00:00:00.491 --> 00:00:03.574
(upbeat jazz music)

00:00:20.305 --> 00:00:22.555
- [Man] Love those oysters.

00:00:24.632 --> 00:00:26.882
(laughter)

00:01:03.208 --> 00:01:05.791
(bright music)

00:01:06.670 --> 00:01:07.550
- [Narrator] Eating an oyster

00:01:07.550 --> 00:01:10.100
is like kissing the sea on the lips.

00:01:18.530 --> 00:01:21.760
Seduced by this briny,
mouthwatering bivalve,

00:01:21.760 --> 00:01:25.910
the oyster is the world's
oldest and most noted

00:01:25.910 --> 00:01:28.300
gastronomic shellfish delicacy.

00:01:29.420 --> 00:01:33.180
A symbol of love since the
goddess Aphrodite, or Venus,

00:01:33.180 --> 00:01:35.340
emerged from the sea on a shell

00:01:35.340 --> 00:01:38.410
and gave birth to Eros,
the Greek god of love,

00:01:38.410 --> 00:01:40.140
better known as Cupid.

00:01:40.140 --> 00:01:42.400
The word "aphrodisiac" was born.

00:01:44.220 --> 00:01:47.970
During that long journey to a
bed of crystal ice and garnish

00:01:47.970 --> 00:01:51.350
perched perfectly and raw
moments before the first drop

00:01:51.350 --> 00:01:54.600
of oyster liquor touches
your tongue, this oyster

00:01:54.600 --> 00:01:58.650
has been touched by hand
20 times over two years.

00:02:00.740 --> 00:02:03.490
Consumption takes less than 20 seconds.

00:02:08.340 --> 00:02:11.070
Our story takes place in the Barnegat Bay

00:02:11.070 --> 00:02:14.340
and Great Bay ecosystems, a local view

00:02:14.340 --> 00:02:17.800
of the extraordinary estuary
systems around the planet

00:02:17.800 --> 00:02:21.150
providing habitat for
80% of the world's fish

00:02:21.150 --> 00:02:23.610
and shellfish during their lives.

00:02:26.203 --> 00:02:29.036
(seagulls cawing)

00:02:31.650 --> 00:02:35.030
- Barnegat Bay was a
source of seed oysters

00:02:35.030 --> 00:02:39.220
for areas from Long Island
down to Delaware Bay.

00:02:40.150 --> 00:02:45.150
The oyster fishery was a
major component of the economy

00:02:45.430 --> 00:02:48.850
of southern New Jersey in the late 1800s.

00:02:48.850 --> 00:02:53.417
It was an extensive and important fishery.

00:02:53.417 --> 00:02:57.260
(upbeat bluegrass music)

00:02:57.260 --> 00:02:59.380
- When we go back and
look in the middle 1800s,

00:02:59.380 --> 00:03:03.480
the amount of oysters that were
consumed is just phenomenal.

00:03:03.480 --> 00:03:05.800
I mean, it was hot dog carts,
there'd be oyster carts

00:03:05.800 --> 00:03:07.080
on the streets of New York city.

00:03:07.080 --> 00:03:08.730
- That was the McDonald's.

00:03:08.730 --> 00:03:11.690
The man on the street and the
rich people all ate oysters.

00:03:11.690 --> 00:03:14.550
- [Gef] In chowders and
soups and fries and all kinds

00:03:14.550 --> 00:03:17.120
of different things you'll
find these very old recipes.

00:03:17.120 --> 00:03:18.080
- It was a mainstay.

00:03:18.080 --> 00:03:20.880
It was critical, and it doesn't exist

00:03:20.880 --> 00:03:24.170
except for the small half shell industry.

00:03:24.170 --> 00:03:26.840
People don't understand how
much things have changed.

00:03:32.550 --> 00:03:35.520
- [Narrator] In the 1700s,
the Jersey oyster wagons

00:03:35.520 --> 00:03:39.480
carried oysters on unpaved
roads from the New Jersey coast

00:03:39.480 --> 00:03:42.470
through the Pine Barrens to points inland.

00:03:42.470 --> 00:03:46.080
And in the 1800s, the
Tuckerton Railroad transported

00:03:46.080 --> 00:03:49.890
fresh oysters from the bay
to the mainline in Whiting.

00:03:49.890 --> 00:03:51.290
The name of the westbound train

00:03:51.290 --> 00:03:53.630
was called the Oyster Express.

00:03:53.630 --> 00:03:55.960
The trains that brought
oysters out the Philadelphia

00:03:55.960 --> 00:03:59.110
and New York brought
tourists back to the coast.

00:03:59.110 --> 00:04:02.960
A thriving coastal tourism
industry was born, and today

00:04:02.960 --> 00:04:07.740
brings in $4.6 billion to
Ocean County, New Jersey.

00:04:07.740 --> 00:04:09.440
- Historically, the
train used to run across

00:04:09.440 --> 00:04:12.100
Good Luck Point, and
people coming from the city

00:04:12.100 --> 00:04:13.920
would jump off the train,
'cause it was the largest

00:04:13.920 --> 00:04:17.030
oyster reef in the bay
from what we were told.

00:04:17.030 --> 00:04:18.310
And they would pick oysters and take them

00:04:18.310 --> 00:04:19.520
to the shore house.

00:04:19.520 --> 00:04:20.838
Can't do that anymore.

00:04:20.838 --> 00:04:24.270
(nostalgic music)

00:04:24.270 --> 00:04:27.680
- [Ken] People don't understand
the ecological significance

00:04:27.680 --> 00:04:30.690
of the demise of the oyster.

00:04:30.690 --> 00:04:33.270
- It was really booming around
the turn of the century,

00:04:33.270 --> 00:04:35.300
and then this is kind
of just what happened

00:04:35.300 --> 00:04:38.050
between over-fishing and
all the anthropogenic stress

00:04:38.050 --> 00:04:41.740
that was there and poor water quality.

00:04:41.740 --> 00:04:44.000
- You're looking at a body
of water that's compromised.

00:04:44.000 --> 00:04:45.670
You're looking at a body of water where,

00:04:45.670 --> 00:04:49.520
30, 40 years ago kids could
go out and harvest clams

00:04:49.520 --> 00:04:51.420
and make enough money to go to college.

00:04:51.420 --> 00:04:53.500
You're looking at a body
of water that 100 years ago

00:04:53.500 --> 00:04:54.930
had oysters all over the place.

00:04:54.930 --> 00:04:57.640
They had creeks where
people were salting oysters,

00:04:57.640 --> 00:04:58.730
and they're not there.

00:04:58.730 --> 00:05:00.840
And so you have an impacted body of water.

00:05:00.840 --> 00:05:02.330
It looks beautiful, looks great,

00:05:02.330 --> 00:05:04.310
but there are things
that are not going right.

00:05:06.150 --> 00:05:09.100
- [Narrator] The Native American
oyster, the eastern oyster,

00:05:09.100 --> 00:05:12.350
was our country's first extinction.

00:05:12.350 --> 00:05:15.070
- It's the history that
puts this in perspective.

00:05:15.070 --> 00:05:19.070
For example, on Great Bay
Boulevard, the Tuckerton Mound

00:05:19.070 --> 00:05:22.690
is an old Indian mitten
that contains arctic clams

00:05:22.690 --> 00:05:26.060
and oyster shells, so these
fisheries have been around

00:05:26.060 --> 00:05:28.080
for thousands of years,
and we're only beginning

00:05:28.080 --> 00:05:31.130
to understand their role in the ecosystem.

00:05:33.400 --> 00:05:38.240
Into the early 1900s, Julius
and his son Thurlow Nelson

00:05:38.240 --> 00:05:41.080
began studying oysters in Barnegat Bay

00:05:41.080 --> 00:05:42.666
because they were so important.

00:05:42.666 --> 00:05:45.833
(upbeat guitar music)

00:05:47.370 --> 00:05:49.770
- One of the main goals of our museum

00:05:49.770 --> 00:05:51.930
is to preserve the
heritage ana the culture

00:05:51.930 --> 00:05:54.070
of the people who lived
and worked on the bay.

00:05:54.070 --> 00:05:57.600
Julius started his research
at Tuckerton Creek in 1901,

00:05:57.600 --> 00:06:00.930
and the houseboat was built in 1909

00:06:00.930 --> 00:06:03.770
and was in use until the '50s.

00:06:03.770 --> 00:06:06.300
If you were talking about
agriculture in New Jersey,

00:06:06.300 --> 00:06:08.300
you have to include
research that was happening

00:06:08.300 --> 00:06:09.133
on the water.

00:06:09.133 --> 00:06:11.070
All of that oyster
farming and clam farming,

00:06:11.070 --> 00:06:14.210
that's part of our agriculture history.

00:06:14.210 --> 00:06:17.460
- In our backyard, some of
the most extensive research

00:06:17.460 --> 00:06:20.810
on oysters was conducted
over a hundred years ago,

00:06:20.810 --> 00:06:24.880
and we're still learning
from, and should be continuing

00:06:24.880 --> 00:06:28.030
to learn from, that early research.

00:06:28.030 --> 00:06:30.480
- I don't think we'd have
the oysters that we do today

00:06:30.480 --> 00:06:32.436
if it wasn't for the research that Julius

00:06:32.436 --> 00:06:33.910
and Thurlow were doing.

00:06:33.910 --> 00:06:37.160
They figured out how to
cultivate oysters, and that's how

00:06:37.160 --> 00:06:40.390
we have our aquaculture industry
that we have to this day.

00:06:44.626 --> 00:06:48.740
- When the oysters began
their decline in the 1920s,

00:06:48.740 --> 00:06:52.580
much of the effort
shifted to Delaware Bay,

00:06:52.580 --> 00:06:55.120
particularly the work of Thurlow Nelson,

00:06:55.120 --> 00:06:59.290
and his student, Hal Haskin,
who has continued that research

00:06:59.290 --> 00:07:01.500
up until the last couple of decades.

00:07:01.500 --> 00:07:03.720
But there are others like Dave Bushick

00:07:03.720 --> 00:07:06.680
and Sue Ford who continued that research.

