Sort of like being paid for not planting corn? “[A]n oysterman here in the nation’s top oyster-producing state can make as much, if not more, collecting damage settlements from oil companies as from harvesting the bivalves themselves, according to a recent study by two Louisiana State University economists.”

“On average,” they wrote, “oyster leases generate a majority of their net income from non-oyster-producing activities.” Money “appears to flow to leases irrespective of their ability to produce marketable oysters.”

So lucrative is the potential payoff from the oil companies that there is almost certainly a lively trade among oystermen in the “speculative” leasing of otherwise unproductive water bottoms, Dr. Keithly and Dr. Kazmierczak [Walter R. Keithly Jr. and Richard F. Kazmierczak] concluded.

Indeed, speaking on condition of anonymity, one of the major “landmen” — middlemen who negotiate between oystermen and oil companies — agreed that some fishermen deliberately leased bottoms in harm’s way, in order to collect from the companies.

The New York Times says the “oyster community” in the Pelican State is infuriated at the report and calls it false. (Adam Nossiter, New York Times, Aug. 15).

Our earlier coverage of one bizarre excursion by the Louisiana courts into oyster-lease compensation is here, here, here, and here. The broadside The Oyster Girl, widely distributed in the English singing tradition, underscores the importance of watching one’s pockets when oysters are being traded.

Filed under: environment, Louisiana