APALACHICOLA BAY, Fla. --- Longtime oysterman Keith Millender sees every shower taken or car washed in metro Atlanta as a small threat to his family, which has harvested seafood from Apalachicola Bay for generations.
The Apalachicola River is running dry. It carries water more than 300 miles from Georgia's Lake Lanier into the bay, providing the delicate balance of freshwater and saltwater oysters need to thrive.
Despite recent rain, Georgia remains in a drought and months of above-average rainfall are needed to fill its reservoirs. Lanier, which provides most of metro Atlanta's water, is less than 60 percent full.
"They are misusing their water -- they are using it for lawns, swimming pools, even in some bathrooms they are flushing twice," Mr. Millender said of Atlanta.
Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue has said his state's demand for the water comes down to "man vs. mussels." Atlanta needs water for its survival, he has said in making a case to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to allow Georgia to take more water from Lanier.
Families who have harvested oysters, shrimped and sold seafood for generations along Florida's Forgotten Coast say they cannot wait years for a lengthy court battle over water rights to play out.
Life on Apalachicola Bay is a sharp contrast to sprawling Atlanta. A two-lane road runs along the bay in front of a string of ramshackle oyster shucking shacks and fresh seafood houses. Many of the business are shuttered. Workers walk across the street from homes they have occupied for generations to jobs in the shacks or on the oyster boats.
Oystering is a $10 million industry in Florida, with about 1,200 licensed harvesters and 25 processing houses in the Apalachicola area.
Frank Coulter, 64, grew up on the bay harvesting oysters like his father before him. With the flow of freshwater into the bay restricted, oysters in the deepest sections are perishing, he said.
"They are scarcer than they should be. Your shallow water is where most of your live oysters are and that really hurts," he said.
His son, Frank Jr., joins him on the oyster boat each day. But Mr. Coulter believes his son's generation will be the last in the oyster business.
"It's a dying business because of population and pollution," he said.
Comments
As a citizen of Georgia let me please apologize for the ignorance of our governor, and the greed of our citizens. Mr. Perdue's "man vs mussels" shows that you don't have to be smart to be governor, you just have to know the right people.
Obviously the mussels and oysters don't know the right people, hopefully they can adapt enough to changing conditions to outlast man.
I'm a resident of the Atlanta area and we have had very tight water restrictions for years. Sometimes - S- - T happens and you have to move on. What about all the steel mill workers, cotton mill workers, and auto workers (just to name a few) that got pink slips and had to find other means of livelihood. Why hasn't Florida done something? Water reclamation pumped back into the river, or whatever it takes to try to solve the problem. All they do is point fingers and complain.
Maybe if the success of the oystermen goes down, the success of the oysters will go up!
Viewpoint, you can leave Atlanta, it's not that attractive there.
If you choose to stay in Atlanta, hope that Sonny does not consider you as insignificant as an oyster, and cut your water off. As far as the economic conditions that made all of those industrial workers unemployed, that too was an issue of greed in America.
Little Lamb it's not overharvesting that's reducing the oyster population, it's pollution and lack of water just like the oysterman said.
our govener care about the working man,yeah right.
These comments are a prime example of lack of compromise in our society. I fully areee the enviroment is very important, But last summer people were in danger of not having drinking water. There should be at least a compromise to override to allow a reduction of water going to the gulf. COME ON ECO-RADICALS BE REASONABLE FOR ONCE THINK OF THE COMMON GOOD NOT ONE SIDE OF THE ISSUE!!!!!
Saveaugusta, I'm no eco-radical, just a person who lives on this planet, and can look around my evryday world and recognize what man has done to it. I'm not advocating letting people die from dehydration, just hoping that enough people will wake up and realize what really is happening, and that we've got to overcome petty politics and accept reality. Common sense dictates that we stop our wasteful and harmful ways, before there is no humankind left. That can happen due to man's arrogance with regard to the very place that he depends on to stay alive.
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