Ashley Jones jumps off the back of a quad bike before it stops and starts raking the sand around his feet.

Time is tight and Gary Jones, his uncle, shakes his head disapprovingly at the meagre scrapings and tells Ashley to get back on the mud-spattered quad.

They are two of the 130 people granted permits to fish for the highly prized cockles by the North Western Inshore Fisheries and Conservation Authority (NWIFCA).

Around 60 permit holders have chosen Leasowe beach, on the Wirral, for the first day of the 2017 season with the rest reportedly targeting Morecambe Bay.

Gary speeds off across the sands and, after a few more scrapings, they settle on a thick patch of cockles on the edge of the retreating tide.

Gary uses two planks bolted together called a tamp, or jumbo, to loosen the cockles by rocking it with an extended handle to give it leverage.

Ashley, of Flint, uses a short-handled rake to scoop the catch into a cockle net and flicks water under the tamp to increase the suction.

Undersized cockles drop through the mesh and when he’s gathered around 10 kilos Ashley transfers the load into a sack which holds fifty kilos.

The pace is relentless and after two hours the pair have gathered around half a tonne of cockles worth in the region of £400 depending on their size.

Most of the cocklers are working in pairs including seven-year-old Warren Williams and his dad Darren, who are from Mostyn.

Also on the beach is Wayne Bradley from Holywell who was the first apprentice fisherman to qualify for a full licence on the Dee Estuary.

Gathering shellfish by hand is mentioned as far back as the Domesday Book – with traditional methods and knowledge handed down through generations.

In 1086, women in Penclawdd worked on the beaches transporting their catch by donkey. Cockles were measure for buyers by the wine glass.

Today donkeys are replaced by quad bikes and wine glasses by sealed jars that hold a similar measure.

Gary said his father Ralph first taught him how to gather cockles on Talacre beach after he struggled with his school work.

He in turn passed on the skills to his son, Luke, and daughter, Jade, before she went on to become a double Olympic gold medallist and gain an MBE for her services to taekwondo.

“The kids thought they were having a holiday – but they were on the beach next to me grafting away and they loved it,” recalls Gary.

“Jade was a grafter and really took to it well and even helped me on the scrap when the cockle season finished.

“It’s good picking at Leasowe at the moment, but we need more buyers on the beach because two people can set the price and the fishermen lose out.

“The beds are matted (thick) here and they’re paying a good price – but it never lasts for long.

“The regulations are a good thing and it’s stopped a lot of accidents and people getting hurt.

“The industry is run correctly now and it will stop the kind of tragedy that happened to the Chinese cocklers in Morecambe Bay.

“I’d love to get a permit for the River Dee – but you have to wait for somebody to die. That’s just the way it is,” he said.

Gary and Ashley worked two tides on the first day of the season and hit their target of three tonnes.

According to the NWIFCA survey the Leasowe beds extend for 212.4 hectares with 3523.5 tonnes of “sized cockles” with a shell length 27mm or more.

The total allowable landings for the 2017-18 season is 2,600 tonnes, but that figure is expected to be reviewed to around half that amount.

The beach falls under the Mersey Port Health Authority which has collaborated with the local council, the NWIFCA and the Gangmaster’s Licensing Abuse Authority to open the fishery.

The main buyer for the area, Rob Benson, director of Kingfisher Seafoods Ltd based in Barrow in Furness, said: “The quality of the cockles with regard to the product for cooking is good.

“It’s just a shame because had they been a better classification we would have had other options of what to do with these cockles.

“What happens is the Mersey Port Health Authority and the local council take samples of the shellfish which they send off to a lab for classification.

“They get put into different grades of A, B or C.

“If they are A class they can take them straight to a market stall and sell them directly to the public.

“Cockles with a B classification can be purified using ultraviolet light in water which cleans them up internally and they can go into the live market.

“The Leasowe cockles are a grade C and we have no other option but to process them or relay them.

“Nobody in this country relays cockles because it’s too commercially expensive – so the only option is to cook them.

“The meat yield is quite high but it will start to drop off as it gets colder because they feed less.

“The meat yield for Leasowe cockles is coming out at 19 per cent which is pretty good for this time of year.

“Generally this time of year in Morecambe Bay, we get 17 per cent meat yield but Flookburgh is 15 per cent because the cockles are further up the beach and have less time to feed.

“The meat yield is very important for the cooking plant. That two per cent doesn’t sound a lot but over a tonne it can give you the difference of 12.5 per cent which is a lot.”

A spokesman for the NWIFCA said three fisheries have been approved at Leasowe, Pilling Sands and at Flookburgh /Leven Sands in Morecambe Bay.