00:07:09.640 --> 00:07:11.980
- [Jackie] This is from Dr. Nelson's

00:07:11.980 --> 00:07:14.540
1892 experiment station report:

00:07:14.540 --> 00:07:16.520
"It will broaden a farmer's
sympathies to learn that

00:07:16.520 --> 00:07:18.690
"off on the coast there
are men who call themselves

00:07:18.690 --> 00:07:21.910
"oyster farmers who
cultivate oysters on farms,

00:07:21.910 --> 00:07:24.580
"who sell oyster seed
and plant and transplant

00:07:24.580 --> 00:07:28.090
"oyster plants, who let their
ground lie fallow to rest

00:07:28.090 --> 00:07:30.610
"now and then because it
has raised so many crops

00:07:30.610 --> 00:07:32.630
"as to be exhausted, and
so we might go through

00:07:32.630 --> 00:07:34.650
"the vocabulary of oyster operations

00:07:34.650 --> 00:07:36.830
"and show that the cultivation of oysters

00:07:36.830 --> 00:07:39.800
"is more like the cultivation
of potatoes than of animals,

00:07:39.800 --> 00:07:42.820
"for the oyster can no more
locomote than can a potato."

00:07:47.260 --> 00:07:50.810
- Oysters provide a whole
host of ecosystem services

00:07:50.810 --> 00:07:52.580
to these estuaries.

00:07:52.580 --> 00:07:55.980
Habitat and their reefs,
they filter the water.

00:07:55.980 --> 00:07:59.460
So given the economic
and ecological importance

00:07:59.460 --> 00:08:04.340
of oysters in the region,
it's surprising how little

00:08:04.340 --> 00:08:09.340
we understand about our ability
to restore the populations.

00:08:09.860 --> 00:08:11.900
- [Narrator] 40% of the world's population

00:08:11.900 --> 00:08:15.780
lives within 60 miles of a
coastline, causing a strain

00:08:15.780 --> 00:08:18.920
on the estuarine systems
around the planet.

00:08:18.920 --> 00:08:21.492
- Over the years, with
more people coming here,

00:08:21.492 --> 00:08:25.140
the impact of those people
increased the "fertilizer"

00:08:25.140 --> 00:08:29.670
that was in the bay, so
eutrification is kind of a big term,

00:08:29.670 --> 00:08:32.050
but it's over-fertilization.

00:08:32.050 --> 00:08:33.630
- Well you know, it's
funny, my dad always said,

00:08:33.630 --> 00:08:36.490
"When I was born, if you
took a picture of the sky

00:08:36.490 --> 00:08:38.070
"and then took a picture 50 years later,

00:08:38.070 --> 00:08:40.290
"you'd see a big difference
in the color of blue."

00:08:40.290 --> 00:08:42.580
And we've been seeing
that just in our lifetime,

00:08:42.580 --> 00:08:44.640
not just the sky or the color of the sky

00:08:44.640 --> 00:08:46.850
but the changes in the bay,
the changes in the ocean,

00:08:46.850 --> 00:08:49.820
the changes in species and communities,

00:08:49.820 --> 00:08:51.600
how they're kind of shifting slowly.

00:08:51.600 --> 00:08:55.950
- Oysters are an important
component of whole systems.

00:08:55.950 --> 00:08:58.150
When you don't have oysters in the system

00:08:58.150 --> 00:09:00.890
the system is altered and
it's altered radically.

00:09:01.780 --> 00:09:03.750
- [Narrator] What happened
to the bountiful oysters

00:09:03.750 --> 00:09:05.280
that once filled the bay?

00:09:09.340 --> 00:09:11.580
Tuckerton, New Jersey
was one of the largest

00:09:11.580 --> 00:09:14.320
seed suppliers on the East Coast.

00:09:14.320 --> 00:09:18.810
In 1901 alone, 450,000 bushels of oysters

00:09:18.810 --> 00:09:20.780
were harvested from the Barnegat Bay.

00:09:21.800 --> 00:09:24.034
Where did the oysters go?

00:09:24.034 --> 00:09:27.201
(doleful piano music)

00:09:38.800 --> 00:09:40.660
And what is the natural population

00:09:40.660 --> 00:09:43.380
of the oysters in the bay today?

00:09:49.040 --> 00:09:51.707
(emotive music)

00:10:38.218 --> 00:10:39.850
- As a kid, I used to clam.

00:10:39.850 --> 00:10:41.970
My father got me a little 16-foot garvey

00:10:41.970 --> 00:10:44.710
when I was about 14.

00:10:44.710 --> 00:10:47.640
All the kids about my
age, we all would trade

00:10:47.640 --> 00:10:48.940
all over Great Bay.

00:10:48.940 --> 00:10:52.180
I was 14 or 15 years
old, and look at me, 67.

00:10:53.129 --> 00:10:55.562
I'm almost the last one standing here.

00:10:55.562 --> 00:10:58.562
(sentimental music)

00:11:11.891 --> 00:11:14.880
A bayman is a person
who loves the outdoors,

00:11:14.880 --> 00:11:17.510
loves working as his
own boss, doesn't have

00:11:17.510 --> 00:11:20.560
a time clock to punch,
is very conservative.

00:11:21.870 --> 00:11:24.610
The majority of them
that I knew personally

00:11:24.610 --> 00:11:26.900
have mostly all passed away.

00:11:27.780 --> 00:11:29.289
In the morning, this time of the day,

00:11:29.289 --> 00:11:32.390
there would be 25 or 30
boats over here every day.

00:11:33.870 --> 00:11:37.340
You just can't catch enough out
here to make a decent living

00:11:37.340 --> 00:11:41.113
unless you're also into the
aquaculture end of it too.

00:11:41.113 --> 00:11:42.363
And it's hard to do both.

00:11:44.820 --> 00:11:47.570
Back in my father's day, early '70s,

00:11:47.570 --> 00:11:50.220
we opened up the fish
market that we have now.

00:11:50.220 --> 00:11:53.720
We've been right there for,
we traced it back a while ago

00:11:53.720 --> 00:11:57.630
to since 1909 is about as
far back as we could go.

00:12:09.270 --> 00:12:13.240
This area right here
last winter softened up.

00:12:13.240 --> 00:12:16.790
I worked right here, right
in this little general area

00:12:16.790 --> 00:12:19.140
in this corner of this lease all winter.

00:12:20.330 --> 00:12:23.689
And I just couldn't believe the
clams that came out of here.

00:12:23.689 --> 00:12:25.630
I mean look, I'm still catching a few.

00:12:25.630 --> 00:12:29.660
I know I have about 80 acres
myself between this bay

00:12:29.660 --> 00:12:31.830
and the other bay, but it doesn't matter,

00:12:31.830 --> 00:12:36.390
because some of these
leases, like all along

00:12:36.390 --> 00:12:39.380
the bank over there,
they're not productive,

00:12:39.380 --> 00:12:41.160
nothing's growing there anymore.

00:12:41.160 --> 00:12:45.000
We have a little strip right
here, this is productive.

00:12:45.000 --> 00:12:48.410
When Beach Haven Inlet
filled in, it cut the flow

00:12:48.410 --> 00:12:50.780
through these creeks right
here, so we're not getting

00:12:50.780 --> 00:12:53.470
any collection, but you
get back in the bay,

00:12:53.470 --> 00:12:55.610
towards West Creek and Parkertown,

00:12:55.610 --> 00:12:59.330
which used to be clam capital
of the whole East Coast,

00:12:59.330 --> 00:13:01.090
you can't catch a clam.

00:13:01.090 --> 00:13:03.380
I mean, nothing survives.

00:13:06.600 --> 00:13:09.120
But the oysters seem to be
coming back a little bit.

00:13:09.120 --> 00:13:11.610
I notice a lot of the
natural set in the marina

00:13:11.610 --> 00:13:14.060
around the bulkheads and
setting on different things

00:13:14.060 --> 00:13:15.970
in the water, and when
the tide really goes out

00:13:15.970 --> 00:13:17.510
you can see them.

00:13:17.510 --> 00:13:18.500
It'll happen.

00:13:18.500 --> 00:13:21.920
What's 150 years in our lifetime?

00:13:21.920 --> 00:13:24.850
I wish I could hang
around to see it happen.

00:13:27.490 --> 00:13:31.240
But right now I'm just plucking
what I can here. (chuckling)

00:13:34.130 --> 00:13:35.889
I love it out here.

00:13:35.889 --> 00:13:38.472
(bright music)

00:13:43.160 --> 00:13:44.940
- [Narrator] With a bay
rich in oyster history

00:13:44.940 --> 00:13:48.990
in the same location that
drew Julius and Thurlow Nelson

00:13:48.990 --> 00:13:52.010
to conduct their pioneering
oyster culture research,

00:13:52.910 --> 00:13:55.630
oyster farmers work the bay today.

00:14:40.700 --> 00:14:42.190
- [Man] There it goes.

00:14:42.190 --> 00:14:43.770
That's a young bald eagle.

00:14:43.770 --> 00:14:45.080
Yeah, that's a baby.

00:14:46.000 --> 00:14:47.630
Which looks even bigger than the adult

00:14:47.630 --> 00:14:50.040
'cause it's got fluffier feathers.

00:14:50.040 --> 00:14:51.930
- This part of the
world, The Barnegat Bay,

00:14:51.930 --> 00:14:54.370
has been associated with a culture

00:14:54.370 --> 00:14:55.950
that has relied on the bay.

00:14:55.950 --> 00:14:58.980
We've had a strong heritage of the baymen,

00:14:58.980 --> 00:15:03.930
but for a number of reasons
that culture has gone extinct.

00:15:03.930 --> 00:15:08.120
We've seen a great opportunity
to bring that culture back

00:15:08.120 --> 00:15:09.520
in a slightly different way.

00:15:13.160 --> 00:15:14.580
I grew up in New Jersey.

00:15:15.570 --> 00:15:20.570
I lived near the water
in Monmouth County and I

00:15:20.730 --> 00:15:25.730
always was really fascinated
with the marine environment.

00:15:26.250 --> 00:15:29.700
One of my first jobs was
working in a fish market.

00:15:29.700 --> 00:15:31.630
And then I wanted to find out more,

00:15:31.630 --> 00:15:34.690
so I went and I worked on fishing boats,

00:15:34.690 --> 00:15:38.420
which led me to college at the
University of Rhode Island,

00:15:38.420 --> 00:15:41.590
where I studied fisheries and aquaculture.

00:15:41.590 --> 00:15:44.173
(bright music)

00:15:49.490 --> 00:15:51.870
Scott and I met at the
University of Rhode Island.

00:15:51.870 --> 00:15:53.240
We were both from New Jersey,

00:15:53.240 --> 00:15:54.940
and we became really good friends.

