By Merrill Leffler

Oyster gardening has been taking hold in the Chesapeake Bay. Along the shores of the Bay's rivers and tidal flats in Maryland and Virginia, citizens of all ages are raising oysters, not to eat, but for the restoration of oyster reefs and habitat. Spearheaded in Virginia by the Virginia Institute of Marine Science and in Maryland by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and the University of Maryland, the oyster gardening program has been growing rapidly, says CBF's Bill Goldsborough.

"We have more than 300 gardener families so far in Maryland and about 40 classes with some 1,200 students."

In 1997, the Foundation joined with the Maryland Sea Grant Extension Program (MSGEP), the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science (UMCES) and the Oyster Recovery Partnership to form The Oyster Alliance, which has embarked on an extensive program of educating citizen-gardeners. "We have more than 300 gardener families so far in Maryland and about 40 classes with some 1,200 students," Goldsborough says. "We haven't stopped growing."

The Alliance offers training forums for gardeners that range from the construction of "Taylor floats" for growing oysters to techniques for ensuring the most efficient growth, says Don Webster, Sea Grant Extension Agent. The forums are also a way for gardeners to keep in touch with new methods for rearing oysters and research advances that might have applicability to their efforts.

In a program this winter, for example, Dr. Standish Allen of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science briefed participants on a breeding program to cultivate oysters that are better able to resist both MSX and Dermo, the two diseases that have devastated Bay oyster populations for more than a decade. These CROSBreed (Cooperative Regional Oyster Selective Breeding) oysters are currently being monitored by scientists in the mid-Atlantic region for disease resistance in various locations - the researchers hope that spat from the specially-bred oysters will eventually be available for oyster gardeners.

Don Meritt, Sea Grant Extension Shellfish Specialist at the UMCES Horn Point Laboratory, has been producing seed oysters in hatchery tanks for the gardening program. And the Oyster Recovery Partnership has recruited volunteers to do the labor-intensive work involved in moving millions of oyster spat. "A non-profit organization, the Partnership has a single mission," says Executive Director Mary Jo Garreis, "of helping to restore Maryland's oyster resources for ecological and economic revitalization."

This summer, the Oyster Alliance began a new program to train Master Gardeners. "We're providing them increased education," says Webster, "so they can serve as the point of contact for gardeners and provide on-site assistance in their locales." The two-day workshop included presentations on such topics as basic oyster biology and reef communities, hatchery operations, monitoring equipment and disease. "The Master Oyster Gardener will become the local link in a chain of producers working to rehabilitate oyster reefs," Webster says. "They will also help with data collection for the website Maryland Sea Grant is developing," he says, "which will become our information hub and will be one part of a comprehensive web site on the oyster."

The Oyster Alliance has combined the strengths of different groups who have a common goal, says Webster. "Our efforts are only a beginning. They will help enhance our oyster reefs and in the long run," he adds, "help advance an effective commercial shellfish aquaculture industry."

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