State Helping Oystermen Regrow Their Business, Oct. 10, 1922

State Aid in Time to Help Oystermen. . . Otherwise the Present Scarcity of Bivalves Would Be Serious Menace to the Industry

Had it not been for the thoughtfulness of the State in planting 200,000 bushels of shells on the depleted beds of North Carolina, we people in this part of the State would be facing a serious scarcity among oysters to-day. The scarcity of bivalves is being keenly felt right here in Elizabeth City, where oysters are selling for 60 cents a quart, most of them coming from Virginia dealers, as only an occasional load of North Carolina oysters can be scraped to put on our local markets.

That we are now obliged to buy our oysters from Virginia is but a result of a combination of circumstances and carelessness on our part. It is not many years since plenty of oysters could be scraped from the waters of eastern North Carolina. But there was little demand for them in the state at the time, and the operations of North Carolina oystermen didn’t extend far beyond an occasional trip for a family’s supply. At that time restrictions affecting every angle of our fisheries were few, so Virginia oystermen, shrewdly sensing an opportunity for some easy money, sent their vessels down to the gullible natives and cleaned the beds, year after year. In this manner tremendous cargoes of oysters went away from the state without any restrictions whatever.

As shipping conditions improved throughout North Carolina thus making it easy for the eastern part of the state to ship to our own inland markets, there grew an increasing demand for the bivalves which offered our oystermen more money than the Virginians with their heavy costs of operation would or could afford to pay. But when North Carolinians attempted to make the most of their opportunities they quickly discovered that their resources were gone.

And so it is that we have to wait a couple of years or so, until our oysters have had time to grow. The menace of Virginia oystermen may not come to pass any more, but there are other fishing resources in North Carolina which are not practically unexploited, and may be taken from the hands of our often too lethargic natives. North Carolina should have the profits from the pick of its resources. It is well for the natives to keep an eye on the few advantages which have been left them, and begin to make the most of these while the making is good. As has been said before, “A word to the wise has a silver lining.”

From the front page of The Independent, Elizabeth City, N.C., Tuesday, Oct. 10, 1922