Shellfish
This indicator describes opening and closure status and trends in commercial shellfish areas in Puget Sound, and trends in direct-harvest closures in Georgia Basin. The indicator also describes the implications of shellfish area closures for the economy, human health and community traditions throughout the Puget Sound Georgia Basin.

What are we doing about it?

Public Policy Responses

Land Use Planning and Pollution Prevention in Watersheds

The first line of defense against shellfish degradation is intelligent, long-term land use planning and pollution prevention.

• Protect watersheds by preserving native vegetation, soils, wetlands, rivers and other shoreline features. Minimize development that creates paved and impervious surfaces upstream from shellfish growing areas. Minimize runoff from properties by retaining and infiltrating storm-based runoff into deep soils, mature vegetation, and natural swales and wetlands.¹²
  
• Preserve forest cover by working to keep forests in forestry through economic and trade strategies and limiting forest clearing and fragmentation associated with sprawl-type development.
  
• Preserve and restore wetlands and limit channeling, armoring, piping and other modifications that change the pathways of water and how it travels that increase runoff.
  
• Promote low impact development, natural landscaping and on-site water infiltration and minimize the connection between impervious surfaces and freshwater and marine waters. This can occur by planting native vegetation, using porous materials, minimizing impervious surfaces and creating opportunities for soil microorganisms to break down toxins.¹³
  
• Implement programs to prevent pollution from sewage systems, farm animals, pets, boats and other key sources of fecal pollution.
  

Protection efforts can be further enhanced by giving citizens a greater stake in clean water. This can be achieved through a variety of means, including increased public access to marine waters for shellfish harvesting and programs that promote private, small-scale shellfish production and community shellfish farms.¹⁴

Shellfish Sanitation and Classification

Washington State

The following links may provide helpful information and are located outside the EPA.gov domain.

In Washington, the Washington State Department of Health (DOH) Office of Food Safety and Shellfish Programs monitors water quality and classifies shellfish areas based on growing area conditions.¹⁵ This work is administered under the National Shellfish Sanitation Program.¹⁶

The Washington State Shellfish Rules for the Sanitary Control of Shellfish can be found at Chapter 246 -282 WAC.

DOH's monitoring activities have expanded in recent years to cover new contamination threats and to include more thorough analysis of water quality trends around the Sound.

DOH administers four shellfish programs:

• Growing Areas Classification Program
• Biotoxin Program
• Commercial Shellfish Licensing and Certification
• Recreational Shellfish Program

The Washington State Growing Area Classification Program evaluates all commercially harvested shellfish growing areas in Washington State to determine their suitability for harvest. Each harvested growing area is assigned a classification according to the results of its evaluation.

Classification is based on:

• Shoreline survey: Identifies pollution sources that may impact water quality, such as on-site sewage systems, sewage treatment plants, animal farms, drainage ways and wildlife;
  
• Marine water sampling to determine fecal coliform bacterial levels in the marine water; and
  
• Analysis of how weather conditions, tides, currents and other factors may affect distribution of pollutants in the area.

A detailed explanation of Washington State's Growing Area Classification Program may be found at Washington State Department of Health's Food Safety and Shellfish Programs Web site, and a synopsis is provided in the table below.

Source: Washington State's Growing Area Classification Program

Once classified, all active commercial shellfish growing areas are regularly monitored and marine water samples are collected throughout the year.¹⁷ Learn more about Washington State's strategy to conserve and recover shellfish growing areas.¹⁸

British Columbia

The following links may provide helpful information and are located outside the EPA.gov domain.

In British Columbia, shellfish protection is shared between the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), Environment Canada (EC) and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DfO). Environment Canada conducts water quality monitoring and shoreline pollution source surveys and recommends appropriate classifications at the biannual meeting of the Pacific Region Interdepartmental Shellfish Committee. Once the classifications have been determined, DFO is responsible for enforcement and public notification and CFIA is responsible for regulating product retailers.

Environment Canada monitors the sanitary quality of shellfish growing waters under the Canadian Shellfish Sanitation Program (CSSP). In 1948, Canada and the U.S. signed a Bilateral Agreement in which the CSSP is audited by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Canadian auditors. This has enabled transboundary marketing.

EC, similar to the DOH in Washington, is specifically responsible for carrying out sanitary and bacteriological surveys of the shellfish growing areas according to the procedures, standards and protocols of the CSSP Manual of Operations.¹⁹ The Canadian Shellfish Quality Resource also features information on the CSSP.

