There was a time when oysters were plentiful and cheap. The Chesapeake Bay abounded in oysters. Today the oyster population is down to about 1% of what it was about 100 years ago.

Oyster lovers and farmers say the way back to oyster heaven — and to clean up the Bay — is to commercially grow the oysters in aquaculture farms in the Bay. Oysters act as natural filters, and can clean hundreds of gallons of water a day.

A recent article in the Economist points out that researchers at the University of Southern California have been experimenting with oyster hybrids that can generate large quantities of eggs — oyster farms need tens of billions of eggs in order to operate commercially.

The researchers, led by Dennis Hedgecock, have been crossing relatively “puny” breeds with each other to ensure healthy and rapid growing oysters. The problem has been that crossing two puny breeds only worked for one generation — constantly regenerating the hybrid did not prove possible.

To get around this, Hedgecock and his colleagues created two hybrids, then crossed those – essentially creating a two-stage crossbreed – and it worked. The result: large, fast-growing and tasty oysters.

There is still more work to be done — researchers are now working at the genome level to see what genes work on size and growth — but if it works, it could be a boon to the Bay, and to oyster-lovers.

There are a number of oyster farmers around the Bay already who could benefit. Richard Pelz’s Circle C Oyster Ranch in St. Jerome, Maryland is one of the farmers who insists that the oysters he grows already are doing their part to clean up the Bay, and he has been doing his own research.

Pelz has been working several different genetic lines chosen for growth rate, disease resistance and shape and bred them to create the  Lineback©. This oyster can be taken from spawn to market in less than 18 months – whereas wild oysters — preferred by the Watermen — can take twice as long.