Cancale (France) (AFP)
In December, the strike resembles a beehive in front of the port of La Houle, in Cancale: the tractors survey the rows of oyster beds at low tide before reassembling the hold, their trailers loaded with the precious shell.
"Everyone brings back several tonnes, even several tens of tonnes every day," comments François-Joseph Pichot, co-manager of the Saint-Kerber parks, in front of this incessant ballet with Mont Saint-Michel in the background. He heads one of around thirty oyster businesses in the town which has just been listed in the inventory of intangible cultural heritage in France and is now targeting Unesco.
Because, hollow or flat, the oyster is a guest of choice on the festive holiday tables. A French specialty: if France is the first producer country in Europe, according to the national shellfish farming committee, it is also the first consumer of fresh oysters in the world.
But this year, the oyster farmer, whose company exports to the whole world, is not very satisfied: some rows of oysters have not grown as he expected. "It didn't rain in the spring and suddenly the oysters ran out of fresh water and they didn't get bigger," he explains, perched at the wheel of his tractor.
"Oysters are like farming: you need fresh water and sun. Otherwise, it doesn't grow! Parks are our fields at sea," he says. Because of the spring weather conditions, "we have far fewer large oysters - number 2 or number 1- this year," he says.
Like a farmer, a "sea gardener", as he likes to be called oyster farmers, does very physical work. The oyster spat, "we receive them at nine months, in the spring. Then, they stay with us two or three years, sometimes four. It depends on how they grow", enumerates François-Joseph Pichot, now in the water until 'mid-thigh, in front of metal tables where oyster pockets weighing about fifteen kilos are moored.
- "nutty taste" -
"The price of an oyster is 80% labor, because it is handled forty times", recalls this 50-something man, who was forbidden by the doctor to move the oyster bags so as not to damage more his shoulders become too fragile.
Beyond the physical aspect, oyster farming is economically demanding. The rate of "recapture", that is to say the number of shellfish harvested compared to the number of spat seeded, "it is 20 to 25% for the hollow. In flat, when we have 10%, this is the maximum ", notes the professional.
Cancale is the stronghold of the flat oyster (Ostrea edulis), an indigenous species with a different taste, the only one present until the beginning of the 20th century, before being decimated by diseases in the 1970s. "The flat is going to be much firmer, crunchier on the teeth, with this inimitable nutty taste ", lauds Laurence Coffineau, in front of her stall, on the oyster market in the port.
"Unlike the hollow, the plates are not in pockets, they grow in a completely natural way, placed on the sand. They are never discovered, even at high tides", unlike the hollow. "The problem is that we lose 90% minimum because they are victims of a predator," laments François-Joseph Pichot, who nevertheless produces them.
Although still extremely modest compared to the hollow, the production of plates has also started to rise again in recent years, welcomes the regional shellfish farming committee: around 1,000 ha, of which 95% in the bay of Mont Saint-Michel.
"In Cancale, in terms of oysters, we have the lowest density in France," notes François-Joseph Pichot. But no way to go further: "in the bay, any new extension is frozen" because there is not enough plankton to feed more molluscs.
Last challenge for the Breton commune: obtaining its inscription in the intangible heritage of Unesco for the breeding of its oysters, cultivated since the 6th century.
© 2019 AFP