Virginia’s oyster harvest has grown tenfold in the past decade to 236,000 bushels in 2011 and a dockside value of $8.2 million, state officials announced Tuesday.
Gov. Bob McDonnell credited the rebound to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission and its promotion of sanctuaries, targeted shell plantings in public oyster grounds and other measures.
“Virginia oysters are not only delicious, they are also profitable,” McDonnell said in a statement. “Our oysters are hitting tables all across the nation and the world, on the half-shell, fried, steamed, roasted and in stew.”
In their heyday, oyster reefs were so thick in the bay some likened the catch industry to a mining operation rather than a commercial fishery. While improving, the harvest is still puny compared to historic highs in the 1950s and 1960s when Virginia’s oyster harvest peaked at 4 million bushels in 1958-59 and remained near or above 1 million bushels into the 1970s, then steadily declined through the decades.
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