Over the past several years some SBYC members have nurtured oyster gardens in their slips over the winter. This year, Dana and Mark Von Rinteln decided to coordinate efforts with our Junior Fleet. Five of them volunteered to build, monitor, and shake the oyster cage gardens over the winter.
The Oyster Garden Workshop was an interesting and informative one-hour training session. Just as everyone was going outside to build their cages, the clouds opened up and the rain began to pour. Patrick, the CBF trainer, had put up a small tent, but it was not large enough for us and all of the other participants. Thinking quickly, our Junior Fleet ran to the sheltered parking spaces under the building with the adults bringing up the rear.
It had looked so easy when Patrick demonstrated how to bend the wire mesh cage material into just the right rectangular shape and then attach the end pieces. It took more effort than we expected, but finally, we successfully made 12 oyster cages. Despite the rain, a good time was had by all, and Nachelle had an idea for her Science Fair project.
We returned to SBYC with our oyster spat and cages. It was still pouring rain. Adding our new cages to the eight donated, previously used cages, we now had 20 oyster garden cages. During our pizza party lunch Dana suggested that we hang the gardens on Sunday since no rain was predicted then. Sunday was overcast and the perfect temperature for completing our project. By chance, several other club members were available to join our Junior Fleet to help identify locations on our docks and hang the oyster cage gardens. By the end of the afternoon all 20 of the oyster gardens had found a slip to call home for the winter, and we had five very tired Junior Fleet members. ~by Linda Sweeting
