- Hello Jeff - Another sad article to point to the planet's
environmental pollution. The QX parasite, "Q" standing for Queensland,"
X" standing for Unknown, has a 100% kill rate and is slowly starving
Sydney's world famous rock oysters to death.
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- The parasite is likely to end Sydney's rock oyster industry.
"QX" disease has been unstoppable and is spreading.
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- We need to have a global policy on pollution of the environment,
such as polluting of our air, oceans and rivers, and our soil.
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- Patricia Doyle
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- From ProMED-mail
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- The World May No Longer Be Sydney's Oyster
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- (Reuters) -- Sydney's world-famous rock oysters, one
of the high points of Australian cuisine, are slowly starving to death.
A mystery parasite is threatening to wipe out the succulent delicacies,
which are held in the same esteem by Australian diners as abalone is at
Asian tables and truffles by French and Italian gourmets. Unique to the
east coast of Australia, the Sydney rock oysters are prized around the
world for their exquisite taste, long shelf life, and, some suggest, aphrodisiac
properties.
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- The disease threatens to destroy an AUD 30 million (USD
23.1 million) a year industry, taking with it the livelihoods of hundreds
of oyster farmers whose families have harvested the molluscs for generations.
The disease has hit so hard that a 3rd generation of oyster harvesters
might be the last to make their living from Sydney rock oysters, which
take 4 years to reach maturity and require meticulous farming. They must
be tended daily. Unlike other oysters, Sydney rock oysters can survive
for up to 3 weeks out of water and can be delivered alive to restaurants
worldwide.
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- 23 Hawkesbury oyster farms may go out of business after
total losses of AUD 10 million (USD 7.7 million) since the parasite 1st
attacked in 2004. Last year [2004], the parasite was found in about 30
per cent of the Hawkesbury oysters. Now almost all are affected. Illustrating
the extent of the disease, a harvester shucked open about 50 of his oysters
before he found one alive.
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- As well as being fast-moving, the QX parasite -- "Q"
for Queensland state, where it is thought to have originated, and "X"
for unknown -- also has close to a 100 per cent mortality rate. It kills
by attacking the oysters' gut and starving them. It spreads rapidly, but
the oysters suffer a lingering death.
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- So far, the QX disease has been unstoppable. It destroyed
the industry in southern Queensland in the 1970s and reappeared in the
Georges River, which cuts through southern Sydney, 10 years ago, wiping
out farmers there. Now it is devouring oysters in the Hawkesbury, the 2nd-largest
producer behind a system of rivers in northern New South Wales.
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- New South Wales Fisheries (NSW), the state agency responsible
for the industry, says the disease is caused by the parasite _Marteilia
sydneyi_, whose origin is uncertain and whose life cycle is thought to
include an unknown intermediate host. After the Georges River outbreak,
NSW Fisheries selectively bred what it believes are QX-resistant oysters
from the few that survived. These are now being put to the test in Hawkesbury.
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- The Sydney rock oyster industry is among Australia's
oldest. Aborigines had harvested the native oysters for centuries before
the arrival of European settlers, who began commercial oyster farming in
the 1890s.
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- In the meantime, Hawkesbury farmers have asked the New
South Wales government to contract them to clean the river of dead oysters
so as to generate much-needed income. They say healthy oysters even play
an important role in river environments by keeping pollution levels down.
Having oysters in the river is like having a oil filter in your car. They
help improve the river's health.
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- Patricia A. Doyle, PhD
- Please visit my "Emerging Diseases" message
board at: http://www.clickitnews.com/ubbthreads/postlist.php?
Cat=&Board=emergingdiseases
- Zhan le Devlesa tai sastimasa
- Go with God and in Good Health
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