Oyster Wars

By Sandy Bradley

There is considerable resistance to change: it's part of how our species has survived. However, this is an era in which change has to happen fast, and it's going to mean challenging times for those who aren't keeping up with the eco-learning curve.

When I mention oyster farming on Willapa Bay, even the better informed bring up "the spartina problem" or "the shrimp problem." These are not problems, ignorance is the problem, and many people will stand steadfast by their constitutional right to be wrong.

Before the West was won, the bay had a sandy bottom, and the small wild native oysters grew on the bottom and on ancient reefs. Then clear-cutting in the hills resulted in mud washing downstream and adding a thick layer of silt to the bottom, so oysters sank and smothered. Our native species grow very slowly, and reach a maximum size of about 1-1/2 inches. Japanese oysters were imported as seed for many years, and eventually it was discovered that they would reproduce here. They grow an inch a year and are very hardy and tasty. Though spartina is cursed as a "non-native species," Japanese oysters are welcome. If anybody tried to remove them, Elian would seem like a blip on the screen by comparison to the oystermen's uproar.

"I've been an oysterman all my life, and I know everything," seems to be the local motto. They fought the marsh grass, spartina, for the past 10 years. They say it is an invasive non-native grass, and occupies oyster habitat and crowds out their crop. They've tried spraying poisons, mowing, crushing, etc.--all with little success. Actually, spartina and oysters do not occupy the same eco-niche: the grass lives only at higher elevations than oysters can tolerate. On the East Coast spartina is being cultivated to improve water quality in large estuaries, and in Asia spartina is preferred as mineral rich animal fodder. I gather it here for weaving, chicken bedding, and mulch, and a local paper maker specializes in high quality spartina paper. The oystermen have to ignore this information and maintain their right to dump poison in the bay, otherwise they will be challenged on their spraying of the shrimp!

The 'shrimp problem' is that the little guys burrow in the mud, making it softer, so oysters sink faster. The other reason oysters get silted in is that the commercial oyster farmers dredge the bottom to harvest, stirring up a huge amount of sediment, which settles on other oysters. Commercial oyster management involves catching spat on dumped shell, moving the shell in bulk from bed to bed at least twice, which is a huge operation if you think about it, and trying to poison the shrimp that are under the oysters.

Here at Nahcotta Oyster Farm, we grow our organic oysters on stakes: PVC pipe stuck in the mud about a foot, sticking up about two feet. The spat catches on the pipe, grows there for three to four years (off the bottom, out of the mud) and then we walk out and pry them off the stakes at low tide. No problem with silt, shrimp or spartina. We have to suspend harvesting when the commercial growers dump pesticides, because poison can't be localized in a bay. This is called chemical trespass, but the law has not been enforced.

Monsanto has been very helpful to the oystermen, assuring them that their poisons are 90 percent effective with one application, thus mitigating the trespass claims. Documents ordered through the Freedom of Information Act expose the fact that Departments of Natural Resources, Agriculture and Fish and Wildlife did their own testing, and Monsanto's claims could not be substantiated.

Nobody likes getting backed into a corner, especially if they've been farming oysters for generations. Some people are reasonable, and some are not. Some make changes based on new information, some dig in a threaten vigilante justice against pesticide activists, like us. This is the Wild West.

Truth in labeling does not apply to organizations....Teach your kids to read the headlines, and then sift through the article and ask lots of questions. Their work will be important.

Reader Comments

Discuss this article in the forums!