00:15:56.100 --> 00:15:59.320
We just connected and saw eye
to eye on a lot of things.

00:15:59.320 --> 00:16:01.730
When we graduated we
said we were gonna hike

00:16:01.730 --> 00:16:04.080
a section of the Appalachian trail.

00:16:06.210 --> 00:16:08.650
I think it was when we were
doing that hike I had started

00:16:08.650 --> 00:16:11.980
talking about how I wanted
to start an oyster farm.

00:16:11.980 --> 00:16:15.310
I guess he had been reading a
book which was talking about

00:16:15.310 --> 00:16:18.950
this farmer in Virginia
kind of revolutionizing

00:16:18.950 --> 00:16:22.220
the organic commercial farming industry

00:16:22.220 --> 00:16:24.080
and how he thought it was so cool

00:16:24.080 --> 00:16:25.520
and how he wanted to
do something like that,

00:16:25.520 --> 00:16:28.300
and I'm like, "You don't
want to do dirt farming.

00:16:28.300 --> 00:16:29.960
"If you want to get into farming,

00:16:29.960 --> 00:16:31.750
"let's look into oyster farming."

00:16:37.020 --> 00:16:40.430
- Oysters are a unique farm product.

00:16:40.430 --> 00:16:43.770
It's not like a dirt farm,
you're adding fertilizer.

00:16:43.770 --> 00:16:46.080
It's not like a pig or
a chicken or a salmon

00:16:46.080 --> 00:16:47.620
or a tilapia where you
have to take something

00:16:47.620 --> 00:16:49.260
out of the environment to feed it.

00:16:49.260 --> 00:16:52.180
Oysters, they're eating
something that already exists

00:16:52.180 --> 00:16:55.380
in the environment and
actually exists in abundance.

00:16:55.380 --> 00:16:57.770
So the more oysters we can have

00:16:57.770 --> 00:16:59.830
the more water we can
filter and the more algae

00:16:59.830 --> 00:17:01.580
we can remove from the environment.

00:17:03.930 --> 00:17:06.380
In the grand scheme of
things we'd like to produce

00:17:06.380 --> 00:17:08.830
a couple of different products.

00:17:08.830 --> 00:17:11.890
Oysters take on the
characteristics of the region

00:17:11.890 --> 00:17:14.250
that they grow in, so if we
can get a couple different

00:17:14.250 --> 00:17:16.400
oysters in this bay, we can market them

00:17:16.400 --> 00:17:20.360
and bring them to the consumer,
it's good economically

00:17:20.360 --> 00:17:23.560
for us, but it's also good for the bay,

00:17:23.560 --> 00:17:24.960
it's good for the community.

00:17:36.480 --> 00:17:38.600
We believe in it and we
believe in this area,

00:17:38.600 --> 00:17:40.880
and we think that the people who come here

00:17:40.880 --> 00:17:42.360
and the people also that live here,

00:17:42.360 --> 00:17:45.570
if they are building their
community because of the foods

00:17:45.570 --> 00:17:47.820
that we have in our ocean and in our bay,

00:17:48.732 --> 00:17:50.630
it's just gonna benefit everybody.

00:18:27.922 --> 00:18:30.589
(emotive music)

00:18:56.260 --> 00:18:57.093
- So when was the last time you guys

00:18:57.093 --> 00:19:00.562
went out in the bay at six in the morning?

00:19:27.380 --> 00:19:28.540
In another year or two this cabin

00:19:28.540 --> 00:19:30.390
will be perfect size for my daughter.

00:19:32.980 --> 00:19:35.350
I'm Dale Parsons, Jr., fifth generation

00:19:35.350 --> 00:19:37.590
to run Parsons Seafood, first generation

00:19:37.590 --> 00:19:39.550
as a commercial shellfish farmer.

00:19:40.871 --> 00:19:43.120
I've been working on
the bay my entire life,

00:19:43.120 --> 00:19:44.690
from childhood on.

00:19:44.690 --> 00:19:47.251
And for a short time I
was a commercial fisherman

00:19:47.251 --> 00:19:50.170
on ocean-going clam boats.

00:19:50.170 --> 00:19:51.900
Spent about 10 years offshore.

00:19:53.340 --> 00:19:56.870
The original Parsons
company was Mathis Company.

00:19:56.870 --> 00:19:59.160
John Mathis settled,
from what I understand,

00:19:59.160 --> 00:20:02.660
from Bass River all the way
north to ?Forked River area.

00:20:02.660 --> 00:20:06.910
The whole Barnegat Bay
community was his settlement,

00:20:06.910 --> 00:20:10.030
and he had these farms
all up and down the bay.

00:20:10.030 --> 00:20:13.320
Now we know them as Manawakin
and West Creek, Parkertown.

00:20:13.320 --> 00:20:17.830
My great-great-great-great-grandfather
was Daniel Mathis.

00:20:17.830 --> 00:20:21.520
Daniel started a small shellfish company.

00:20:21.520 --> 00:20:23.310
He took a grocery store off Route 9

00:20:23.310 --> 00:20:25.750
and rolled it down South
Green Street on logs,

00:20:25.750 --> 00:20:28.220
moved it down on the crick
right up here behind me

00:20:28.220 --> 00:20:32.250
and started buying clams from
the community in Tuckerton

00:20:32.250 --> 00:20:34.048
who was going out into the bay

00:20:34.048 --> 00:20:35.548
and finding their day's catch.

00:20:43.760 --> 00:20:46.760
- I saw that those poisonous
blowfish came in the bay,

00:20:46.760 --> 00:20:48.500
those southern puffers.

00:20:48.500 --> 00:20:50.400
- Oh there were probably
already always here,

00:20:50.400 --> 00:20:51.640
somebody just found one.

00:20:51.640 --> 00:20:54.350
- You guys catching any blowfish or no?

00:20:54.350 --> 00:20:56.090
- There was one the size of a football

00:20:56.090 --> 00:20:57.460
up there on the point.

00:20:57.460 --> 00:20:58.700
- Everything else has been good though?

00:20:58.700 --> 00:21:00.600
You've been getting them or what?

00:21:00.600 --> 00:21:02.170
- Yeah, yeah, market's hot.

00:21:02.170 --> 00:21:03.620
All right, I'm going to work.

00:21:08.890 --> 00:21:10.740
That could go on all day if I let it.

00:21:12.546 --> 00:21:15.470
So the first step for me is
to put all this inventory

00:21:15.470 --> 00:21:16.470
back in the water.

00:21:16.470 --> 00:21:19.113
We'll give it a few months to freshen up.

00:21:19.113 --> 00:21:21.007
But you can't sell all the inventory.

00:21:21.007 --> 00:21:26.007
That's how you lose customers. (chuckling)

00:21:29.003 --> 00:21:31.586
(upbeat music)

00:22:33.900 --> 00:22:37.120
- My family has been
working the coastal waters

00:22:37.120 --> 00:22:41.190
of New Jersey, jeez, back
since about probably before

00:22:41.190 --> 00:22:44.560
the 1860s, so probably
like the 1840s or so.

00:22:44.560 --> 00:22:48.300
I first went on the water
in 1963 as a little boy.

00:22:48.300 --> 00:22:50.754
I don't think anybody plans
on doing this, you know?

00:22:50.754 --> 00:22:52.610
(laughing)

00:22:52.610 --> 00:22:55.100
I get out of college in '78.

00:22:55.100 --> 00:22:56.750
It was very difficult finding a job.

00:22:56.750 --> 00:22:59.950
And the job offers I did get were like

00:22:59.950 --> 00:23:01.740
it was such a low-paying thing

00:23:01.740 --> 00:23:03.950
that I decided just to
start working on the water,

00:23:03.950 --> 00:23:06.340
which I'd done all my life
anyway, since I was I kid.

00:23:06.340 --> 00:23:09.050
I was a clammer back then, we clammed.

00:23:09.050 --> 00:23:11.180
Periodically did oystering.

00:23:11.180 --> 00:23:13.550
I ended up taking over the
business, the family business

00:23:13.550 --> 00:23:18.550
in 1981, so I've been in
business I guess about 35 years.

00:23:18.610 --> 00:23:22.710
I haven't had a summer
off or like, you know ...

00:23:24.500 --> 00:23:27.179
Been anywhere in the summer since 1962.

00:23:27.179 --> 00:23:29.429
(laughing)

00:23:30.680 --> 00:23:32.430
Yeah, it's been a long time.

00:23:34.540 --> 00:23:37.240
- I used to work in a bakery,

00:23:37.240 --> 00:23:39.670
and I did like specialty
cupcakes and wedding cakes

00:23:39.670 --> 00:23:42.340
for a couple years, and I
only ever worked with girls,

00:23:42.340 --> 00:23:44.370
so this is definitely different.

00:23:49.750 --> 00:23:51.200
In the summer it's so pretty.

00:23:51.200 --> 00:23:53.870
When you have to get up incredibly
early and it's terrible,

00:23:53.870 --> 00:23:56.580
but it's so worth it seeing the sunrise.

00:23:56.580 --> 00:23:57.620
Oh my gosh!

00:23:59.180 --> 00:24:00.581
It's my favorite part.

00:24:00.581 --> 00:24:03.164
It's like, okay, it's worth it.

00:24:24.930 --> 00:24:26.950
- New Jersey's been kind of a tough place

00:24:26.950 --> 00:24:28.380
to start an oyster farm, just because

00:24:28.380 --> 00:24:31.190
there's so many regulatory road blocks.

00:24:31.190 --> 00:24:32.830
There just hasn't been enough support

00:24:32.830 --> 00:24:37.100
to try to make things
conducive for startups.

00:24:37.100 --> 00:24:40.900
In New Jersey we have about
12 oyster farms right now.

00:24:40.900 --> 00:24:44.760
As a state we sell about $1.5 million

00:24:44.760 --> 00:24:47.850
worth of oysters a year
from the aquaculture sector.

00:24:47.850 --> 00:24:51.880
Compare that to Massachusetts
or Virginia or Maryland,

00:24:51.880 --> 00:24:53.180
it's not even close.

00:25:19.460 --> 00:25:20.560
- What's going on, guys?

00:25:20.560 --> 00:25:21.630
How are you?

00:25:21.630 --> 00:25:23.253
Got all your seed bagged up for you.

00:25:23.253 --> 00:25:25.836
(bright music)

00:25:26.840 --> 00:25:28.650
We grow most of the oyster seed

00:25:28.650 --> 00:25:30.450
for all the farmers in New Jersey.

