Archive for the ‘oysters’ Category

Paul, Me, and Oysters Three!

Tuesday, August 20th, 2019

Paul Brent

Artist Paul Brent and I have a special relationship.  It has to do with oysters.  But not in the way you might think.  It has nothing to do with eating oysters and certainly nothing to do with growing oysters or even gathering them.  It has more to do with their shells.

As I’ve written now and then,  for 160+ years Oysterville’s economy has been based upon three different varieties of oysters.  The pioneers here made their living by shipping Native oysters (Ostrea lurida) to gold-rich San Francisco in the 1850s and ’60s.  By the turn of the century, when those little Natives were depleted to the extent that they were no longer economically viable, the oystermen began importing oyster seed from Chesapeake Bay.

By Paul Brent

Those young Easterns (Crassostrea virginica) thrived and reached harvestable size, but they did not propagate well in the cold Willapa Bay waters.  However, the growers continued importing them, though prices for the little oysters were high and freight costs exorbitant.  The death knell for Easterns here came in the summer of 1919 when an unexplained environmental event in the Bay destroyed virtually all of the oysters.

Enter Trevor Kindaid, a marine biologist from the University of Washington, who brought students here to experiment with imported seed of the Japanese oyster (Crassastreaa gigas). They thrived (but, for years, did not propagate consistently) in our bay.  Each case of seed (baby oysters attached to pieces of old oyster shell) could produce 150 gallons of fresh oyster meat and, in the first years, oysters matured to marketable size within 18 months. Though the onset of World War II put a temporary halt to imports of seed cases from Japan, oyster growers managed to maintain production until 1948 when seed imports resumed.  Today, of course, it’s a whole new ballgame what with hatcheries and “designer” oysters and triploids and I don’t know what all.

Painting by Paul Brent

About the time I met Paul (at an early Art Walk at the Port of Ilwaco) I was teaching a class on Oysterville history and I was especially interested in our economy and development as it paralleled the various decades of oyster production in Willapa Bay.  As visual aids,  I had examples of Native oyster shells (tiny!) and Japanese shells (huge!) but none of an Eastern (medium sized, but a bit different in thickness).  Somehow Paul and I got to talking about that.  “There are lots of ‘Easterns’ in Florida!  When I go home, I’ll send you some shells.”  And he did.

Yesterday, he sent me more oyster shells – of the photo variety, through email —  paintings, inspired he said, from something he saw during the recent Music in the Gardens Tour.  I love these paintings!!  Even more than I love oysters!  Thank you Paul.  I’m so glad you and Lana Jane now have homes on both coasts and that our friendship has transcended oysters!

A little knowledge…

Thursday, May 7th, 2015

 

Ghost Shrimp

Ghost Shrimp

In the ‘Words to Live By’ department, we have all been told that “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.”  So, when all the to-spray-or-not-to-spray-for-burrowing-shrimp controversy erupted recently, I tried to do a little research on the ‘why’ of the problem — hoping to get some information beyond the knee-jerk reactions I was seeing in much of the media.   As in, if those ghost shrimp are native to our bay, why have they proliferated to threatening numbers just since the 1960s?

The best answer seems to be the decreasing numbers of sturgeon in the bay, possibly because of over-fishing. That makes total sense to me. And it would seem that since the sturgeon are a natural predator of ghost shrimp and the latter have increased to the point of threatening the long-established oyster industry, someone somewhere would have a handle on that off-kilter balance in the bay by now. Lord knows, there are enough regulatory agencies involved with oyster farming. And the problem has been noted for more than fifty years.

Sturgeon

Sturgeon

Well, I didn’t spend a whole lot of time looking for answers. But I did go online to see what would come up if I searched on “Sturgeon in Willapa Bay.” Right away I came across two articles of interest. “Willapa/Naselle Sturgeon Fishing” by LeeRoy Wisner was concerned mainly with the boat launches that fishermen can take when fishing for sturgeon. He says, “There are at least 8 launches that can be used in Willapa Bay.” He goes on to describe them and tell which are best and includes great photos – a wonderful get-started manual for sturgeon fishermen. I’m not sure when it was written. It has a 2004-2013 copyright date at the end. If this information is still viable, it would seem that sturgeon fishing is still alive and well in Willapa Bay.

The second article that came up was “Status Review for North American Green Sturgeon, Acipenser medirostris” by the National Marine Fisheries Service and the United State Geological Survey written in 2002. About Willapa Bay it said: Willapa Bay, along with the Columbia River and Grays Harbor, is one of the estuaries where green sturgeon concentrate in summer… Catches have declined from 3,000-4,000 fish per year in the 1960s to few or none in recent years… Much of this is probably due to reduced size limits and seasonal and area closures…

A Keeper

A Keeper

The study was done in answer to a 2001 petition to list the American green sturgeon as an endangered or threatened species. The conclusion of the study, of course, was that there was not sufficient information to do so.

I can’t quite wrap my mind around all those “facts.” It seems logical to me that if boat launches for sturgeon fishermen are being touted online, someone must be catching sturgeon or at least trying to. On the other hand, if that scientific study is correct and there are no sturgeon being caught, they may not be coming into the bay because their food supply has been cut off, perhaps by spraying of ghost shrimp. Maybe the ecological balance is out of whack. Maybe Fisheries (or someone) ought to be addressing that aspect of things. Maybe they are. But wouldn’t you think that would be Big News (capital B capital N) about now? Just sayin’…

Well… I’m not a scientist and I concede that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Certainly there seem to be more questions than answers.

Apples and Oranges

Monday, January 19th, 2015

 

Dredge in Front of Oysterville, c. 1950s

Dredge in Front of Oysterville, c. 1950s

Despite the title of today’s blog, I really want to talk about oysters, not fruit – well maybe ‘fruits de mer’ on a fancy French menu. I am continuously amazed at how sparse my knowledge is of the Willapa Bay oyster industry, especially considering that its main headquarters is right outside my front yard.

Every day we watch oyster dredges ply the waters of the bay and most times we have not a clue as to who they belong to or what they are doing. In fact, they are so much a part of our landscape (or is it seascape?) that we don’t always pay attention. It is often a visitor who calls our attention to activity out there and usually there are accompanying questions. “Like how many oysters are grown out there, anyway?”

Charles Fitzpatrick Postcard, 1941

Charles Fitzpatrick Postcard, 1941

I always feel I should have ready answers but I’m never sure of my ground (or oyster beds, you might say.) Some years ago, I was told that one out of every three oysters purchased in restaurants across the United States comes from Willapa Bay. I don’t know if that is still true. I tried to look it up online and found that the annual production of oysters in our bay is 1,500 metric tons shucked. Whoo! That sounds like a bunch.

"Willapa Bay Oysters"

“Willapa Bay Oysters”

But, I have no basis for comparing it with the one-out-of-three figure that I remember. That’s where the apples and oranges come in. Nor can I compare 1,500 metric tons with the 80,000 gallons produced back in 1941 – or at least that was the claim made on a wonderful old Charles Fitzpatrick postcard I ran across recently. That card also claims that 7,650 cases of canned oysters and 5,845 cases of smoked oysters were produced that year. Maybe it’s a matter of comparing apples, oranges and raisins.

My “answer” to oyster questions these days usually involves a recommendation to buy or at least to watch Keith Cox’s oyster documentary, “Willapa Bay Oysters.” The five-disc set will answer just about any oyster question possible. And no apples or oranges (or raisins) involved!