PANACEA, Fla. — A Florida man basically held two centuries in his hand after finding a large clam while walking on Alligator Point in Franklin County.
On Feb. 11, a man named Blaine Parker and his family were walking in the community when they stumbled upon an Ocean Quahog, also called a hard clam.
According to Gulf Specimen Marine Lab, these types of mollusks range from Newfoundland to North Carolina and are found within 2.8- 4.3 inches long in length.
But the clam, which was named "Aber-clam Lincoln," measured up to 6 inches and 2.6 pounds.
And get this, the Ocean Quahog can live to be older than 200 years old – reproducing by the age of 6 and commercially eaten at 20. The age is calculated by the number of layers on the shell, with each layer representing a year.
The Parker family was able to count 214 layers on "Aber-calm Lincoln's" shell, meaning this clam was born in 1809. And yes, that's the same year Former President Abraham Lincoln was born in.
While these clams are usually harvested to eat, the family said they felt it was a special mollusk.
"We were just going to eat it, but we thought about it a while and figured it was probably pretty special. So, we didn't want to kill it," he told the Tallahassee Democrat.