Oyster Recycling in Choctawhatchee Bay
Lessons we can learn from this coalition
“…(yet he was no Coward that first ventered on [oysters])…”
- Thomas Moffett, died 1604
It’s difficult to find those ambivalent about eating oysters. Some love the taste of raw, plain oysters. Others won’t touch a fried oyster. I enjoyed oysters with lemon and crackers before I went vegan. There is something peculiar, though, about oysters that brings people together. Noting this peculiarity, Tucker Reynolds of the Choctawhatchee Basin Alliance Oyster Recycling Program pointed out that there aren’t many foods to which a restaurant will be dedicated (i.e. Oyster houses, Oyster bars). Oysters are food of an occasion; they are food we share in communion with others.
For millennia, oysters have been part of the diet of coastal communities, evidenced by the presence of oyster shells located in artifactual refuse mounds known as middens. One such mound located only several miles from me dates back a thousand years and was a site of cultural importance for the people living at that time. It stands as a relic, smack-dab in the middle of a downtown where a highway interchange is about to unfold, tenuously connecting the people of that time to us.
Hundreds of millions of years before the first human “ventered” on them, oysters of the family Ostreidae began settling in marine water beds. Despite their simple appearance, their anatomical composition includes a three-chambered heart, two kidneys, and three nerve cords. They are a keystone species, providing architectural habitat and water filtration. A single oyster can filter several gallons of water per day, removing toxins and clearing the water column. This includes nitrogen-containing compounds, many of which can find their way into wastewater runoff from our use of fertilizers. Clearing particulate matter increases sunlight available for photosynthesizing seagrass beds. Oysters also provide nutrients for numerous species at a foundational level in the food chain,
Oysters were once considered food for those less economically fortunate, but due to their extensive harvesting, became a more scarce delicacy. A 1988 estimate of oyster filtering in the Chesapeake Bay found that the size of pre-industrial oyster populations could filter all the bay’s water in about 3 days, while the modern population would require almost a full year. Baltimore, Maryland, a city on the Chesapeake Bay, became the United State’s lead supplier of oysters, shipping first on ice via the railroad, and then even farther once canning improved shelflife. This encapsulates the more recent human phenomenon of food convenience, enabling anyone anywhere to get the specific food they want when they want it, a practice not as common or possible among native dwellers of this land a thousand years ago.
In 2010, the Choctawhatchee Basin Alliance in Florida’s panhandle established its oyster recycling program, diverting used shells from landfills and collecting them for oyster bed restoration projects. In the height of the summer tourist season, Tucker Reynolds states that the program collects a trailer full of 50-gallon trashcans in oyster shells two to three times weekly, covering a dozen restaurants over the east 20 miles of the Choctawhatchee Bay’s Gulf of Mexico coast. These shells then pile in mounds reminiscent of the native culture, decontaminating over several months. Buzzards, stray cats, raccoons, lizards, and other wild animals pick at what nutrients we leave behind. I got too close to a fresh load of these shells and was reminded of my summer chucking food waste into a dumpster at a local seafood restaurant. Once the oysters are clean, they are packaged into mesh bags that will go on to create surface area for new beds.
NOAA states three ecological benefits of oyster reef restoration programs:
- Safety and habitat for smaller marine species
- Nutrient and particle cycling, which provides for the growth of grass beds, and in turn, a more stable and safe habitat for foundational marine species
- A buffer against shoreline erosion due to waves, floods, and tides, which, again, provides a more stable habitat for several marine species
These benefits coincide with three of the nine “planetary boundaries” established by a team of scientists at the University of Stockholm in Sweden:
- Biosphere integrity (specifically the functional diversity of ecosystems)
- Biogeochemical flows (specifically nitrogen cycling)
- Land transformation (as a buffer against coastal land erosion)
While climate change is a major issue requiring our collective action, it only comprises one of the nine planetary boundaries. According to the researchers, six boundaries have already been crossed, including the three mentioned above. The boundaries represent a threshold, the crossing of which increases the risk of irreversible damage to environments, many of which humans rely on. Despite their lack of capitalistic feasibility, coalitions such as oyster recycling programs illustrate one way we can begin to tackle these boundaries.
Other oyster recycling programs exist around the country in coastal communities, including New York City, coastal Louisiana and Texas, and communities along the Chesapeake Bay. They work to undo the harvesting levels of centuries past and educate communities on the importance of this keystone species. They engage locals to be a part of something for the environment, demonstrating how we can begin to repair damaged environments worldwide.
While restoration is certainly a needed action, we don’t have to look far to see other resource depletions not fully managed by restoration alone. In this vein, how can something like degrowth apply to our use of oysters? What may be most beneficial is normalizing plant-based diets for those willing and able to reduce demand for these marine animals.
In the phrase “reduce, reuse, recycle,” degrowth rightfully emphasizes the need for reducing. Oyster Recycling Programs, however, are a prime example of a recycling system that actually works. We humans will continue to determine what behaviors will best suit us and the environment moving forward. As for the oyster, it will continue with its own biological programming, which, likely unbeknownst to it, serves as a foundation for the many beings it shares a home with.
