Anne Arundel County’s oysters lead a tough life, but the shellfish could grow with some help from Mother Nature and human influence, though the specifics of that aid have been debated for years.
That was the theme Saturday at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center where the Anne Arundel Watermen’s Association hosted a symposium on oysters. Representatives from the Department of Natural Resources, the Maryland Advisory Commission and others discussed broad-level issues and science related to the shellfish.
“The idea of this came about because oysters seem to find themselves in the paper and very seldom is the actual science brought out in any of the articles,” said Bill Scerbo, president of Anne Arundel Watermen’s Association. “You never hear the actual facts and science behind oyster fisheries. The idea was to round up some fishery scientists to actually get the information from the oyster’s mouth, so to speak.”
In 1999, there was an estimated 600 million market-size oysters, meaning those oysters were available for harvesting, according to stock assessment data. But in the early 2000s, a drought and other factors drove down market populations to about 200 million. Since then, that population has regrown through 2014 to more than 450 million, but has declined to about 300 million since then, according to the assessment.
It takes work for Anne Arundel oysters to recover. County waters are further from the ocean, meaning there is less salinity for oysters, a saltwater creature. Lower salt levels make it harder for oysters to survive bursts of fresh water and to reproduce naturally. Wetter seasons can drop salt levels so low oysters die. But the lower salt levels protect oysters from diseases though droughts bring disease and can kill off chunks of oyster bars
Oyster populations can survive naturally in Anne Arundel County, said Chris Judy, Department of Natural Resources shellfish division director. But the county’s harvests will not be as robust as Somerset County unless oysters are planted.
Different regions of the state have different environments so not every county is the same, Judy said.
“The point for today was to communicate the basics of oyster status,” Judy said. “In Anne Arundel County oysters are faced with a somewhat difficult environment. If you want to have a vigorous population either in sanctuaries or harvest areas, you really have to plant oysters and bring these populations up.”
Oysters are a controversial topic in Maryland. For centuries, the fishing of oysters has been a part of state culture and a source of income for families and businesses. But harvesting in the late 1800s was aggressive and over time the Chesapeake Bay’s health deteriorated from a combination of factors. The number of oysters have plummeted since those golden years.
Conservationists, scientists and watermen have been debating how to manage oyster populations without sidelining the long tradition of oyster harvesting.
Eileen Manyin, of Epping Forest, said she found Saturday’s symposium informative. She has done some oyster gardening using her neighbor’s dock.
“I appreciate the effort by DNR to take the scientific side of the problem, but also appreciate the watermen’s perspective to maintain their lifestyle,” Manyin said. “The oyster itself, we are asking it to do too much (with) filtering and also feeding us.”
The Department of Natural Resources has released a draft Oyster Management Plan that includes rotational harvest as a management option, suggests opening some oyster sanctuaries to harvest where protection hasn’t led to more oysters and calls for adopting oyster population targets to prevent overfishing.
The Chesapeake Bay Foundation is hoping for a stronger strategy after the recent stock assessment showed low populations.
Scerbo is supportive of the plan, saying it was drafted with oyster industries in mind. The plan wasn’t discussed in great detail at the symposium, but Scerbo wanted people to be informed so they could comment on it.
That plan is open for public comment until March 19. It can be found online at dnr.maryland.gov.