Both shoreline sanitary surveys and water quality monitoring are used to classify growing areas into Approved, Conditionally Approved, Closed or Prohibited. Visit Environment Canada's Shellfish Closures page to learn more about Classification of Shellfish Growing Areas in British Columbia.

The Canadian Growing Area Classification Program classifies shellfish growing areas as follows:

Source: Environment Canada Shellfish Closures

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans/Canada is responsible for the control of commercial harvesting, licensing, handling, storage, transportation, processing and labeling of shellfish including imports. It also patrols closed areas. DFO is responsible for public information and hosts and maintains the Shellfish Contamination Closure Web site which shows both PSP and sanitary closures.²⁰

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency regulates the processing of fish and seafood products, including shellfish production; exporting and labeling; shipping, certification, storage and repacking. CFIA regularly tests commercially harvested shellfish for bacterial contamination and maintains a biotoxin surveillance program of shellfish growing areas. They are also responsible for controlled depuration. Depuration of shellstock is the controlled purification of contaminated shellfish by moving shellstock from closed or approved waters into a controlled aquatic environment on land (similar to relays in Washington but not in water).

Measuring Fecal Coliform Pollution

Environment Canada and the Washington State Department of Health both monitor fecal coliform bacteria, which come from the intestinal lining of mammals (humans, wildlife, farm animals, etc.).

Citizen, Business and Community Response

Taking Care of Your Land

The following links may provide helpful information and are located outside the EPA.gov domain.

• Reduce impervious surfaces or use pervious pavements
• Reduce lawn areas and plant beautiful native plants
• Plant or retain vegetation near the water
• Use soft armoring techniques on the shoreline (root walls, rock armoring, anchored logs, revegetation) and do not bulkhead or build revetments, groins, jetties or other hard structures
• Use natural lawn care and organic gardening; avoid chemical fertilizers
• Regularly inspect and maintain your on-site septic system-pump when needed.
  
• Pick up and properly dispose of pet waste.

Shared Problem Solving

To reopen shellfish beds, our communities have formed partnerships that help build and define community, celebrate positive change and help improve local economic and environmental conditions.

Shellfish Protection Districts: When pollution closes or threatens shellfish beds in Puget Sound, local governments can form Shellfish Protection Districts that give counties a range of opportunities. Shellfish Protection Districts – sometimes called clean water districts – are designated geographic areas in which a county is given funding and other authority to protect and restore water quality in shellfish growing areas.²¹

Closure Response Strategies: In both BC and Washington, shellfish growing area closures trigger the development of management strategies or closure response strategies. In the Georgia Basin, Environment Canada, Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency work with stakeholders and relevant Provincial government agencies to identify sources and recommend measures to reduce the severity of the problem responsible for shellfish growing area closures. Restoration activities have been ongoing since the late 1990s and improved water quality conditions have allowed for some reclassification of closed areas. One example is Mink Island in Desolation Sound, where installation of approved septic systems by surrounding property owners has removed an annual closure.

In Puget Sound, when shellfish beds are downgraded because of pollution, the Washington Department of Health, Washington Department of Ecology, and the Puget Sound Action Team work with governments, shellfish growers and other affected community members to design and carry out targeted restoration plans called closure response strategies. Restoration strategies have been developed at a dozen sites around the Sound since the early 1990s and have helped to improve water quality and reopen shellfish harvesting at about two-thirds of these sites, including Drayton Harbor and Portage Bay in Whatcom County.

Early Warning System: Early detection of water quality problems is crucial for preventing the deterioration and loss of shellfish beds and the protection of human health. Led by the Washington Department of Health, the "early warning system" is designed to annually assess the status of the Sound's major growing areas, identify those areas threatened by pollution, and generate follow-up actions to protect and restore water quality in the affected areas.²²

Tribal and First Nations Partnerships: Washington Tribes and BC First Nations are historically connected to restoring shellfish beds. Through a memorandum of understanding between the Department of Health, Department of Ecology and the Puget Sound Action Team, Washington tribes are encouraged to lead closure response strategies and have pursued restoration with grant funding from partners.

Grower Association Environmental Management: Many shellfish growers in the Puget Sound Georgia Basin are affiliated with The Pacific Coast Shellfish Growers Association²³ or the BC Shellfish Growers,²⁴ both of which adopted environmental management and codes of practice in 2001. These practices include an established environmental policy, environmental stewardship and responsible management. The Pacific Shellfish Institute developed a 2010 Strategic plan that advocates adoption of an environmental management system for growers based on ISO 14000 (International Standards Organization).²⁵

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