How oysters filter water and improve water quality

To admire South Carolina’s marshes, harbors, bays, rivers and creeks is also to admire the critters keeping them clean.

Oysters are the Palmetto State’s most ubiquitous filter feeder. They provide habitat for other species, stabilize shorelines by slowing erosion and improve water quality. When submerged, oysters continuously pull water through their bodies to extract oxygen, nitrogen, pollutants, sediment and nutrients.

“Oysters are very sophisticated in terms of their abilities to sort different particles,” said Peter Kingsley-Smith, senior marine scientist at the S.C. Department of Natural Resources.

So how does this "foundation species" manage to do all this?

An oyster’s shell protects its tissues and organs, Kingsley-Smith said. It draws water in through its incurrent siphon. Wa