The tiny but mighty Olympia oyster regains a foothold in Washington waters

State biologists selected 19 priority restoration areas around Washington — from Drayton Harbor near the Canadian border, to Budd Inlet near Olympia — by searching through old reports and records from archaeological digs to find out where the oysters used to be most abundant.

“The best places to start are the places they existed prior to European contact,” says Marco Hatch, an ecologist at Western Washington University and member of the Samish Indian Nation.