Shellfish Culture Farming

Shellfish Culture Farming

Shellfish Culture Farming is a branch of agriculture and aquaculture, the practice of farming aquatic organisms. It involves cultivating freshwater and saltwater populations under controlled conditions, and can be contrasted with commercial fishing, which is the harvesting of wild fish.

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Shellfish culture farming is a very old method of cultivating shellfish for food. Abalone were some of the earliest cultivators in East Asia, especially in China and Japan. In prehistory, marine mollusks were collected by hand from the shoreline to serve as food. Shellfish were eaten regularly during the Paleolithic period and are possibly represented in Paleolithic paintings in France.

To this day, cultures around the world have shellfish as an important part of their diet. Oysters were farmed in coastal areas in Roman times along the coast of North Africa and Italy.

In the United States, Native Americans harvested oysters on both sides of the country throughout history. Commercial harvesting on the Atlantic coast began around 1750. Although it did not become significant until around 1850 when it was discovered that New York City had a demand for oysters. 

In 1878 residents began harvesting oysters from Long Island Sound and continued through until 1893 when they began to see that they had overfished their beds.

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Shellfish culture farming is also known as aquaculture. It is a practice of raising and breeding shellfish in a controlled environment. A shellfish farm can be a pond, an ocean bay or even an aquarium. Shellfish that are raised in their natural environment are often referred to as wild.