Shellfish Farming Netherlands

Shellfish Farming Netherlands

Shellfish Farming Netherlands is a family business which has been active for over 50 years. The company started out as a small industry on the Wadden island of Terschelling and grew into a modern, professional and efficient business. Today, Shellfish Farming Netherlands is one of the largest mussel farming companies in Europe.

Our goal is to supply sustainable and safe food products of the highest quality at competitive prices.

We want to do this by investing in our people, processes and technology. We constantly work on improving our products, our processes, our communication and collaboration with customers, suppliers and partners. Shellfish Farming Netherlands is highly aware of her social responsibility towards society, environment and employees.

Shellfish Farming Netherlands is a shellfish breeding company that operates in the south west of the Netherlands. We have been breeding mussels for many years in the Oosterschelde and Westerscheldt. Since 2009 we also have had oyster-farming in the Grevelingen lake.

Mussel culture

At our mussel farms, we grow both the blue-black mussel (Mytilus edulis) and the green-lipped mussel (Perna canaliculus). The mussels are cultivated on ropes or nets which are hung between floating buoys. The nets or ropes hang freely in the water so that they can be cleaned by the current. The mussels use their byssus threads to attach themselves to these ropes or nets. They quickly grow into large, delicious shellfish.

Oyster breeding

The oysters also attach themselves to ropes or nets with their byssus threads. But they do this when they're still young, small oysters (spat). These spat are placed on prepared ropes or nets, and then suspended from floating buoys until they have grown into mature shellfish.