Florida Oyster Culture Strained

APALACHICOLA BAY - Longtime oysterman Keith Millender sees every shower taken or car washed in metropolitan Atlanta as a small threat to his family, which has harvested seafood from northwest Florida's Apalachicola Bay for generations.

The Apalachicola River - which carries water more than 300 miles from Georgia's Lake Lanier into the bay, providing the delicate balance of freshwater and saltwater that oysters need to thrive - is running dry.

Georgia remains in a drought and months of above-average rain are needed to fill its reservoirs. Lanier, which provides most of metro Atlanta's water, is less than 60 percent full.

"They are misusing their water - they are using it for lawns, swimming pools, even in some bathrooms they are flushing twice," Millender says of Atlanta's growing thirst for water. The metro area's population has doubled since 1980, surpassing 5 million residents.

Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue has said his state's demand for the water comes down to "man versus mussels." Atlanta needs water for its survival, he has said in making a case to the Army Corps of Engineers to allow Georgia to take more water from Lanier.

Way Of Life Hangs In Balance

Negotiations among Alabama, Florida and Georgia over controlling the water flow have fallen apart and the states plan to settle their differences in court. But families who have harvested oysters, shrimped and sold seafood for generations along Florida's Forgotten Coast say they cannot wait years for a court battle to play out.

Life on Apalachicola Bay is a sharp contrast to sprawling Atlanta. A two-lane road runs along the bay in front of oyster shucking shacks and fresh seafood houses. Many of the businesses are shuttered. Workers walk across the street from homes they have occupied for generations to jobs in the shucking shacks or on the oyster boats.

Oystering is a $10 million industry in Florida, with about 1,200 licensed harvesters and 25 processing houses in the Apalachicola area. About 3 million pounds of oyster meat was landed in the state last year, about 10 percent of the national harvest. Texas and Louisiana are bigger oyster producers and could make up the difference if the Florida industry fades.

"But you cannot put a price on the culture, the way of life and the heritage of the industry," said David Heil, an oyster regulator with the Florida Department of Agriculture.

'A Dying Business'

Millender remembers when more oyster houses were open. The dwindling supply of oysters, coupled with increasing regulation of the industry, has put many out of business.

"It used to be when all this here was oyster houses," he said pointing up the bay to several boarded-up businesses.

Frank Coulter, 64, grew up on the bay harvesting oysters like his father before him. With the flow of fresh water into the bay restricted, oysters in the deepest sections are perishing, he said.

"It's a dying business because of population and pollution," he said.

Before long, Apalachicola Bay will be like Tampa Bay, too polluted to harvest fresh seafood.

"They will close everything down," he said.