Independent person

FILE PHOTO Jeff Mercer He only stayed on Nantucket for about two years, but during those 24 months, former town biologist Jeff Mercer arguably did more for Nantucket's shellfish fisheries than anyone to hold that job before him.

Touted by marine superintendent Dave Fronzuto as "…just a wellrounded, hands-on, in-the-water kind of guy" at his hiring in spring 2007, Mercer proved to be as motivated as he was resourceful and productive. As he did in 2008 and 2007, Mercer arranged for adult scallops to be used to produce seed in off-island hatcheries to help augment the natural populations in the island's harbors. While it cost $6,500 for one million seed his first year here, Mercer connected with the National Oceanographic & Atmospheric Administration's shellfish research lab in Milford, Conn., which was glad to produce all the bay scallop seed Nantucket needed for free, including this year's batch of 1.5 million that yielded around 850,000 juvenile scallops from Mercer's propagation efforts in the marine lab at the Brant Point boathouse. And he found areas of the harbor to designate as no-fishing seed sanctuaries to raise this seed to harvestable size.

He developed the weekly catch report that scallopers use to record bushels caught, pounds, seed and its size seen, duration and location of fishing, and how many dredges used. Mercer was also instrumental in helping hatch the 2.5-inch measurement up scallop shells to determine legally harvestable size. And Mercer diligently surveyed the Nantucket Harbor bottom many times a year, diving along prescribed transects to get a clear sense of how much seed and how many adults scallops were in the harbor. I