By Sean Greene, Bay Nature
They are basically just small rocks out in the San Francisco Bay, stuck to bigger rocks that anchor them in place for their entire lives. The tides come and go, and they just sit there, unmoving and sometimes opening and closing their shells. If you are not looking closely, you might think the oyster does not do much at all. But its apparent inactivity belies its true nature: The oyster actually works pretty hard for us.
The West Coast’s native Olympia oyster plays an important role as an ecosystem builder with its ability to filter the water and serve as substrate for other organisms. Its habitat once ranged from Baja California to north of British Columbia.
But owing to reasons that are still somewhat unclear, over the last few millennia native oysters have largely disappeared from the bay.
Read the complete story at Bay Nature.
