2023-05-17 17:31:40
INFOGRAPHICS – Will flat oysters still be present on our coasts in 2100? Victims of overfishing, pollution and global warming, researchers at the new Océanolab center are studying how they will be affected.
For thousands of years, man has loved oysters, leaving behind mounds of empty shells. The shell mound of Saint-Michel-en-l’Herm in Vendée would have counted five billion. Throughout the ages, these shells have fed poor and rich alike. It is said that 150 were served per person in the gargantuan dinners of the Renaissance, that Louis XIV brought in every day from Cancale. Heroine of a fable by La Fontaine (“The rat and the oyster), it ended up entering the cultural heritage, by gratifying us with a morality: “Such is taken who believed to take”.
It is so appreciated that it was very early victim of overfishing. From the 19th century, the number of flat oysters (eat oysters) in Brittany has dropped enormously. Victims of overconsumption and parasites. Oyster farmers first replaced it with the Portuguese oyster (Crassostrea angulata), soon decimated in turn by diseases. They then brought back a new species…
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