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Guardian Environmental Network

The Big Apple Brings Home Its Bivalves

Once the “oyster capital of the world,” New York City’s reckless dumping of raw sewage early last century poisoned its waterways and sank its local seafood industry. Now, thanks to the 1972 Clean Water Act, rivers and estuaries around the city are finally ready to welcome the oyster home again. Tomorrow night, a new documentary Shellshocked: Saving Oysters to Save Ourselves (see our review) premieres in Manhattan. The film recounts the story of the oyster’s dramatic disappearance and showcases the work of those New Yorkers helping to stage the mollusk’s comeback.

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Rachel Nuwer is a Brooklyn-based freelance science journalist who writes about the environment for the New York Times, Audubon, Smithsonian, and others. When not hunched over her desk, she enjoys eating swamp rats in Vietnam or avoiding alligators in... READ MORE >