More Oysters

As different areas close to harvest, the industry has begun moving en mass to different areas for harvest. Many of these small areas, such as Beldon’s Reef, are not able to sustain the heavy harvest pressure for long periods of time. These high pressure concentrations of harvest also result in high water turbidity. Photo by John Blaha.

The Oyster – a sessile organism that creates its own habitat with a remarkable ability to filter water, removing excess organic matter from our bay systems. One single oyster can filter up to 50 gallons of water per day and one acre of oyster reef provides $6,500 in denitrification services annually. Oyster reefs stabilize bottom sediments, reduce shoreline erosion, diminish wave energy and protect wetlands, historically serving as horizontal levees that provide in excess of $20 billion worth of storm protection annually to Gulf Coast businesses and communities.

In their natural environment, oyster reefs do almost all the same things as coral reefs. They are refuge. They are food. They are habitat. Over 300 aquatic species utilize oyster reefs, and research has shown that oyster reefs support nearly 4.5 times the aquatic biomass than seagrasses and 11.5 times the aquatic biomass found along marsh edge habitat.

Texas oyster reefs are a critical component of the natural landscape, no different than the trees of the piney woods, the brush in south Texas plains or the wooded mountains of the Trans-Pecos. Without vibrant oyster reefs, you have an underwater landscape that's flat and featureless with nowhere for critters to hide and little to eat.

It may be difficult to imagine but there was a time where oyster reef systems expanded across entire bay systems, and at low tides, wildlife, livestock and humankind would utilize these reefs systems for navigation between land masses. In the last 100 years, due to storms, mining, dredging and commercial oyster fishing, you’d be hard pressed to find any reef system that has any resemblance of its former self. Much of the discussion recently is focused on the immense shift in oyster fishing pressure to the Texas middle coast and the observable impact it is having on oyster reef systems.

As the transient oyster fishery moves en masse to smaller harvest areas we are witnessing these changes in real time. The 2nd Chain of Islands, Ayres Reef, Ranch House Reef, Beldon’s Reef, Cedar Reef, Carlos Reef, and certainly multiple reef systems in Matagorda, San Antonio, Copano, Aransas Bays are being unnaturally altered in both size and structure. Repeatedly dragged and scraped by the oyster dredges, public oyster reefs are being toppled and scattered, drastically changing their structural nature. Reefs that used to be measured vertically in feet are now measured in inches or are all together lost. Reefs that historically would extend to the water surface at low tide are now worked down to the bay bottom, making them more vulnerable to being covered by mud and silt.

Anglers, birders, and coastal residents can attest. Previously wadable reefs are now inaccessible. Reefs that once offered sanctuary for shore birds no longer breach the water’s surface. Reefs that used to protect shorelines from erosion are no longer high enough to absorb wave energy across the bays.

It is time to prioritize the structural and ecological benefits of reefs.

It is time to safeguard existing reefs and boldly expand current restoration efforts.

It is time to expand the legally approved state bay-bottom lease program (certificate of location), and promote increased participation in cultivated oyster mariculture (oyster farming).

Public oyster reefs need our help, and we need to remain vigilant and patient as we work together to increase sustainability of a fishery that means so much to health of our bay systems. Please visit ccatexas.org/oysters to learn more and be sure to participate in upcoming opportunities to share your concerns as Texas Parks and Wildlife Department considers management options to conserve public oyster reefs. In the end, we all want more oysters.

At the January 25-26 meeting, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission (TPWC) was briefed on the state of oysters. This briefing included the biology of oysters, industry participation and trends, management practices in place and what could the future hold. This presentation was followed up with a request by Texas Parks and Wildlife Department Coastal Fisheries asking the TPWC permission to move forward and seek public comment on a proposal to consider prohibiting the harvest of oysters in Carlos Bay, Mesquite Bay, and Ayres Bay. The closure to oyster harvest would protect ecologically sensitive and unique oyster habitat from the negative biological impacts of increased harvest pressure. Per TPWD, the ecological importance and sensitivity of these oyster reefs coupled with the historically high harvest pressure and highly variable oyster relative abundance makes this minor bay complex a candidate for permanent closure from harvest. TPWC will consider this proposal their March 23-24 meeting. Please stay on alert for opportunities for public comment prior to and during the next TPWC meeting. We will provide updates via email, on the CCA Texas website and across all our social media platforms.