00:25:30.450 --> 00:25:33.460
This year alone we did
about 12 million seed.

00:25:33.460 --> 00:25:35.990
Rutgers has one of the
oldest oyster shellfish

00:25:35.990 --> 00:25:38.510
breeding programs in
the world at this point.

00:25:38.510 --> 00:25:40.220
One of the good ways we
found to grow them out

00:25:40.220 --> 00:25:41.280
are on these tables.

00:25:41.280 --> 00:25:44.510
We can hold almost
100,000 seed on one table.

00:25:49.740 --> 00:25:51.710
So we got your guys' stuff
all bagged up already.

00:25:51.710 --> 00:25:53.910
It's just shy of a quarter million,

00:25:53.910 --> 00:25:55.180
all about six millimeter.

00:25:56.220 --> 00:25:57.410
All right, you guys good to go?

00:25:57.410 --> 00:25:58.670
- Yeah, cool, thank you.

00:25:58.670 --> 00:26:00.240
- All right, we'll see you guys soon.

00:26:24.188 --> 00:26:25.930
- This right here is
one of the major issues

00:26:25.930 --> 00:26:27.260
with Barnegat Bay.

00:26:27.260 --> 00:26:30.090
This is what happens to fertilizer.

00:26:30.090 --> 00:26:33.310
Whatever people decide
to throw in the water

00:26:33.310 --> 00:26:34.310
turns into that.

00:26:35.370 --> 00:26:37.030
And that decomposes

00:26:38.270 --> 00:26:40.690
and sucks all the oxygen out of the water

00:26:40.690 --> 00:26:42.240
and kills everything around it.

00:26:44.759 --> 00:26:46.040
I was hoping the storm that we just had

00:26:46.040 --> 00:26:47.810
would actually carry
some of that grass out,

00:26:47.810 --> 00:26:49.870
but there's still quite a bit here.

00:26:55.810 --> 00:26:59.520
The shellfish industry
has changed quite a bit.

00:26:59.520 --> 00:27:01.470
I do have a couple oysters on the farm.

00:27:02.700 --> 00:27:04.230
And I call it the shellfish industry

00:27:04.230 --> 00:27:06.430
'cause at one point it was
not a farming industry.

00:27:06.430 --> 00:27:09.110
It was kind of the
hunter-gatherer industry

00:27:09.110 --> 00:27:12.463
where you had a community of baymen.

00:27:12.463 --> 00:27:14.100
All right, now comes the fun part.

00:27:14.100 --> 00:27:16.140
They bought their own Jersey white seater,

00:27:16.140 --> 00:27:17.240
built their own boats.

00:27:17.240 --> 00:27:18.600
They went out into the bay

00:27:18.600 --> 00:27:20.740
and they sold whatever they found.

00:27:20.740 --> 00:27:22.520
I try to design everything we do here

00:27:22.520 --> 00:27:23.840
so one man can come out

00:27:27.482 --> 00:27:29.470
and do a decent day's pay.

00:27:29.470 --> 00:27:34.040
Now we either purchase or
produce juvenile shellfish.

00:27:34.040 --> 00:27:36.580
Spent a long time trying to get permits

00:27:36.580 --> 00:27:40.550
to put that shellfish in
the bay, and we allowed

00:27:40.550 --> 00:27:42.740
a growth period of about a year or two,

00:27:42.740 --> 00:27:45.620
sometimes three or more
depending upon your site.

00:27:45.620 --> 00:27:48.210
We re-harvest and sell to market.

00:27:55.740 --> 00:27:58.920
Once we get a little weight
in it it's a lot easier.

00:28:28.550 --> 00:28:32.350
Starts out with a lot, ended
up with a little. (chuckles)

00:28:54.620 --> 00:28:57.700
- Our main goal is not to
get the line in the wheel.

00:28:57.700 --> 00:28:59.740
Bridget take the wheel, will you please?

00:28:59.740 --> 00:29:02.490
Stay right like your heading
to the fish factory, okay?

00:29:08.290 --> 00:29:11.830
I must say, we have
minimal conditions here.

00:29:11.830 --> 00:29:13.850
This is a group of leases that I own.

00:29:13.850 --> 00:29:16.500
I'm gonna say this is
somewhere around 50 acres here.

00:29:20.740 --> 00:29:22.690
50 acres on the water looks a lot bigger

00:29:22.690 --> 00:29:24.790
than 50 acres on land, I'll tell you that.

00:29:30.520 --> 00:29:35.520
We get this marine growth at
different times of the year.

00:29:42.860 --> 00:29:46.520
We take shell and put it
on our leases in the river.

00:29:46.520 --> 00:29:48.560
When the oysters spawn
they attach to that.

00:29:48.560 --> 00:29:52.080
They are usually there
at least a couple years,

00:29:52.080 --> 00:29:54.380
and then we move them down here,

00:29:54.380 --> 00:29:55.730
move them here, and we
move them over there

00:29:55.730 --> 00:29:57.540
across the bay over to Crab Island.

00:29:57.540 --> 00:29:59.260
That's our other place that we oyster.

00:29:59.260 --> 00:30:02.430
That's our other brand that
we have, Crab Island oysters.

00:30:02.430 --> 00:30:04.330
These are the Graveling Point oysters.

00:30:06.681 --> 00:30:10.720
They're usually here about
a year, and we usually ...

00:30:11.820 --> 00:30:15.450
We have to rotate where we
plant, just like a farmer does.

00:30:15.450 --> 00:30:18.870
We typically have to
wait at least two years

00:30:18.870 --> 00:30:21.360
after we harvest from a spot
to be able to plant again.

00:30:21.360 --> 00:30:23.070
We need a lot of area to do that.

00:30:24.110 --> 00:30:26.020
Bridgette, get ready to grab the wheel.

00:30:29.210 --> 00:30:31.110
Don't turn yet, honey, don't turn it.

00:30:34.790 --> 00:30:35.690
Straighten it out.

00:30:36.840 --> 00:30:37.840
All right, now turn.

00:30:38.930 --> 00:30:39.763
Slowing down.

00:30:40.960 --> 00:30:42.660
- Yeah, slowed down.

00:30:46.190 --> 00:30:50.280
- When MSX came through in
1958, it didn't kill everything.

00:30:50.280 --> 00:30:51.170
Some survived.

00:30:51.170 --> 00:30:52.100
They spawned.

00:30:52.100 --> 00:30:54.290
Then they died off, and
some survived to there's.

00:30:54.290 --> 00:30:58.100
They just naturally become
immune to MSX and Durmo.

00:30:59.660 --> 00:31:00.820
Jeez, we've probably got like

00:31:00.820 --> 00:31:03.280
30, 40 generations of stuff here.

00:31:03.280 --> 00:31:05.230
It's changed dramatically.

00:31:05.230 --> 00:31:07.170
We see species here now.

00:31:07.170 --> 00:31:09.150
The evasive species from the south

00:31:09.150 --> 00:31:10.740
that are here now, it's crazy.

00:31:10.740 --> 00:31:12.230
I mean, it's like ...

00:31:12.230 --> 00:31:15.760
And it's not just something
that you've seen over the last

00:31:17.540 --> 00:31:20.970
my 35 years or 40 years here, but I mean

00:31:20.970 --> 00:31:25.290
you're starting to see stuff that is,

00:31:25.290 --> 00:31:29.070
in just the last maybe five,
six, seven, eight years,

00:31:29.070 --> 00:31:32.970
I mean, really wild looking changes.

00:31:32.970 --> 00:31:35.550
We had a trigger fish that was up here

00:31:35.550 --> 00:31:36.820
biting the ends of the oysters off.

00:31:36.820 --> 00:31:39.430
We've had porpoises swim by.

00:31:39.430 --> 00:31:41.710
There's a manatee up around Sandy Hook.

00:31:41.710 --> 00:31:43.960
They're catching redfish offshore now.

00:31:43.960 --> 00:31:45.580
I mean, it's nuts.

00:31:49.540 --> 00:31:53.210
I am a Maxwell on my father's side

00:31:53.210 --> 00:31:54.630
and an Allen on my father's side.

00:31:54.630 --> 00:31:58.620
The Allens were doing it way
back in the 1840s, I think.

00:31:58.620 --> 00:32:01.360
The Maxwells really didn't start it

00:32:01.360 --> 00:32:05.260
until around the turn of the
century, the last century.

00:32:05.260 --> 00:32:07.809
My mother's sides are Daytons and Adamses.

00:32:07.809 --> 00:32:09.280
The Adamses, they'd been doing it

00:32:09.280 --> 00:32:12.830
since probably the 1880s,
something like that.

00:32:12.830 --> 00:32:15.960
It's something I was kind of born into.

00:32:15.960 --> 00:32:17.530
I don't have sons.

00:32:17.530 --> 00:32:18.640
I have two daughters.

00:32:19.692 --> 00:32:22.600
(laughing)

00:32:22.600 --> 00:32:24.940
So, you know ...

00:32:26.873 --> 00:32:29.100
It's a different type of thing.

00:32:29.100 --> 00:32:30.550
I would love to see it continue

00:32:30.550 --> 00:32:34.030
and to just be here for a long time.

00:32:34.030 --> 00:32:37.186
Whether it will or not,
I'm not sure, you know?

00:32:37.186 --> 00:32:39.936
(ethereal music)

00:33:15.290 --> 00:33:16.810
- For many growers the name of the game

00:33:16.810 --> 00:33:19.090
is production quantities.

00:33:19.090 --> 00:33:23.580
But we sort of have a side
mission which is branding.

00:33:26.600 --> 00:33:30.780
It's less about quantity
and more about reputation

00:33:30.780 --> 00:33:32.710
and an incredible product.

00:33:36.000 --> 00:33:39.840
By choosing New Jersey to
grow in, we've taken it

00:33:39.840 --> 00:33:42.830
upon ourselves to try to
convince people outside

00:33:42.830 --> 00:33:46.240
of New Jersey that it's a
great place to grow oysters.

00:33:47.270 --> 00:33:51.360
Our product stands up
against regional powerhouses

00:33:51.360 --> 00:33:54.320
like the Wellfleets and
the Prince Edward Islands.

00:33:54.320 --> 00:33:57.740
This is an amazing place to
grow, but there's a perception.

00:33:57.740 --> 00:34:00.433
I mean, look at this place.

00:34:00.433 --> 00:34:05.433
Dirty Jerz. (chuckling)

00:34:16.780 --> 00:34:20.330
- The regulation of oysters
in this country, it's the most

00:34:20.330 --> 00:34:22.910
regulated food product in
this country right now.

