Save oysters, save the bay
New report shows oyster restoration progress worth celebrating
What’s good for oysters can be good for us all. That’s the heartening message in a new report from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation that offers strategies for using the bay’s resurging oyster population as a versatile tool in the fight against climate change.
The report, released in February, praises the recent progress in restoring the bay’s oyster population. Much of that progress has come through the efforts of Virginia, Maryland and the other states in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement that have been working to clean the bay’s badly polluted waters.
That the oyster harvests in the last couple of years have been the best in three decades is cause for celebration on several fronts. It’s welcome news for all who consider Chesapeake Bay oysters a delicious treat. That makes it good news also for Virginia’s billion-dollar seafood industry, a mainstay of the Hampton Roads economy, and for the related tourism industry.
But even better is the foundation’s message that restoring the bay’s oyster population could have wide-reaching benefits beyond providing humans with delectable food.
Oysters are a keystone species, with a huge, beneficial impact on the salty or brackish coastal waters where they live.
They help build the ecosystem as their shells form reefs that provide food, habitat and breeding grounds for a variety of fish, crabs and other shellfish. They support seagrass beds and other vegetation in coastal marshlands.
Oysters have been making a comeback because of concerted efforts by local, state and federal governments and environmental groups — efforts in which oysters have played several important roles.
Oysters are filter feeders with voracious appetites: One adult oyster can clean 50 gallons of water a day of pollutants.
They also remove algae that block the sunlight vital to seagrasses. They deposit nutrient-rich organic matter that supports plant growth.
Those coastal habitats reduce the greenhouse gas emissions that are the primary cause of climate change. The underwater vegetation and salt marshes that oysters protect are more effective than forests in removing carbon from the atmosphere and storing it indefinitely.
The report outlines ways that wise policies could make the most of what oysters have to offer.
Oysters can mitigate the increased flooding that threatens Hampton Roads and other coastal areas as a result of the rising sea levels and more powerful storms caused by the warming climate. Restoring oyster reefs and encouraging well-managed oyster farming help control erosion and protect fragile marshes and wetlands rather than relying too much on manmade structures such as bulkheads and seawalls.
The report recommends policies that encourage removing such “hardened” shorelines where possible and replacing them with “living shorelines” that include oyster reefs. Doing so, of course, would also lead to more carbon removal and cleaner water.
The report cautions that the recent oyster comeback is fragile and should not be taken for granted. The fight to reduce pollution across the watershed must be continued and intensified in the face of climate change.
Carbon emissions also cause ocean and bay waters to become more acidic, making it more difficult for oysters to grow and build shells. There is an “urgent need,” the report stresses, to do everything possible to rebuild oyster populations on a large scale.
State, regional and federal officials and interest groups will need to work together to establish and follow policies that will sustain and increase the oyster recovery. More large-scale projects such as the nearly complete effort to restore 11 bay tributaries for oyster habitat will be needed.
We should plan wisely, choosing sites for restoration projects and oyster farming that will take best advantage of all that oysters have to offer, helping to preserve marshes and to protect coastal areas from flooding. Virginia and other states must make wise decisions about where oyster fishing is allowed and how oyster farms operate.
If we do what we can to help oysters thrive, they will do even more to help us. Long live the bay oysters!