Tag Archives: Texas Oyster Industry
A Last Stand for Texas Oyster Fishermen
People often ask if Frances and Johny Jurisich had an arranged marriage, the couple jokes. Both come from oyster fishing families that immigrated from the same small village in Croatia to Louisiana’s Gulf Coast, then west to Texas. In fact, Frances’ father, Misho Ivic, is Johny’s godfather, and the shucking house that Frances’ mother, Franka Ivic, founded in the unincorporated Galveston County area of San Leon is just 12 miles from the Jurisich dock in Texas City. The couple started dating in high school. They married in 2004 and today have three children. On the Jurisich side, Johny is part of the fourth generation to go into oyster fishing. He hopes his 5-year-old son will carry the tradition into a fifth generation. Their 15-year-old daughter has a good head for business, Frances said, and may also go into oysters, but only if the business stays profitable. It may well not. >click to read< 08:32
The Texas oyster industry is struggling as the state’s reefs close for harvesting
At Johny Jurisich’s family dock in Texas City, more than a dozen empty oyster boats with names like Sunshine and Captain Fox lazily float in the marina on a recent Monday morning, an odd sight for what is normally peak oyster harvesting season. Currently, 21 of the state’s 27 harvesting areas are closed, with three more areas set to close Tuesday. Alex Gutierrez, who owns a few oyster boats and has worked as an oyster fisherman for 35 years, said he usually hires between 10-15 people to work with him each season. But recently he’s been dipping into his savings and doesn’t think he’ll be able to afford the annual maintenance on his boats. >click to read< 08:31
The Texas Oyster Industry Is Now a Shell of Itself
It’s the first day of Texas oyster season, and Galveston Bay is packed with so many boats that 33-year-old Captain Joaquin Padilla decides to post a video of them on Facebook, adding a side-eye emoji as comment. Padilla has been on the water with his little crew since sunup, steering his boat, the Miss Kosovare, in languid circles, dragging his dredge—a chain and metal basket about the size of a basking shark’s mouth—over the oyster reefs below. His is one of about 150 trawlers out this November day, harvesting bivalves from the limited wild reefs on the bottom of Galveston Bay, right in Houston’s backyard. Out on the water, Padilla sticks with a smaller group of about ten boats that all belong to his buddies and family—his father, uncle, brother-in-law, and cousins all make a living oystering, too. >click to read<20:31
