Hochul should sign legislation to protect horseshoe crabs

The longevity of horseshoe crabs is astonishing. They have been around for 450 million years, predating dinosaurs by some 200 million years, and have survived multiple mass extinction events. At this point, they're considered "living fossils."

Nearly as astonishing would be Gov. Kathy Hochul's refusal to ensure their continued survival.

Horseshoe crabs have been declining for at least 15 years, according to the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission. Populations considered "good" in 2009 dropped to "poor" in 2019. The culprits have been habitat loss and unsustainable harvesting. Noted ecologist Carl Safina, a professor at Stony Brook University, says more than 4 million horseshoe crabs have been killed in Long Island waters alone since 2000.

Why should you care about this primitive-looking species? Besides the innate desire humans feel to protect our connections to the past — in this case, the ancient past — horseshoe crabs today are also a keystone species in the food web. The protein-rich eggs females lay on seashores each spring feed millions of migrating birds, including the federally threatened red knot, and adult crabs are food for federally endangered loggerhead turtles. Balance is critical for ecosystems to survive.

A bill passed this year by the State Legislature would prohibit the taking of horseshoe crabs for commercial and biomedical uses. It's a bill Hochul must sign. But the measure is opposed by the fishing industry and some pharmaceutical companies. Their arguments are not convincing.

Fishers only catch horseshoe crabs to cut them up and use them as bait to catch conch and eel. Environmentalists sensibly point out that green crabs, an invasive species that have become a problem in Long Island Sound, also can be used as bait. Targeting green crabs instead seems like a win-win.

Pharma likes horseshoe crabs because their blood contains a clotting agent sensitive to infection-causing bacteria. The blood is used to test injectable drugs and implant products like knee and hip replacements. Unfortunately, up to 20% of crabs captured for this purpose die during the bloodletting. Now there is a synthetic alternative that's being used in Europe, which doesn't have horseshoe crabs, and it's been approved for use in the U.S. Eli Lilly and Pfizer are among the companies that already have made the switch.

Nevertheless, this dual lobby seems to have Hochul's ear, not a good look for a governor who wants to be more responsive to Long Island. Her apparent hesitancy comes despite Connecticut and Massachusetts adopting similar bans on horseshoe crab harvesting in the past 15 months. New Jersey passed its moratorium in 2008. Even renowned conservationist Jane Goodall has implored Hochul to approve the bill in a letter that rightly cited "a sense of shared responsibility for the natural world." Failing to sign the legislation would ravage any claim the governor could make to being a protector of our environment.

For 450 million years, horseshoe crabs have persevered. Gov. Hochul should honor that legacy.