Fal Oysters

A law dating to 1868  makes it illegal to gather them with mechanical means or from crafts  other than sail boats or row boats. The little fleet of oyster fishing  boats from the port  of Truro, the most important town in Cornwall, is  the last one in the world to be made up entirely of sail boats and row  boats, and the only one in Europe that is used for commercial purposes.  Moreover, the oyster gatherers, united in the Port of Truro Oyster Fishermen’s Protection Association, have drawn up regulations to protect  this local resource. They use dredges, small hand- maneuvered nets,  only capture mollusks with a shell larger than five centimeters in  diameter, and have a very short fishing season. At the end of the hunt,  they return to port and sell the oysters to the wholesalers (there are  five along the Fal  River), who take the oysters to one of two plants to  be cleaned and then sell them to restaurant owners and shops in the  county.
Despite sustainability measures and the abundant supply,  the Fal oyster risks extinction because it is threatened by an infesting  organism and the shoals are being damaged by the moorings of the  yachts. Furthermore, the price of the mollusks has remained the same for  more than 20 years, and the poor pay discourages young people from  taking up the craft.