Around the Sound

Blog

Jan 18

Taylor Shellfish

Harvesting Under The Stars: A Night In The Life Of A Shellfish Farmer

Posted by Taylor Shellfish

Allie Ferguson of knkx 88.5 fm recently featured Jason Ragan, the director of clam and oyster farming at Taylor Shellfish Farms in a piece about winter night tides.

To listen to the full story, please follow the link.

"Almost every night in the winter, there are hundreds of farmers at work along the Washington coast. The lights of their head lamps are just barely visible on the shoreline. They are shellfish farmers out harvesting clams, oysters, and geoducks. They are up at such late hours because of the tide. That’s when it’s lowest during the winter months.

Jason Ragan is director of clam and oyster farming with Taylor Shellfish Farms. On one particularly snowy night, Ragan showed Sound Effect producer Allie Ferguson what it takes to survive these midnight harvests. They walked around oyster and clam farms on Totten Inlet near Olympia. "