00:34:24.400 --> 00:34:26.080
Maybe a few years ago it was raw milk,

00:34:26.080 --> 00:34:29.610
but that's just, you
can't find that anymore.

00:34:29.610 --> 00:34:32.200
That's just illegal now. (chuckling)

00:34:32.200 --> 00:34:36.820
- We've gone through many,
many, many years of red tape,

00:34:36.820 --> 00:34:39.990
basically, lobbying to
open up new growing areas.

00:34:39.990 --> 00:34:41.610
Right now we're trying to open up a site

00:34:41.610 --> 00:34:45.010
right by the lighthouse, and it's taken us

00:34:45.010 --> 00:34:47.860
almost a year of just the federal permits.

00:34:47.860 --> 00:34:49.490
So then we have to go to the state,

00:34:49.490 --> 00:34:50.930
and there's a few different state permits

00:34:50.930 --> 00:34:54.130
that we need to get, and
that's after three years

00:34:54.130 --> 00:34:56.420
of lobbying the state
to try to just open up

00:34:56.420 --> 00:34:58.180
and lease us the area.

00:35:02.460 --> 00:35:05.270
The way that the laws work as far as

00:35:05.270 --> 00:35:08.360
this collective resources,
the leasing policies.

00:35:08.360 --> 00:35:11.380
But yes, it's time consuming
and it's a pain in the ass,

00:35:11.380 --> 00:35:14.760
and you have to deal with
bureaucracies like crazy,

00:35:14.760 --> 00:35:17.860
and like Matt was saying,
it's extremely regulated,

00:35:17.860 --> 00:35:19.710
but it's a little bit of a land grab.

00:35:26.835 --> 00:35:30.650
On a very macro scale I
believe that growing protein

00:35:30.650 --> 00:35:33.950
on planet Earth in a sustainable way

00:35:33.950 --> 00:35:37.040
is an incredibly prosperous opportunity.

00:35:37.040 --> 00:35:39.570
And I mean, in 20 years from now

00:35:39.570 --> 00:35:43.400
when the U.S. population
has, I don't know,

00:35:43.400 --> 00:35:45.560
it might sound stupid,
doubled or something,

00:35:47.512 --> 00:35:51.380
having a place where you
can grow macro algaes

00:35:51.380 --> 00:35:55.990
and different types of protein
in a not just sustainable,

00:35:55.990 --> 00:35:58.440
a restorative, environmentally
restorative way,

00:35:58.440 --> 00:36:00.290
I think there's a huge value to that.

00:36:04.170 --> 00:36:08.675
- So we just put in this,
there's 25,000 on this screen

00:36:08.675 --> 00:36:12.120
And then 25,000 on the screen below it.

00:36:12.120 --> 00:36:15.850
- Some of these will, about
this time next year, be ready.

00:36:15.850 --> 00:36:17.260
Some faster than that.

00:36:17.260 --> 00:36:19.470
Some may have to survive another winter.

00:36:20.390 --> 00:36:22.500
These will grow, these will double in size

00:36:22.500 --> 00:36:26.480
hopefully by the time we
put them out onto the lease,

00:36:29.730 --> 00:36:32.510
once the winter hits us
or once the temperatures

00:36:32.510 --> 00:36:34.240
get below 50, like Thanksgiving.

00:36:36.450 --> 00:36:38.600
And then they'll just
hibernate all winter.

00:36:39.750 --> 00:36:42.320
We love this place and
we love to grow here

00:36:42.320 --> 00:36:45.070
and we love being the
people that grow here,

00:36:45.070 --> 00:36:49.090
but we know deep in our
hearts that we need to expand.

00:36:49.090 --> 00:36:53.880
For our business to grow we
need other successful growers

00:36:55.000 --> 00:36:56.920
to help tell that story and to come out

00:36:56.920 --> 00:37:00.020
with other cool products
out of the enormous bay.

00:37:00.020 --> 00:37:05.020
It's a "rising tide lifts
all ships" kind of mentality

00:37:05.310 --> 00:37:08.459
is the direction we're heading.

00:37:08.459 --> 00:37:11.292
(inspiring music)

00:37:34.490 --> 00:37:36.910
- My dad always calls it
like cutting diamonds.

00:37:36.910 --> 00:37:38.110
He's a diamond cutter.

00:37:49.040 --> 00:37:50.730
I've had a lot of people be like,

00:37:50.730 --> 00:37:53.220
"Your oysters are so gross looking."

00:37:53.220 --> 00:37:55.380
I'm like, "Yeah, well you
should have seen them before.

00:37:57.510 --> 00:37:59.070
"I cleaned them up."

00:37:59.070 --> 00:38:00.910
My grandfather, if he ever breaks one,

00:38:00.910 --> 00:38:04.640
like you can very easily just
put it through and break it,

00:38:04.640 --> 00:38:06.490
and then he'll always eat
all the ones he breaks

00:38:06.490 --> 00:38:07.323
on the boat.

00:38:08.540 --> 00:38:11.520
So nothing really goes to waste.

00:38:12.380 --> 00:38:14.610
All the little stuff
you just throw back in

00:38:14.610 --> 00:38:16.910
until their lot, so it's
kinda like the seeds.

00:38:26.700 --> 00:38:29.210
Some of the guys will go
out and then I'm just here

00:38:29.210 --> 00:38:32.810
for hours, like days on end of just like.

00:38:32.810 --> 00:38:34.360
It does help you take out frustration,

00:38:34.360 --> 00:38:37.630
and if there's a podcast you
really want to catch up on,

00:38:37.630 --> 00:38:38.800
then it's good for that.

00:38:38.800 --> 00:38:42.530
Other than that, though,
this is annoying. (laughs)

00:38:45.507 --> 00:38:48.060
I don't know, I think my
dad is more of the farmer.

00:38:48.060 --> 00:38:50.940
He's like the brains,
I'm just like the brawn

00:38:50.940 --> 00:38:55.070
which (laughing) I don't feel
I do that much, like lifting.

00:38:58.170 --> 00:39:00.020
I'd be like, I don't
know, like middle school

00:39:00.020 --> 00:39:01.990
and like up here trying to reach.

00:39:02.850 --> 00:39:05.200
So this is like how I
remember when I was a kid

00:39:06.160 --> 00:39:08.830
what daddy's business
was, was counting stuff

00:39:08.830 --> 00:39:13.670
and smashing it, which was fun. (laughs)

00:39:16.670 --> 00:39:19.420
I don't know, I wouldn't
want to do anything else.

00:39:20.470 --> 00:39:22.280
It wouldn't make sense to me to try to do

00:39:22.280 --> 00:39:25.320
anything else, 'cause it's fun.

00:39:27.380 --> 00:39:29.780
I don't know, nothing else
seems interesting enough

00:39:29.780 --> 00:39:31.780
and also has a history to it.

00:39:31.780 --> 00:39:34.900
And it's my family, so why not?

00:39:36.160 --> 00:39:39.400
As long as it doesn't
die, I'm gonna be here.

00:39:39.400 --> 00:39:42.450
And then hopefully my
kids and, I don't know,

00:39:42.450 --> 00:39:44.370
it just keeps going.

00:39:44.370 --> 00:39:48.070
So we'll have generation
seven maybe. (laughs)

00:39:50.670 --> 00:39:53.230
Which I don't think is a
plan my dad really had.

00:39:55.910 --> 00:39:57.900
Despite his best efforts of not wanting me

00:39:57.900 --> 00:40:02.177
to make a life on the
bay, oh well. (laughs)

00:40:02.177 --> 00:40:04.760
(bright music)

00:41:16.500 --> 00:41:19.430
- A land-based shellfish
nursery, it's a farm.

00:41:19.430 --> 00:41:22.860
It's a farm that starts out
in a fiberglass tank on land

00:41:22.860 --> 00:41:25.090
then moves out to the bay bottom.

00:41:25.090 --> 00:41:28.700
I chose this location
based on the water quality,

00:41:28.700 --> 00:41:31.060
based on the natural ...

00:41:31.960 --> 00:41:34.020
The type of food that was in the water.

00:41:34.020 --> 00:41:35.660
It's a lot like the vineyard

00:41:35.660 --> 00:41:37.370
picking the soil for the grapes.

00:41:37.370 --> 00:41:38.910
You need the right hay for the cows,

00:41:38.910 --> 00:41:40.670
you need the right soil for your grapes,

00:41:40.670 --> 00:41:43.540
we need the right water
for our clams and oysters.

00:41:43.540 --> 00:41:46.230
So this isn't exactly what
we use as an upweller,

00:41:46.230 --> 00:41:48.470
but it's the same basic principle.

00:41:48.470 --> 00:41:52.000
Water gets pumped in from the marina,

00:41:52.000 --> 00:41:55.160
water goes into the tank,
it gets plugged into here

00:41:55.160 --> 00:41:58.160
with a piece of pipe, water
flows through the bottom

00:41:58.160 --> 00:42:00.930
to the top, out this port into a drain

00:42:00.930 --> 00:42:03.390
which will be located here,
back down to the drain

00:42:03.390 --> 00:42:06.150
in the ground, and then
back out into the bay.

00:42:06.150 --> 00:42:08.350
We need large-scale oyster restoration

00:42:08.350 --> 00:42:11.080
for all of the biological benefits

00:42:11.080 --> 00:42:12.410
that oysters provide to the bay.

00:42:12.410 --> 00:42:14.890
There's water quality issues.

00:42:14.890 --> 00:42:16.660
There's a lack of oysters in the bay.

00:42:16.660 --> 00:42:18.530
There's an excess of phytoplankton.

00:42:18.530 --> 00:42:20.550
There's a million and one reasons

00:42:20.550 --> 00:42:23.530
why we need an oyster reef in the bay.

00:42:23.530 --> 00:42:26.004
The real question is how do we do it?

00:42:26.004 --> 00:42:29.240
(bright music)

00:42:29.240 --> 00:42:32.400
This past summer I was
partnering up with Stockton,

00:42:32.400 --> 00:42:35.040
American Littoral Society and
the Barnegat Bay Partnership

00:42:35.040 --> 00:42:37.430
on a restoration effort
in Southern Barnegat Bay.

00:42:37.430 --> 00:42:39.150
We're nicknaming it the Tuckerton Reef.

