Wash Cockle Fishery 2025: closed areas update

As of 0751hrs on Sunday 10 August 2025, the following revisions to closed areas within the Wash Cockle Fishery will come into effect:

• The high-density juvenile closure on the Roger will be removed; and
• The high-density closure on Pandora is revised, opening part of the area to fishing activity.

The full set of permit conditions are available here.

Alternatively, the revised closed area charts (Schedule 1) are available here.

Areas closed for the protection of high-density juvenile cockles have been closely monitored since the annual spring cockle survey to detect signs of die-off through ridging out.  Ridging out is where cockles in high densities force each other out of the sediment as the grow and compete for space. On occasion, ridging out can lead to significant losses of cockles from the stock.

Enabling fishing activity within these areas potentially reduces the density of cockles (reducing the likelihood of ridging out) and makes cockles available to the fishery which would otherwise be lost.

The high-density juvenile cockle areas on the Roger sand are considered to be particularly vulnerable because they are present in a very dense and consistent sheet (rather than ‘patches’ of high density cockles which is more common) and because the area has attracted spat settlement. At the most recent site visit, signs that ridging out was occurring were observed and the risk that high number of cockles will be lost is high. In addition, cockle spat is considered more likely to survive and resettle if fished prior to it growing further. As such it is considered appropriate to open the area to fishing as soon as possible.

During a visit to Pandora, it was identified that the high-density juvenile area is limited to only part of the closed area currently in place. In addition, spat has settled throughout the box. The closed area has therefore been revised to better protect the high-density juvenile cockles.