The next razor clam dig is Friday and Saturday at four coastal beaches.
Long Beach, Twin Harbors, Copalis and Mocrocks will be open for digs on evening low tides. No digging will be allowed at any beach before noon.
The low tide on Friday (-0.5 feet) will take place at 4:28 p.m. On Saturday, the low tide of -0.8 feet will be at 5:17 p.m.
For best results, try digging an hour or two before the low tide.
The next scheduled dig is planned during President’s Day weekend, Feb. 18-19, at Long Beach, Twin Harbors and Mocrocks.
Additional digs through spring will be announced once a catch assessment is completed for the season through February, said Dan Ayres, state coastal shellfish manager.
Digging this year has seen good days and bad days, Ayres said. He cited the Dec. 22-23 digs as an example. The first day took place under sunny skies and good surf conditions.
“Our crews hardly encountered anyone who had less than their limit of 15 clams,” Ayres said. “The coastwide average for the evening was 14.7 clams per digger with 5,900 diggers out.”
The next day, however, the winds came up, creating large waves and making digging difficult.
“Many people reported being rolled in the surf,” Ayres said. “The average catch coastwide dropped to 7.8 clams per digger trip, and that was only because digging was still good at Mocrocks – unlike everywhere else.”
So far this season, which opened in October, people have dug a little more than 650,000 clams, about 25 percent of the state’s total allowable catch.
Ayres pointed out, however, that the allowable catch on most beaches are lower this year than they’ve been for the past decade, meaning less digging opportunities, Ayres said. From October-December, the state has offered nine days of digging, compared with 14 days for the same period in 2010 and 17 days in 2009.
“The good news is ... we will very likely have a sufficient number of clams on most beaches to allow for some openers – again on most beaches – during the morning tides coming in March, April and May,” he said.
Ayres said the state is closely monitoring digs at Copalis. It started with the lowest total allowable catch and 40 percent of that has already been harvested. Because of the popularity of Copalis, it includes the Ocean Shores and Pacific Beach area, the total quota there could go quickly.
Kalaloch remains closed until April because of a low razor clam populations. The National Park Service, which manages that beach in cooperation with the state, has plans to open Kalaloch for a razor clam dig April 7-9.