00:42:39.150 --> 00:42:42.310
We've taken conch shell,
which normally is discarded,

00:42:42.310 --> 00:42:45.290
and we set oysters on the
shell to go out into the bay

00:42:45.290 --> 00:42:48.810
and produce a permanent manmade reef.

00:42:48.810 --> 00:42:51.090
- Barnegat Bay historically
had approximately,

00:42:51.090 --> 00:42:54.030
so they say, 12,000 acres
of oyster reef habitat.

00:42:54.030 --> 00:42:55.820
Right now it's much less.

00:42:55.820 --> 00:42:58.360
I know I have the half
acre that we recreated,

00:42:58.360 --> 00:43:01.120
but the fact is most of
that habitat is gone.

00:43:01.120 --> 00:43:02.430
- One of the things
that we need to look at

00:43:02.430 --> 00:43:05.640
before we take big steps
towards investing in restoration

00:43:05.640 --> 00:43:06.770
is what's gonna work.

00:43:06.770 --> 00:43:10.320
Basic component to the
program is to compare

00:43:10.320 --> 00:43:14.390
using aquaculture techniques
versus transplanting animals

00:43:14.390 --> 00:43:16.460
or oysters from the Mullica river system.

00:43:16.460 --> 00:43:19.160
- We put down 163,000 oysters.

00:43:19.160 --> 00:43:21.610
- These oysters are not to be harvested.

00:43:21.610 --> 00:43:23.340
They go out, they stay out,

00:43:23.340 --> 00:43:26.760
they are a permanent
improvement the system.

00:43:28.890 --> 00:43:31.470
- [Reporter] Babies are
onboard, oyster babies,

00:43:31.470 --> 00:43:33.567
lulled by a lullaby.

00:43:33.567 --> 00:43:36.250
(playing trombone)

00:43:36.250 --> 00:43:38.670
And the gentle sway of boats taking them

00:43:38.670 --> 00:43:41.260
to their new home in the Barnegat Bay.

00:43:41.260 --> 00:43:43.030
They nestled into their new homes,

00:43:43.030 --> 00:43:46.430
as many as 43 were found on one shell.

00:43:46.430 --> 00:43:50.140
- So if you think of each
shell as being an apartment

00:43:50.140 --> 00:43:52.860
for oysters, sometimes you
can have families of five,

00:43:52.860 --> 00:43:55.110
sometimes you can just have
a single person living there,

00:43:55.110 --> 00:43:57.050
so it's the same for the oysters.

00:43:57.050 --> 00:43:58.890
- [Reporter] This morning,
captain Alex Majesky

00:43:58.890 --> 00:44:00.920
sampled the reef and proudly found

00:44:00.920 --> 00:44:03.860
what he thinks may be a natural set.

00:44:03.860 --> 00:44:06.350
- Natural set being
wild oysters in the bay

00:44:06.350 --> 00:44:08.400
actually set on the reef that we created.

00:44:10.190 --> 00:44:11.730
- This is a proof of concept.

00:44:11.730 --> 00:44:13.750
We're doing this to collect data.

00:44:13.750 --> 00:44:15.560
And the data we're trying to collect

00:44:15.560 --> 00:44:18.590
is we're allowing the bay to tell us

00:44:18.590 --> 00:44:21.530
what we should be using
for our restoration work.

00:44:21.530 --> 00:44:24.160
- If we're successful we
figure out this recipe

00:44:25.080 --> 00:44:27.540
of restoration, it can
be applied nation-wide

00:44:27.540 --> 00:44:29.160
or in other areas that are really similar,

00:44:29.160 --> 00:44:31.580
so it has a lot of applicability,
even on a global scale,

00:44:31.580 --> 00:44:33.940
because we're all
experiencing similar problems

00:44:33.940 --> 00:44:35.010
in our environment.

00:44:35.010 --> 00:44:37.450
- It's really a great
example of how science

00:44:37.450 --> 00:44:39.610
can work with the commercial industry,

00:44:39.610 --> 00:44:41.780
whether it's the local
crabbers that we work with

00:44:41.780 --> 00:44:43.430
on some projects, the water men.

00:44:43.430 --> 00:44:46.210
These are all hard workers
that are on the bay

00:44:46.210 --> 00:44:48.040
way more than any scientist,

00:44:48.040 --> 00:44:50.740
so we stand to learn
a lot from each other.

00:44:52.280 --> 00:44:54.360
- I like to work. (laughing)

00:44:54.360 --> 00:44:55.510
It's what I do.

00:44:55.510 --> 00:44:57.030
It's my passion.

00:44:57.030 --> 00:44:59.900
It's something that I've
always wanted to do.

00:44:59.900 --> 00:45:03.400
From a small child up until
last year I've been thinking

00:45:03.400 --> 00:45:06.120
about this sort of work and
I've always wanted to do it.

00:45:06.120 --> 00:45:10.110
It is the Parsons legacy
to have a restored reef

00:45:10.110 --> 00:45:12.268
in the southern part of the bay.

00:45:12.268 --> 00:45:14.620
It's where we live, it's where we eat,

00:45:14.620 --> 00:45:17.125
where we grow, it's what we do.

00:45:17.125 --> 00:45:19.708
(bright music)

00:45:24.810 --> 00:45:26.670
- It's not just the ecological restoration

00:45:26.670 --> 00:45:28.560
that we're looking at or the resiliency.

00:45:28.560 --> 00:45:30.960
We're looking at restoring
the culture of the bay.

00:45:30.960 --> 00:45:33.410
We're looking to let generations to come

00:45:33.410 --> 00:45:35.840
and generations past kind
of really connect together

00:45:35.840 --> 00:45:38.320
and say, "Hey, this is the
bay and this is where it was,"

00:45:38.320 --> 00:45:41.410
because they don't really
understand, the young kids today,

00:45:41.410 --> 00:45:43.920
what the bay was 50 years
ago or 100 years ago,

00:45:43.920 --> 00:45:45.920
so we need to get that
message and those stories

00:45:45.920 --> 00:45:48.270
to those kids as well
through this restoration.

00:45:50.930 --> 00:45:52.370
- All right, guys, listen up.

00:45:53.950 --> 00:45:56.460
I know we were here a few weeks ago.

00:45:56.460 --> 00:45:59.920
We were standing up on
the beach there, right?

00:45:59.920 --> 00:46:01.400
So we have this blowout tide, we've had

00:46:01.400 --> 00:46:04.870
this strong west wind
for what, three days now?

00:46:04.870 --> 00:46:07.460
MATES is a full-time
academy through Ocean County

00:46:07.460 --> 00:46:10.900
Vocational Technical school
district, and this is

00:46:10.900 --> 00:46:13.810
a really unique program that
students apply to get into.

00:46:13.810 --> 00:46:17.020
They're coming here and
they're actually learning

00:46:17.020 --> 00:46:19.430
a little bit more about the environment.

00:46:19.430 --> 00:46:21.240
It's kind of a higher level.

00:46:21.240 --> 00:46:23.740
You can see some of the old
oysters that were on there,

00:46:23.740 --> 00:46:26.230
and then these are some
new ones growing together.

00:46:26.230 --> 00:46:28.980
So again, these could form
large beds and eventually

00:46:29.900 --> 00:46:31.930
these provide more surface area, right?

00:46:31.930 --> 00:46:32.763
Think about it.

00:46:32.763 --> 00:46:35.090
If these are laying on a big
bottom, they're gonna provide

00:46:35.090 --> 00:46:37.390
a lot more habitat that just flat bottom.

00:46:38.360 --> 00:46:40.580
It's kinda that mentality
of trying to teach

00:46:40.580 --> 00:46:44.100
the future generations about
conservation, preservation,

00:46:44.100 --> 00:46:47.390
all those key values that
we should be focusing on

00:46:47.390 --> 00:46:50.040
because we're growing
massively as a population.

00:46:51.480 --> 00:46:53.120
Our coastlines are
suffering because of that,

00:46:53.120 --> 00:46:57.360
so I think if we can help
educate those children,

00:46:57.360 --> 00:46:59.587
it's gonna make a huge
difference in the future.

00:46:59.587 --> 00:47:02.170
(bright music)

00:47:16.420 --> 00:47:18.690
- This creek has a couple different names,

00:47:18.690 --> 00:47:21.250
but we call Rosie's Creek.

00:47:21.250 --> 00:47:24.610
This is Rose Cove, which is
a part of Little Egg Harbor.

00:47:25.670 --> 00:47:27.590
South of here is Little Egg Harbor Inlet,

00:47:27.590 --> 00:47:31.430
which is where the ocean
contributes saltwater to the bay.

00:47:31.430 --> 00:47:36.430
Upstream here is one of our
many freshwater tributaries

00:47:37.450 --> 00:47:40.570
that comes downstream
from the Pine Barrens.

00:47:40.570 --> 00:47:43.790
Very little development
upstream from here,

00:47:43.790 --> 00:47:47.060
making it an amazing
place to grow oysters.

00:47:47.060 --> 00:47:50.100
And nobody had a lease up
here, se we found a nice little

00:47:50.100 --> 00:47:53.960
protected area that was
near our open water leases,

00:47:53.960 --> 00:47:57.080
and it allows us to use different
types of aquaculture gear.

00:47:57.080 --> 00:48:00.163
(bright piano music)

00:48:05.510 --> 00:48:08.580
My grandfather had a small
boat, had a little house

00:48:08.580 --> 00:48:11.280
on a lake, and I liked those past times.

00:48:11.280 --> 00:48:15.930
So that was an early sort of
attraction to this profession,

00:48:15.930 --> 00:48:17.530
was that I just liked the water.

00:48:19.150 --> 00:48:21.100
My father is like a MacGyver.

00:48:21.100 --> 00:48:25.590
He finds trash and turns it
into incredibly useful things.

00:48:25.590 --> 00:48:28.520
And I have a desire to
excel in that craft too.

00:48:28.520 --> 00:48:32.150
And farming has a long tradition of taking

00:48:33.060 --> 00:48:38.060
one man's junk and turning
it into a machine. (chuckles)

00:48:38.110 --> 00:48:40.640
Here what we do each day
is we take the oysters

00:48:40.640 --> 00:48:45.030
off of our bay lease, out of
the cages, and we bring them

00:48:45.030 --> 00:48:48.480
over to this platform
where we tumble them.

00:48:48.480 --> 00:48:50.170
And what it does is
three different things:

00:48:50.170 --> 00:48:53.240
it grades by size so certain
smaller oysters fall out

00:48:53.240 --> 00:48:55.620
of the tumbler earlier and
the larger ones fall out

00:48:55.620 --> 00:48:58.500
the ends, but it also, it
chips the bills of the oysters.

