The rise and fall of the oyster

It is finally fall and I am excited for the seasonal change. Cooler weather means it is time for roasting oysters over an open fire. And, as an ostreophile — a lover of oysters — I look forward to savoring and sharing the ecological and historical importance of oysters amongst us coastal dwellers.

Oysters are found all over the world. In North America, humans have been consuming oysters for thousands of years. Evidence of our regional fascination with oysters can be found from coastal South Carolina to Mississippi in the form of shell rings. Archaic shell rings dating back thousands of years are found along islands, river banks, marshes and the mainland. The people who built these shell rings were hunter-gatherers and fishers. They used the coastal regions seasonally for sustenance.

Between Amelia Island and Jacksonville lies the Rollins Shell Ring site on Fort George Island. The site is part of the Timucuan Ecological and Historical Preserve. Rollins Shell Ring is one of 30 known shell ring sites along the southeast Atlantic coast. These shell rings represent the largest and oldest standing architecture in the Southeast. They are constructed exclusively of oyster shells harvested from local waters.

The Rollins Shell Ring site is horseshoe-shaped, with smaller shell ringlets surrounding the main site. It is approximately 235 meters across with numerous smaller ringlets attached on all sides. All the rings were likely constructed by combining labor with feasting, religious ceremony, music, dancing, mate selection, and pure old-fashioned gossip, the trading of information according to Rebecca Saunders, Professor of Anthropology, LSU.

When Europeans arrived, they put the oyster shells that made up the rings to use. They paved roads and constructed buildings made with oyster shells. Tabby buildings are constructed by combining burned oyster shells, sand, and water. The mixture is then poured into a form, which sets up like concrete. Today, several tabby structures can be seen in historic downtown Fernandina and at Kingsley Plantation on Fort George Island.

North America reached its peak in oyster consumption in the late 1800s. Oysters were food for the rich and the poor. Unregulated harvests and pollution devastated the oyster industry along the East Coast. It is estimated that only 10% of East Coast oyster beds remain productive today. Around Amelia Island, oyster beds are closed for harvesting. Urban stormwater runoff containing excessive nitrogen and phosphorus, leaking septic tanks, and industrial pollution ended local oyster harvesting decades ago.

In 1970, local Amelia Island resident Gustav Gerbing was a well-respected horticulturalist with a formal camellia and azalea garden in Amelia City (near the present-day Harris Teeter grocery store). Gerbing also built the first fishing pier on Amelia Island. And, Gerbing owned and operated an oyster packing house and restaurant. Both the packing house and the restaurant were famous for their “Amelia River Oysters” and “all the oysters you can eat for a dollar,” according to the Miami Herald article published Dec. 3, 1970.

In 1970, Gerbing told reporters, “When they built the pulp mills at Fernandina and began dumping millions of gallons of polluted water into the river, the oysters began to taste like pine tar and kerosene.” Gerbing said he was forced out of business. His restaurant had to be closed. Nobody would eat oysters taken from the Amelia River. At that time, Gerbing employed 60 to 70 pickers, shuckers, packers and dock hands in his restaurant and packing house.

Gerbing soon found out he could do nothing about the pollution. According to the Miami Herald article, the Florida Legislature passed an act that permitted industry to pollute any stream in Nassau County. In 1967, the Legislature had to appeal this act before it could pass the Florida Air and Pollution Act. When the Florida Air and Pollution Act was enacted, Gerbing went to court and asked for the pollution to be stopped and for damages of $10,000.

“Efforts by the company to get the suit thrown out, or to satisfy Gerbing by building an ocean outfall for disposal of pollutants, failed. When the outfall was suggested, Gerbing went to court and got an injunction to prevent its construction. ITT Rayonier already has one ocean outfall but still dumped millions of gallons of effluents a day into the Amelia River. I refuse to be a party to any scheme to dump more pollutants in the ocean. I want the polluting stopped altogether,” said Gerbing. The state cited ITT Rayonier for violations of pollution regulations. A company suggestion that it agree to skim off 90 percent of solids from wastewater has been rejected.

At the time, Container Corporation, Fernandina’s other pulp mill, installed pollution control devices as part of a $65 million expansion program. They claimed the $3 million device would remove 99 percent of suspended solids from effluent that is normally released into the river.

It is worth noting that the Environmental Protection Agency was proposed in 1969 by President Richard Nixon and was officially established in January 1970. EPA was charged with addressing major environmental challenges, including air and water pollution. The creation of the federal agency to address pollution was sparked in part by Rachel Carson’s book, “Silent Spring” in 1962. The book raised awareness about the dangers posed by pesticides and other human activities to the environment.

Local oyster beds in Nassau County have been closed for decades. Gerbing was not successful in stopping pollution from being dumped into the Amelia River. And, even though our water quality is better today than it was in 1970, we still have polluted waterways in our region that prevent oyster harvesting.

For thousands of years, oysters were abundant and harvested in local waters for sustenance. They have been woven into the tapestry of our cultural traditions. And, they are essential to the health of local estuaries. As a lover of oysters, I am saddened that money and politics have been allowed to decimate our once-thriving estuaries with pollution.

In my next article, we will explore more oyster industry history and measures taken to restore oyster beds throughout the region.