How to Start an OYSTER FARM

How to Start an OYSTER FARM

Daniel Hanson and Dawn Smart

You can ask Siri or Alexa how to do it and surprisingly, they’ll give you several helpful options. The articles range from “jonathans blog” to Hobby Farm Magazine and the Port City Daily online news source for Wilmington, NC. YouTube also has a number of informative videos on the subject.

Together they cover everything you need to know, including startup costs, siting, permitting, equipment and where to get seed. Of course, it’s a lot of work to tackle each item and it is not for the faint of heart, especially permitting. But if you are interested in starting a farm you could do worse than to follow these leads. They may not be complete, but there is enough information to get you headed in the right direction.

Alternatively, there is an online course from the Institute of Food and Agriculture at the University of Florida, Sea Grant of Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana and the Auburn University Shellfish Lab. It is free and here’s the link: https://oyster-culture. teachable.com/p/online-oyster-course.

In our case the process was somewhat less structured—more serendipitous and fun. Early one spring Saturday our 92-year-old father and Dan attended a Taylor Shellfish Community Seed Sale. It started at 8:00 AM so they thought they should get there around 7:30 AM. What did they find but a line of about 100 people snaking through the parking lot? It was fun to talk with others looking to start or expand their farms. There were people from all over the area. The waiting time enabled Dan and Ray to talk to other would-be oyster gardeners and some actual farmers. It was the perfect venue for our dad to have a conversation with whomever would talk to him, so he did, and they made friends with a few people. One person really helped—Steve Bloomfield. He told them what they would need besides oyster seed… some rope, rebar, plastic lay-flat bags, and lots of zip ties. They had no idea!

Steve gave them some used lay-flat bags and they bought Pacific oyster seed and the rest of the equipment and headed home. Suddenly, and to their surprise, they realized that the seed needed to be planted that day before the tide came in!

When they got home the tide was still low enough for them to install the lines, rebar, and the bags with seed. They really didn’t know what they were doing, but it was simple enough to get it done. That would be the beginning of our fledgling farm.

Flashback: Oyster harvesting was Dan’s very first job as a young person; in 1959 he was hauling gunny sacks of oysters from our beach on Hood Canal up to Highway 106. They were picked up by a truck from a Grays Harbor shellfish company; don’t remember the name and not sure if the truck was even refrigerated back then. They opened the oysters and Dan was paid $2.50 for a gallon of shucked meat. Not a lot at the time, but a lot to a 13-year-old boy!

Our two tidelands on Hood Canal had been used by the family as recreational properties for three generations. Swimming, water skiing, picnics and sunbathing were the main events but our grandfather, the original settler, used to dig clams and open oysters on the beach and share them with friends and business associates.

His contribution to the health of the animals was to sort them by size, throwing the largest ones further down the beach to spawn and harvesting the more edible sizes in the intertidal zone. We formed HC Snail, LLC in 2006 and put our two beach properties into the company. We didn’t do much farming at first. The beaches were leased to a harvester, and we were paid a little bit for the product. But it was a second beginning.

Fast forward to 2010 when Dan retired from the Weyerhaeuser Company after a 30+ year career as a scientist. Having a technical and scientific background was helpful as we progressed and learned more. This was the third and the true beginning of his experience as an oyster farmer.

HC Snail joined PCSGA in 2012 and Dan attended his first annual Pacific Coast Shellfish Growers Association Conference that fall. He was hooked! The people and the conference were so great, and he knew he had to learn more. Impressed with the attendees’ openness and willingness to share their experiences, Dan took advantage to learn as much as possible and make industry contacts. After a career in a highly competitive industry where trade secrets and patents were closely guarded, it was really refreshing.

In 2013 we negotiated a lease agreement with DeNotta Seafood and have enjoyed a mutually beneficial business relationship with them ever since. Their cooperation and help were invaluable. In exchange for the use of our beaches, from time to time they provide advice, oyster seed and labor from their crews. Among other things, DeNotta is responsible for harvesting wild set oysters from both beach properties and managing the relationship with the Skokomish Tribe.

In 2014 HC Snail got its Department of Health Operating License and Site Certificate. Dan attended HACCP and Vibrio training. This was the year we began more serious oyster cultivation and installed long lines with tumble baskets. We were helped by Taylor Shellfish, Allen Shellfish, the Hama Hama Company, and several individuals.

We can’t say enough about the people that helped us get started. They were generous with their time, advice and help on the ground. They were patient, kind and fun to work with.

We’ve learned a great deal since 2010, reworking the lines and equipment we use, creating a Safety Officer, establishing a mental approach to continuous improvement, and developing more efficient sorting and harvesting processes. Inventions to make our farm more productive included a sorting table, a mechanism to keep tumble baskets in place, and thanks to Dan’s grandson, a quick and easy way to remove barnacles from the lines. We also learned, likely true of most oyster growers, that we like the spring and summer low tides better than the middle of the night winter tides, although a calm, moonlit night on the beach is a beautiful thing.

Beginning in 2016 we applied for and received a Nationwide 48 Permit from the Army Corps of Engineers.

Everything was good until all permits in Washington State were vacated by court order due to a lawsuit in which the Army Corps was named as the defendant. Then began the anxious process of getting a new permit. In our case, it turned out to be a five-year Letter of Permission, which we received in the spring of 2021.

So, we were back in the saddle again… at least until 2026! Others have not had it that easy. We are so very fortunate and realize what a blow this has been to Washington’s shellfish industry. Dan’s participation on the PCSGA Corps Permit Committee was and continues to be a real education. HC Snail would not be in the position we are in today without that experience.

We hope to continue farming our oysters and participating in select PCSGA and other industry activities for the foreseeable future. From Dan’s first job and now to this last one, he can’t think of a more rewarding retirement avocation, but then again, he doesn’t really know what retirement is!