PANACEA, Fla. (WTXL) — Ninety percent of the world’s ancient oyster reefs have collapsed in the last thirty years, one of them is in Apalachicola.
I’m Kenzie Krueger in Panacea highlighting a local film that shows the role oysters play in areas like Wakulla County.
Chucha Barber produced a documentary called Unfiltered: The Truth About Oysters. She and her team have been working on this project for six years. During that time, wild oyster harvesting was shut down in Apalachicola Bay.
Some believe it was because of over-harvesting and environmental factors. With several oyster reefs closing, Barber says it could be detrimental to the ecosystem.
Chucha Barber: “If you don’t have oyster reefs, you don’t have a natural estuary for 3000 species of marine life so there would be no shrimp, crabs or fish, it’s such an important animal.”
The film talks about the vital role that oysters play in our ecosystem.
Chucha Barber: “The film is a great reflection of the life of the people in the area, the many generations that wild oyster harvesters have worked the bay, and also a reflection of the farming efforts that are going on.”
Oyster farming has grown in places like Wakulla County. Veeral Padalia owns Forgotten Bay Oysters and says oyster farming became a new way to get oysters.
Veeral Padalia: “We kind of came in to fill in the gaps so we can still get oysters and it’s a really new industry in Florida. It’s not like in a Louisiana Mississippi Virginia and up North they’ve been doing this for decades.”
He believes that farmed oysters have helped wild oysters grow.
Veeral Padalia: “What I’ve noticed being out there on the farm is the wild oysters out there, the baby spat is attaching to our farmed oysters and cages so I can see the bays are coming back healthy and there are wild spat out there.”
Oysters play a vital role in our waters. Barber hopes her film will spread awareness to this.
“If we want clean water if we want the beauty of incredible marine life, we have to have oysters.”
For more information on where you can watch the documentary, I’ll provide information in my web story @wtxl.tv
