Study uncovers vivid and poignant accounts of reefs as high as houses off countries including UK, France and Ireland
Only a handful of natural oyster reefs measuring at most a few square metres cling on precariously along European coasts after being wiped out by overfishing, dredging and pollution.
A study led by British scientists has discovered how extensive they once were, with reefs as high as a house covering at least 1.7m hectares (4.2m acres) from Norway to the Mediterranean, an area larger than Northern Ireland.
The study involved dozens of researchers poring over government records, nautical charts, fishery reports, customs documents, naturalists’ accounts, scientific journals and newspapers from the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries to piece together the spread of the European flat oyster (Ostrea edulis).
They found vivid – and poignant – accounts of often sprawling reefs at 1,196 locations off countries including the UK, France, Ireland, Denmark, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands. One report from a scientific article mentioned oyster reefs reaching 7 metres in height in the Black Sea.
The point of capitalism as a system is to create scarcity and crisis and then profit off of it. Stability and abundance are existential threats to the ruling class.
Why would a rich capitalist who owns seafood company give a shit how few oysters are left in the ocean? An extinction is just a chance to make killer profit right up to the end and then exit the industry and invest somewhere else like antidepressant manufacturing companies that have to meet increased demand from people being sad the ocean is dead.