The Bill Taylor column piggybacks and provides additional spin to the Dec. 9 Gregoire shellfish initiative.
All pending shoreline aquaculture applications are for intertidal geoduck and non-native/invasive specie (Gallo) near shore mussel raft expansion where industrial methodology, beach preparation, predator protection, harvesting, clogging, fouling recreational waters are end products.
Introduction of tons of plastic, nets, rebar, backhoe grooming, PVC tube planting and firehose harvesting, and raft maintenance degrade Puget Sound shorelines. Predator exclusion/elimination practices include all marine organisms (e.g. starfish, sand dollars, moon snails), shorebirds, migratory waterfowl – all in decline in areas of monoculture saturation.
Forage fish (including herring, sea smelt) suffer similar declines. Concepts of bagged oysters, intertidal geoducks, and invasive specie mussels as environmentally sustainable in Puget Sound should be seriously questioned.
Shellfish cleansing of Puget Sound waters “filtering and improving the quality of our marine waters” mantra must be expanded to include ingestion of phytoplankton, zooplankton (including fish larvae), dissolved oxygen vital to sustain all marine life and resultant pollution in the filtering process.
Morphing of traditional South Sound aquaculture practices into runaway industrial production argues for more stringent permitting analysis – not less. A “ fourth-generation Washington state shellfish farmer” entitlement culture must adjust to embrace environmental scrubs of all existing and proposed installations.
Let some healing begin.