00:48:58.500 --> 00:49:02.000
So, much like a tree that
is pruned is a healthier,

00:49:02.000 --> 00:49:05.020
more beautiful and shapely product,

00:49:06.010 --> 00:49:08.830
an oyster that has the
new growth chipped off

00:49:08.830 --> 00:49:10.490
forms a deeper cup,

00:49:10.490 --> 00:49:13.210
which is a more desirable
product at market,

00:49:13.210 --> 00:49:16.110
and then the third thing it
does is it washes the oysters.

00:49:21.930 --> 00:49:24.800
My mother, she's a trained botanist

00:49:24.800 --> 00:49:27.690
who found herself a computer programmer.

00:49:27.690 --> 00:49:30.930
She has this ability to
build organized systems.

00:49:32.280 --> 00:49:34.530
Farming, there's an incredible
amount of bookkeeping.

00:49:34.530 --> 00:49:36.440
Just in general, the
more that we scale this,

00:49:36.440 --> 00:49:39.750
the more that we have to
stay meticulously organized.

00:49:39.750 --> 00:49:42.330
And to stay organized
in that way bodes well

00:49:42.330 --> 00:49:45.430
for our organization here
and making the numbers work.

00:50:11.270 --> 00:50:13.810
- So when I was in college and
I worked on an oyster farm,

00:50:13.810 --> 00:50:16.550
we worked in these conditions
that were pretty ideal

00:50:16.550 --> 00:50:17.500
for productivity.

00:50:17.500 --> 00:50:20.000
It was very shallow water.

00:50:20.000 --> 00:50:22.880
Low tide it was about knee height.

00:50:22.880 --> 00:50:25.410
High tide it was about waist height.

00:50:25.410 --> 00:50:28.100
And since then I've always been

00:50:29.870 --> 00:50:32.080
in search of a situation like that.

00:50:34.080 --> 00:50:36.590
It's just ideal for getting work done.

00:50:37.439 --> 00:50:40.920
And Scott and I have been
scouring the entire bay

00:50:40.920 --> 00:50:43.250
looking for a situation like that

00:50:43.250 --> 00:50:45.930
but it's difficult
because the Barnegat Bay

00:50:45.930 --> 00:50:47.590
historically had a lot of eel grass

00:50:47.590 --> 00:50:49.540
and you can't put an oyster farm

00:50:49.540 --> 00:50:53.640
where there was or where
there is eel grass,

00:50:53.640 --> 00:50:56.670
so this spot that we've
been trying to permit

00:50:56.670 --> 00:51:00.880
for about five years now,
we finally got our last

00:51:00.880 --> 00:51:03.692
permit two weeks ago.

00:51:03.692 --> 00:51:06.275
(upbeat music)

00:51:10.050 --> 00:51:12.970
We have 200,000 oyster seed that have

00:51:12.970 --> 00:51:14.980
about a 13 month head start.

00:51:16.320 --> 00:51:20.860
We need to make it so that
the Barnegat oyster is known.

00:51:20.860 --> 00:51:22.410
You know, you say "Wellfleet"

00:51:22.410 --> 00:51:24.010
and everybody thinks of oysters.

00:51:25.834 --> 00:51:27.910
And the industry just in that town

00:51:27.910 --> 00:51:31.050
is supporting families and families,

00:51:31.050 --> 00:51:33.780
marina owners and boat builders,

00:51:33.780 --> 00:51:37.610
people that make the gear
that those oysters go into.

00:51:37.610 --> 00:51:41.170
It's a vibrant and sustainable industry,

00:51:41.170 --> 00:51:44.010
and we can do that here in this bay.

00:51:44.010 --> 00:51:47.630
It's just gonna take a lot
of work and a lot of people.

00:51:47.630 --> 00:51:50.330
- This will fill 50 cages, and the farm

00:51:50.330 --> 00:51:53.920
could probably have 4,000 or more cages.

00:51:55.376 --> 00:51:57.140
This is just the beginning.

00:52:01.710 --> 00:52:04.210
- This is the first oyster
farm in this section

00:52:04.210 --> 00:52:07.950
of the Barnegat Bay, very
close to the Barnegat Inlet,

00:52:07.950 --> 00:52:11.360
and close to Barnegat Lake,
which rich maritime history

00:52:11.360 --> 00:52:15.920
and continues to this day
to be a significant source

00:52:15.920 --> 00:52:17.010
of seafood landings.

00:52:46.250 --> 00:52:50.060
- So we're in what's referred
to as the middle grounds

00:52:50.060 --> 00:52:52.240
between Parkertown and Beach Haven,

00:52:52.240 --> 00:52:56.970
and this area was chosen
based on the bottom texture.

00:52:56.970 --> 00:52:59.910
It's not a shifty sand dune.

00:52:59.910 --> 00:53:03.500
It's not a soupy, sloppy bottom.

00:53:03.500 --> 00:53:05.430
It's kind of like a medium texture bottom

00:53:05.430 --> 00:53:07.030
like a clay bottom.

00:53:07.030 --> 00:53:09.710
That's the best case
scenario for building a reef.

00:53:10.689 --> 00:53:11.522
There they are.

00:53:24.310 --> 00:53:25.990
Ah, they grow up so fast.

00:53:29.750 --> 00:53:34.050
So if we went a mile towards
the west, towards the mainland,

00:53:34.050 --> 00:53:37.080
we'll get in the soft bottom
and heavy macro algae issues.

00:53:37.080 --> 00:53:38.920
There's much less tidal flow.

00:53:38.920 --> 00:53:43.170
If we go to the east
towards LBI, we get into

00:53:43.170 --> 00:53:46.870
some boat traffic stuff,
and you'll get into

00:53:46.870 --> 00:53:49.470
a more live, shifty, sandy bottom.

00:53:49.470 --> 00:53:52.200
This is kind of the
compromise, the middle.

00:53:52.200 --> 00:53:55.440
I think our set ratio
was around 10 or 15%,

00:53:55.440 --> 00:53:58.050
and we had I think ...

00:53:59.360 --> 00:54:01.090
four million animals.

00:54:01.090 --> 00:54:06.090
So, somewhere around 400,000-ish,
maybe half a million.

00:54:06.700 --> 00:54:07.987
They're already growing.

00:54:07.987 --> 00:54:10.737
(ethereal music)

00:54:13.190 --> 00:54:15.330
I would define a bayman as someone

00:54:15.330 --> 00:54:19.520
who's dependent on the
bay for their livelihood,

00:54:19.520 --> 00:54:21.150
someone who can identify with the bay,

00:54:21.150 --> 00:54:23.350
someone who appreciates
the bay, someone who

00:54:26.320 --> 00:54:27.880
embraces the opportunity

00:54:29.780 --> 00:54:32.540
to take part in life
every day on the water.

00:54:34.880 --> 00:54:37.300
There's people who pay their mortgage,

00:54:37.300 --> 00:54:39.910
pay their kids' education,
who have built their homes

00:54:39.910 --> 00:54:42.350
based on what they take out of this water.

00:54:42.350 --> 00:54:44.520
When I was very young,
my father used to clam

00:54:44.520 --> 00:54:45.600
right off here in the Green Street,

00:54:45.600 --> 00:54:47.760
and he had a 21-foot garvey.

00:54:47.760 --> 00:54:50.100
And my mother would drive
me down the end of the road,

00:54:50.100 --> 00:54:52.400
my father would come in, then
I would jump over the bulkhead

00:54:52.400 --> 00:54:55.500
into his boat and hang
out with him in his boat

00:54:55.500 --> 00:54:57.380
while he was raking right off
the end of the Green Street,

00:54:57.380 --> 00:54:59.280
and he would tell me what something was

00:54:59.280 --> 00:55:01.700
when something interesting
came up in his rake.

00:55:01.700 --> 00:55:05.000
That same time period I
met all of those old salts

00:55:05.000 --> 00:55:08.200
of the bay, the guys who
really depended on the water.

00:55:08.200 --> 00:55:10.930
It wasn't a second
income, it wasn't a hobby,

00:55:10.930 --> 00:55:14.040
it wasn't something they
do just in the summer.

00:55:14.040 --> 00:55:15.730
These guys, they built their boats,

00:55:15.730 --> 00:55:19.110
they broke through the ice, they went out

00:55:19.110 --> 00:55:21.090
in 40 mile an hour wind

00:55:21.090 --> 00:55:23.160
'cause they had to, the same way I do.

00:55:24.240 --> 00:55:26.790
We break half a mile of ice to get out

00:55:26.790 --> 00:55:29.370
to our leases to harvest for market.

00:55:29.370 --> 00:55:31.240
Everyone's paycheck depends on it.

00:55:31.240 --> 00:55:33.440
That's what a bayman is.

00:55:38.351 --> 00:55:40.934
(upbeat music)

00:56:28.480 --> 00:56:32.150
- Oysters are sort of the mood setters.

00:56:32.150 --> 00:56:34.570
It's sort of a thing that
opens up your palate,

00:56:34.570 --> 00:56:37.430
it opens up the experience of eating

00:56:37.430 --> 00:56:39.710
in a way that other foods may not.

00:56:39.710 --> 00:56:41.030
If you have a plate of oysters,

00:56:41.030 --> 00:56:44.070
you're satisfied but you're not full.

00:56:45.043 --> 00:56:48.619
You are excited for what comes next.

00:56:48.619 --> 00:56:51.200
(upbeat music)

00:56:51.200 --> 00:56:53.480
What I always say is that
oysters are like wine.

00:56:53.480 --> 00:56:56.360
You can take an oyster and
grow it over at 40 North,

00:56:56.360 --> 00:57:00.210
grow it over at Rose Cove, or
you can move 10, 12 miles down

00:57:00.210 --> 00:57:04.050
to Graveling Point and grow the
Mullicas there in Great Bay,

00:57:04.050 --> 00:57:06.590
you can move back into the
bay where Parsons is growing

00:57:06.590 --> 00:57:08.850
his oysters, and you're gonna
get three different oysters.

00:57:08.850 --> 00:57:10.450
What makes them different is

00:57:10.450 --> 00:57:12.950
where they were raised and
how they were produced.

00:57:24.460 --> 00:57:26.980
- Oysters are a huge
part of what we do here

00:57:26.980 --> 00:57:28.340
and at all of our restaurants.

