Oysters to be moved to Mobile Bay reef

MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) - Millions of pounds of oysters are being harvested out of Mobile Bay but they are not quite ready to be slurped up. Oystermen are transferring the shellfish to a more southern part of the bay.

Oyster boats idled into Dog River by the dozens. Crews spent Tuesday morning catching millions of oysters. They weren't allowed to bring them home; at least not yet. The oysters are in waters that are deemed contaminated by conservationists, so they have to be moved to cleaner water. Once they are there, they will purify themselves over about 20 days, and then be safe to eat.

Darrell Grahm and his crew were one of the boats taking part in the oyster relocation project.

"We caught 100 sacks today and there are about 500 in each pack. There are 200 boats out there doing it. That's a lot of oysters," Grahm said.

The oystermen catch the shellfish and load them onto a barge.

Grahm said Monday's harvest was so big, it took too long to get the oysters onto the barges. Once the oysters are on the barge, they can only be out of the water for a few hours.

Each boat was given a 100 bag limit so crews could handle the load and get the oysters to their new location on time.

"They sit there and load them on barges and from there they take them down south, somewhere off Fowl River and put them back in the water. They say it takes 20 days for them to purify themselves and then they are going to let us harvest them," Grahm said.

Connie Johnson is another fisherman who said it's worth the work now to get a better harvest later. He also said the young oysters will help the reef grow and hopefully yield even more of the high demand shellfish.

"They will be able to go back out on the market for the public again and that's a good thing for the economy down here in Alabama," Johnson said.

The crews will be working until an estimated six million pounds of oysters are moved farther south in the bay.