The New Oyster Cult

A community is helping to restore the once rich biodiversity of Loch Craignish, one species at a time

- JUDY VICKERS

THE last few years have seen a curious springtime phenomenon on the shore of Loch Craignish, a sea loch which dips into the coastline of Argyll.

Loch Around 60 people, from children to older folk, gather in wellies and waterproofs on the edge of the water and at a given sign, hurl oysters into the water.

Tens of thousands of young oysters, about the size of biscuits, disappear under the waves over the course of the half-hour shellfish-slinging session. It's a fraction of the million total planned to be scattered into the loch over a five-year period in the UK's first community-led native oyster restoration project.

The project, run by charity Seawilding, has won a host of accolades including two Nature of Scotland awards. The charity's CEO and founder, Danny Renton, scooped the National Lottery Awards' environment prize in 2023 for both the oyster work and a parallel scheme to restore seagrass meadows to the loch.

This vision, to turn the clock back on our seas to the time when oysters were so common in our waters they were the food of the poor, has helped to spawn a host of other projects around Scotland's coasts.

The charity was founded by Danny in 2020. The 58-year-old was horrified at the loss of biodiversity in our seas over his own lifetime, and frustrated that campaign groups were largely ignored.

"From year zero I went to Tiree with my parents where we had a family home for generations, and I am a sailor so I know the west coast really well. When I was a kid, we used to go to Oban to go to Tiree and the harbour was full of fishing boats. If you are there now, there are very few fishing boats left. That's really happened over the last 50 years."

He blames a 1984 decision to allow dredgers far closer into shore for turning once-rich seabed habitats into "raked gravel beds".