00:57:28.340 --> 00:57:31.710
But we really wanted to make the oysters

00:57:31.710 --> 00:57:33.890
the focal point of this place.

00:57:33.890 --> 00:57:36.890
And six months into it we all sat down

00:57:36.890 --> 00:57:39.450
and said we need to do something.

00:57:39.450 --> 00:57:42.600
We have a lot of oyster
shells coming through

00:57:42.600 --> 00:57:45.000
on a daily basis in the summertime.

00:57:45.000 --> 00:57:47.920
It's pretty costly for
us to dispose of them.

00:57:47.920 --> 00:57:51.920
And I had heard about oyster
recycling in Barnegat Bay,

00:57:51.920 --> 00:57:53.760
so I started to push a little bit

00:57:53.760 --> 00:57:56.630
and came across the Littoral Society.

00:57:56.630 --> 00:57:59.930
- The American Littoral Society
assisted in this program

00:57:59.930 --> 00:58:04.680
to start a pilot-level
shell recycling program.

00:58:04.680 --> 00:58:08.320
Behind me is about a year's worth

00:58:08.320 --> 00:58:11.780
of oyster shell from Old Causeway.

00:58:11.780 --> 00:58:15.810
So, rather than shucking and discarding

00:58:15.810 --> 00:58:19.150
and paying to discard all of these shells,

00:58:19.150 --> 00:58:21.540
a restaurant will
essentially recycle these.

00:58:21.540 --> 00:58:24.160
We can plant it in a system
like the Mullica River

00:58:24.160 --> 00:58:27.890
and wild oysters will
set on it, or this shell

00:58:27.890 --> 00:58:32.748
could be made available to
our aquaculture partners.

00:58:32.748 --> 00:58:34.320
(rousing music)

00:58:34.320 --> 00:58:36.230
- [Voiceover] Thousands of
pounds of shell are discarded

00:58:36.230 --> 00:58:38.740
every week from our coastal restaurants.

00:58:38.740 --> 00:58:40.460
Without hard surface in the bay,

00:58:40.460 --> 00:58:43.480
there's nowhere for
oysters to set and grow.

00:58:43.480 --> 00:58:46.290
Long Beach Township is the
first municipality in New Jersey

00:58:46.290 --> 00:58:49.000
that is exploring this new
frontier of waste management

00:58:49.000 --> 00:58:50.800
and creating a restorative model

00:58:50.800 --> 00:58:53.950
for removing this food
waste from our landfills.

00:58:53.950 --> 00:58:55.870
The farmers and restoration
efforts increase

00:58:55.870 --> 00:58:58.720
the number of animals and
hard structure in the water.

00:58:58.720 --> 00:59:00.940
The scientists research
the health of the system

00:59:00.940 --> 00:59:04.130
and all the species that
benefit from oyster reefs.

00:59:04.130 --> 00:59:06.500
Local government is investing
in the health of the bay

00:59:06.500 --> 00:59:08.650
by redirecting shells back into the system

00:59:08.650 --> 00:59:10.420
where nature intended it.

00:59:10.420 --> 00:59:12.450
And the consumer should
continue to eat shellfish

00:59:12.450 --> 00:59:13.900
and participate in recycling.

00:59:15.420 --> 00:59:17.580
The Tuckerton Research
Reef Project is a model

00:59:17.580 --> 00:59:21.770
for sustainability, stewardship
and community partnerships.

00:59:21.770 --> 00:59:24.320
But it's part of a much larger picture.

00:59:24.320 --> 00:59:27.380
The Earth is connected by
water, and oyster restoration

00:59:27.380 --> 00:59:30.270
projects are providing
ecological benefits to the world.

00:59:35.860 --> 00:59:38.260
The southern part of Barnegat Bay is ready

00:59:38.260 --> 00:59:41.130
and holds the potential for
the rebirth of oyster reefs.

00:59:48.885 --> 00:59:51.468
(upbeat music)

00:59:54.520 --> 00:59:57.810
- Barnegat Bay is a huge part of our life.

00:59:57.810 --> 01:00:00.820
Everything we do at these
two restaurants, the crabs

01:00:00.820 --> 01:00:04.460
are local, the clams are
local, the oysters are local.

01:00:04.460 --> 01:00:07.860
We wanted to make sure we
were keeping our environment

01:00:07.860 --> 01:00:10.810
healthy locally for generations to come.

01:00:12.110 --> 01:00:15.660
- The reef is kind of an
avenue of understanding

01:00:15.660 --> 01:00:18.770
for the folks who don't
know much about the water.

01:00:18.770 --> 01:00:21.120
So the idea, and especially with the shell

01:00:21.120 --> 01:00:23.760
recycling program, is to get the community

01:00:23.760 --> 01:00:26.500
in contact with the potential of the bay.

01:00:26.500 --> 01:00:30.640
It's to bring those folks
back in touch with the water.

01:00:30.640 --> 01:00:32.690
- These guys are providing great benefits

01:00:32.690 --> 01:00:36.350
to the system by just
keeping oysters going.

01:00:36.350 --> 01:00:37.350
- Putting oysters in the water

01:00:37.350 --> 01:00:39.420
should be a priority for everyone.

01:00:39.420 --> 01:00:42.240
One oyster cleans up to 50
gallons of water per day.

01:00:42.240 --> 01:00:44.580
We've lost 85% of our world's oyster reefs

01:00:44.580 --> 01:00:47.670
and 100% in certain areas
throughout the northeast.

01:00:47.670 --> 01:00:48.990
- Oyster reefs are sort
of like coral reefs,

01:00:48.990 --> 01:00:51.290
they're a critical habitat
for thousands of species.

01:00:51.290 --> 01:00:53.290
They prevent flooding and erosion.

01:00:53.290 --> 01:00:56.100
- I've noticed that over
the last decade or so

01:00:56.100 --> 01:00:58.700
there are more oysters
around than there used to be.

01:00:58.700 --> 01:01:00.587
It will be interesting to see how long

01:01:00.587 --> 01:01:02.290
that rebirth continues.

01:01:07.200 --> 01:01:09.950
(stirring music)

01:01:22.900 --> 01:01:26.460
- The age of the bayman's
kind of come and gone.

01:01:27.320 --> 01:01:31.810
I'm the generation going from
the old salt to the new age

01:01:31.810 --> 01:01:36.220
and trying to be inspired by my childhood.

01:01:40.520 --> 01:01:43.160
The bay supported towns.

01:01:43.160 --> 01:01:44.900
It supported communities.

01:01:44.900 --> 01:01:49.380
And that community, it
was a culture of people

01:01:49.380 --> 01:01:53.900
who learned how to utilize
those resources for a living.

01:01:53.900 --> 01:01:57.230
These were towns of people
that depended on the water,

01:01:57.230 --> 01:02:01.250
so when someone drives
through Tuckerton, West Creek,

01:02:01.250 --> 01:02:04.410
Parkertown, LBI, they should
remember that, at some point

01:02:04.410 --> 01:02:08.100
in time, the reason why that
town is there was the bay.

01:02:08.100 --> 01:02:10.540
The bay brought those people to the area.

01:02:10.540 --> 01:02:12.870
That natural resource was the reason

01:02:12.870 --> 01:02:14.940
why these folks are here today.

01:02:18.940 --> 01:02:22.140
It's long been forgotten,
and I think it needs to be,

01:02:22.140 --> 01:02:24.120
people need to be reminded
that towns are here

01:02:24.120 --> 01:02:25.070
because of the bay.

01:02:33.650 --> 01:02:35.100
- So in the beginning it was just about

01:02:35.100 --> 01:02:36.980
creating a job for myself.

01:02:36.980 --> 01:02:40.700
But it's gone from just
creating a job for myself

01:02:40.700 --> 01:02:44.970
to trying to do what we can to spark

01:02:46.374 --> 01:02:49.210
the renaissance of this
industry in the Barnegat Bay.

01:02:54.030 --> 01:02:57.980
- My wife and I both
feel like we're doing it,

01:02:57.980 --> 01:03:01.760
it's not to succeed but to
show my daughter, who's two,

01:03:01.760 --> 01:03:04.260
and we have a baby on the
way, that the struggle

01:03:04.260 --> 01:03:07.040
and the adventure is important,
and chasing your dreams

01:03:07.040 --> 01:03:10.310
is a virtue that not everybody
gets the opportunity to do,

01:03:10.310 --> 01:03:13.330
and I hope that my children

01:03:13.330 --> 01:03:15.310
are able to make that leap as well.

01:03:17.040 --> 01:03:19.700
- My wife is the most important aspect,

01:03:19.700 --> 01:03:21.820
to me at least, of this entire thing.

01:03:22.870 --> 01:03:25.210
We made a decision early on

01:03:25.210 --> 01:03:27.240
that we were gonna give this a go.

01:03:28.380 --> 01:03:32.020
At first it was like, "It'll
take two years, three years."

01:03:32.020 --> 01:03:34.390
Several years later and
it's still a struggle.

01:03:38.590 --> 01:03:41.830
- Whether we make it and
this business continues on

01:03:41.830 --> 01:03:44.540
into the future and does
what we really hope it does,

01:03:46.060 --> 01:03:47.980
or not, at least we'll have shown them

01:03:47.980 --> 01:03:51.260
that being miserable in your lifestyle

01:03:51.260 --> 01:03:54.320
just to stay comfortable
is not acceptable.

01:03:54.320 --> 01:03:57.160
So, you know, here we are.

01:03:57.160 --> 01:03:58.931
And the view ain't bad.

01:03:58.931 --> 01:04:01.598
(rousing music)

01:04:07.350 --> 01:04:10.600
- I like to think that
the golden age of oysters

01:04:10.600 --> 01:04:13.760
is before us and not behind us.

01:04:24.950 --> 01:04:27.533
(bright music)

01:04:33.330 --> 01:04:35.010
- [Narrator] The resurgence of the oyster

01:04:35.010 --> 01:04:38.510
restores its heritage to the
waters of the Barnegat Bay,

01:04:39.370 --> 01:04:41.470
preserving our coastal culture.

01:04:54.050 --> 01:04:57.250
Oyster farmers serve as a beacon of hope,

01:04:57.250 --> 01:05:00.540
striving to make their
livelihood from these waters,

01:05:01.600 --> 01:05:05.080
cultivating a living legacy of the bay

01:05:05.080 --> 01:05:07.672
for future generations.

01:05:07.672 --> 01:05:10.255
(bright music)