Still, the fisheries commission in May approved new best management practices for the biomedical industry’s harvesting and handling of the crabs. Those include minimizing exposure to sunlight and keeping crabs cool and moist, Starks said.
Blair said the industry is working toward a synthetic alternative - an outcome conservationists have been pushing for years. However, for now the wild harvest of horseshoe crabs remains critically important to drug safety, Blair said. One of the most important ecosystems for horseshoe crabs is the Delaware Bay, an estuary of the Delaware River between Delaware and New Jersey. The bay is where the crabs breed and the red knots feed.
Niles and volunteers he organizes have been counting the horseshoe crab eggs since the 1980s and tagging birds since the 1990s. In mid-June, as he was wrapping up this year’s tracking in southern New Jersey, he described the eggs as “good and consistent” through the month.