I poked the eye of the hermit crab who had been enticed by the smashed blue mussel in a pool of warm tidal water. The crab promptly shrunk from view into its host shell. A few seconds later, two stalked eyes peered out from under the periwinkle home, and a pair of antennae twitched furtively in the water.

The allure of mussel meat swirling in the water was too tempting for the crab to resist. I watched the hungry crab scurry towards the bait; however, it was not my quarry. I waited as the hermit crab gorged on the succulent flesh of the exposed mussel. Soon, more hermit crabs succumbed to temptation.

In what seemed to be forever, my patience was rewarded when a green crab cautiously sidled out from the rocky wreck of a breakwater. The dark brown and mottled green-colored crab towered over the hermits as it ripped the flesh from the shell. I waited until I thought the new crab was fully engaged in its free-found meal, and I plunged my hand into the water.

A Benny’s yellow plastic bucket with a white plastic handle became the new temporary holding tank for the hapless crab. When several crabs had been coaxed from their rocky lair and plopped into my bucket, I ran splashing through the tidal surge of Alewife Cove to my parents’ blanket near lifeguard tower three of Ocean Beach. I was a small browned boy making a beeline from the water across the blinding white sand, swinging a bucket full of dizzy green crabs back to my parents for the perfunctory “oohs and aahs.”

Alewife Cove provided hours of entertainment for my entire family. My first memories of beachgoing in New London — at Ocean Beach — always included a trip to “The Cove.” New London’s Ocean Beach and Waterford Beach were bisected by the tidally dominated estuary where the fresh headwaters were derived from the dammed Fenger Brook on the back side of apartments on Niles Hill Road.

At the mouth, the powerful incoming and outgoing tidal currents were, at first, a barrier between the two beaches. As I became older, the once frightening but now inviting currents provided hours of entertainment. We grabbed our masks and snorkels from our family encampment, and yelled over our collective shoulders: “Goin’ to tha’ Cove!”

We padded barefoot through the marsh up the water’s edge, sometimes as far as the Ridgewood bridge on the back side of Ocean Beach. We jumped into the warmth of an outgoing tide, facedown, masks in the swirling water. We gave ourselves to the powerful tidal draw down the Coves’ sinewy course through the salt marshes. We drifted in our own “Lazy River” nature ride past the backside of the beaches unseen, and wholly ignored.

Tumbling seaweeds travelled along with us. Occasionally, schools of mummichog, menhaden, alewife and silverside minnows would scatter from under our dead man floating forms. I couldn’t imagine what that must have looked like, all face down, yelling in unison through our snorkels as we saw sea life swimming below.

As we grew, so did our ambitions, and we would continue our planktonic drift — but subversively now, under the ever whistle-blowing lifeguard’s watch. Mostly we were caught, but if we were careful we could elude the “scree” of the guard’s whistle and follow the drift past the rock jetty, and swim to the Waterford side out to the rocky islands.

At 10 years old I bought a frog spear trident tip, found an old broken broom handle and affixed the spear to the tapered end, and rubber tubing to the other. I would swim out to the Shore, Middle and Cormorant rocky islands and hunt the crevices for blackfish, flounder and cunners. If I was lucky enough to spear one, I stuffed it into an old onion bag and brought it home so that my mother could show me how to clean the fish. I’ve never tasted anything better.

Junior high school in Waterford hosted the Oceanology Club run by Dave Scott and John Scilleri. It was official: I was “hooked.”

I was surrounded by adults and like-minded students who all shared common experiences, and a love for all things marine. Since 1972, Project Oceanology provided the platform; Dave and John, the adult guidance; and Alewife Cove, the venue. Dave has since retired and unfortunately John passed. Their legacy lives on in the lives they influenced using the Cove as our classroom.

Alewife Cove has had several champions. John Scilleri headed a group for one in the past, and now a new concerned group has expressed an interest: the Alewife Cove Conservancy. Their cause is just, and the salty slice of marsh mud heaven deserves all the support and preservation that we can provide.

Their proposal to pull down the dam, and free the waters for the Cove’s namesake alewife to spawn is a noble undertaking.

My children have since drifted past John Scilleri’s memorial granite bench overlooking the Cove, face down in the water, squealing through their snorkels as they watch schools of fish scatter. Maybe, just maybe, my potential grandchildren will get their own yellow plastic buckets filled with dizzy green crabs and sore-eyed hermits at Alewife Cove.

Joseph Hage of Montville grew up in New London and Waterford. Learn more about the Alewife Cove Conservancy at www.alewifecove.org.