Abalone: The Remarkable History and Uncertain Future of California's Iconic Shellfish

295 Pages·2020·16.778 MB·English

by  Ann Vileisis

Abalone

Abalone
The Remarkable History and Uncertain Future
of California’s Iconic Shellfish
Ann Vileisis
Oregon State University Press Corvallis
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Vileisis, Ann, author.
Title: Abalone : the remarkable history and uncertain future of California’s
iconic shellfish / Ann Vileisis.
Description: Corvallis : Oregon State University Press, 2020. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019054126 | ISBN 9780870719882 (trade paperback) |
ISBN 9780870719899
Subjects: LCSH: Abalones—California—History. | Abalone
populations—California.
Classification: LCC QL430.5.H34 V55 2020 | DDC 594/.3209794—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019054126
∞ This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992
(Permanence of Paper).
© 2020 Ann Vileisis
Illustrations © 2020 Dominick Leskiw
All rights reserved.
First published in 2020 by Oregon State University Press
Printed in the United States of America
Oregon State University Press
121 The Valley Library
Corvallis OR 97331-4501
541-737-3166 • fax [phone]
www.osupress.oregonstate.edu
Contents
Introduction: A Mollusk with Charisma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
PART 1: A STORIED SHELL (70 million years BP–1850)
1 Before the Written Word . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2 The Unexpected Consequence of Shimmer . . . . . . . . . . 34
3 The Anatomy of Iridescence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
PART 2: THE ABALONE CENTURY (1850–1962)
4 Becoming a Commodity and an Icon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
5 The Abalone Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
6 Too Many Abalone Hunters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
PART 3: SCARCITY (1939–1985)
7 The Sea Otters’ Return . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
8 Last Best Chance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
9 A Wishful Tack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
PART 4: CRISIS (1980–1997)
10 Losing Grip . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
11 From Crisis to Closure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
12 The Abalone War. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
PART 5: IMPERILED (1997–2019)
13 Racing Extinction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189
14 Against All Odds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
Conclusion: Poised at the Brink . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285

If you don’t know history,
it’s as if you were born yesterday.
—Howard Zinn

Introduction
A Mollusk with Charisma
Ask anyone who spent time on California’s coast during the 1950s, 1960s, and
early 1970s about abalone, and his or her eyes will likely brighten and then
drift to a clear and potent memory: a beachside barbecue, summer vacation
foraging in tide pools, or perhaps even plunging into deeper waters to “pop”
the meaty shellfish from its rocky dwelling spots. At the time, California’s coast
seemed awash in abalone. From San Diego to Crescent City, people gorged
on abalone steaks, sandwiches, and burgers. Glimmering shells were sold in
beach-town trinket shops, nailed to garden fences as signs of diving prowess,
and shown off in living rooms as novel décor or psychedelic ashtrays. Sunset
Magazine routinely showcased abalone recipes and craft projects. Abalones’
remarkable abundance and appeal made them icons of California’s easy living,
laid-back beach culture, and enduring natural opulence.
But by just a few decades later, many younger Californians had never
seen or even heard of the legendary shellfish. In a relatively short period, the
juicy steaks, ubiquitous shells, and animals that had long studded nearshore
reefs vanished from central and southern California, remaining abundant only
in northern California, for a time, owing to a tightly managed fishery.
In the past twenty years, two of California’s seven abalone species have
joined the US endangered species list and four more have become “ species
of concern.” Just recently, even the red abalone in northern California—long
regarded as most hardy—has been devastated by a “perfect storm” of environ-
mental stressors, resulting in the closure of the long-popular fishery. The few
abalone species that range north into waters from Oregon to Alaska are at risk,
too.
After millions of years of gripping tenaciously to North America’s western
shoreline, after twelve thousand years of sustaining human foragers with their
meat and of stirring human imagination with their iridescent shells, how—in
our time—did the fate of these delicious, wondrous, and once-abundant mol-
lusks become so precarious?
The answer to that question, and any hope for these animals’ future, lies
in understanding the remarkable history of people and abalone on the West
Coast.
9