into proposals and plans for summer REU projects. This would give students the chance to gain research experience while directly addressing the needs and concerns of the local shellfishers.
In response to the challenges facing the local soft-shell clam industry,PIE hosted a follow-up meeting a few months later, inviting regional expert Dr. Brian Beal from U. Maine’s Downeast Institute to engage with the group. The meeting drew in 45 attendees, including many shellfishers from the first event, along with researchers, managers, and other stakeholders.
Looking ahead, PIE hopes to build on this momentum by planning follow-up meetings, exploring new partnerships, and leveraging opportunities created by the APEAL seed grant to collaborate with the local community in supporting the health of the estuary, fishery, and local economy.
The APEAL project continues to support the growth of public engagement efforts across the Network by funding PES seed projects, facilitating knowledge sharing, and conducting research to understand how organizations think about and design PES strategies centered around community listening.
