The Bay Has More Oysters and Watermen Want Them

Bay Journal, Bill could open future Bay oyster sanctuaries to commercial harvest

Environmentalists are decrying language added to a U.S. House spending bill that would open future federally supported oyster restoration projects around the Chesapeake Bay to commercial harvesting.

U.S. Rep. Andy Harris, Maryland’s lone Republican member of Congress, inserted the provision into a bill funding the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The House Appropriations Committee passed the bill on a 32-28 vote in May. It is expected to come up for a vote by the full House in the coming weeks.

The provision is likely to face stiff opposition if it reaches the Senate. A similar measure was stripped out of last year’s funding package before it became law. But it is part of a growing number of efforts in Washington, Annapolis and Richmond aiming to soften or remove the protected status of restored reefs amid the bivalve’s rebound in the estuary.

“It comes at a time when ideas like this maybe have more legs,” said Ben Ford, the Miles-Wye Riverkeeper. “Everyone wants more oysters in the Bay. But people see the success of meeting the oyster restoration goals in the Bay Agreement and think the job’s done.”

It's worth noting that Andy Harris, the sole Republican in Maryland's congressional delegation, represents a district on the Eastern Shore, where the politics are dominated by watermen and agriculture. Watermen have long balked at having oyster sanctuaries protected from harvesting, and they've been known to sneak in under cover of darkness and pillage them. 

Although oyster populations have improved in recent years, they are nowhere near the numbers that existed before the widespread oyster mining of the late 1800s and early 1900s. I'm still in favor of stopping the harvest of "wild" oysters for 5-10 years to find out how well they will be able to flourish in the modern Bay.