It was supposed to be a bumper year for oysters. Maryland watermen want disaster aid instead.

When watermen took to the Chesapeake Bay last fall for the start of oyster season, Robert T. Brown expected a bumper year.

Oysters have made a steady resurgence in the bay over the last two decades, and watermen had one of their biggest hauls in recent memory just a few seasons ago.

“We were planning on having one of the best years we had had since I don’t know when,” said Brown, who is president of the Maryland Watermen’s Association and lives on the Potomac River.

Hope died fast.

Between Thanksgiving and Christmas — a typically busy period as people prepare for the holidays — demand was so low that Brown said many Chesapeake oystermen worked only two or three days a week.

Winter brought other hardships. Before Christmas, health warnings linked cases of salmonella around the country to raw oysters, scaring some away from the Chesapeake’s signature shellfish. By late January, many watermen were locked to their docks in the deep freeze. That same month, a pipe collapse near Washington sent millions of gallons of sewage downstream into the Potomac River — a catastrophe officials worry could do long-term harm to perceptions of bay seafood.

The harvest has been so dismal that Gov. Wes Moore appealed Feb. 27 to President Donald Trump’s administration for disaster aid. In his request, the governor said Maryland would use federal support to send direct relief to watermen, fund public awareness about the health safety of Chesapeake shellfish and finance a new oyster marketing campaign.

According to preliminary data included in Moore’s letter, Marylanders landed just over 188,600 bushels between October and January. That’s 44% below the five-year average and much less than in the 2022-23 season, when half a million bushels were harvested during those first four months.

It’s been almost “a perfect storm” this season, said Maryland Natural Resources Secretary Josh Kurtz, who stressed that these headwinds stemmed from faltering demand — not from any lack of bivalves in the bay.

In fact, Chesapeake oysters are in the middle of a mini-renaissance.

Once so abundant that ships had to navigate around their reefs, the Chesapeake oyster was nearly wiped out by overharvesting in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Disease killed off more, until the fishery hit a low in 2003-04, when watermen harvested just 26,000 bushels.

Restoration has helped to more than triple oyster populations since then, but Kurtz said he worries this season signals a longer-term challenge.

Kurtz said many customers aren’t buying oysters during tight economic times. He also pointed to competition from other regions.

Moore’s request for disaster support came after some Maryland Republicans publicly called for federal aid. Rep. Andy Harris, who represents the Eastern Shore, asked the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to declare a disaster in early February, saying weather and market conditions had “left many crews effectively tied to the dock.”

“It’s like Murphy’s Law on steroids this oyster season,” said Del. Jay Jacobs, another Republican who represents the upper Eastern Shore in Annapolis.

Jacobs was encouraged to see Moore’s letter but worries about the slow harvest’s longer-term impacts, since watermen will have less money in the off-season.

So far this season, Maryland harvesters have sold $6.7 million worth of oysters, the lowest total in the last five years, according to Moore’s letter. Though this harvest isn’t over, that figure is almost half of the season before and a fifth of the 2022-23 season.

The Jan. 19 collapse of the Potomac Interceptor added more chaos.

The rupture emptied an estimated 243 million gallons of raw sewage into the Potomac, fouling the waterway with harmful bacteria and prompting closures of Maryland shellfish waters 60 miles downstream. Testing since then suggests that these harvest areas are unaffected by the spill. Maryland plans to lift its closures next week.

The Potomac disaster enflamed a dispute between Trump and Moore, which culminated days before the governor requested federal aid for the oyster fishery.

The Trump administration declined disaster relief last year for flood-ravaged communities in Western Maryland. And Moore’s 2023 ask for federal support to combat the invasion of blue catfish also was denied.

Spokespeople for NOAA and the Department of Commerce did not respond to a request for comment on Moore’s disaster request.

Maryland has extended this year’s oyster season to April 14, an extra two weeks, because of the prolonged freeze, a step also taken by Virginia.

Rich Pelz, owner of Circle C Oyster Ranch in St. Mary’s County and a stalwart of the bay oyster business, said he’s had a fairly normal year and expects the industry will rebound quickly. Yields have always gone up and down, he said, and good years often follow bad ones.

“Oysters are tough,” he said. “If you work with them, they will come back.”

Conservationists and watermen have clashed previously over oyster protections in the bay, and some tensions remain.

Jacobs, the Eastern Shore delegate, introduced a bill this legislative session to allow watermen to harvest oysters from certain sanctuaries. Meanwhile, Moore’s proposed budget would cut state investment in oyster restoration next year by over 40%.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation opposes both of those measures.

Julie Luecke, Maryland coastal resource scientist for the foundation, said efforts to restore the estuary’s once-abundant oyster population and encourage their harvest should go hand in hand. For one, she noted, most of the baby oysters seeded in the bay take root on recycled shells from restaurants.

As state officials await the Trump administration’s decision, they’re mulling using federal funds for a new branding campaign.

Some suggest the monicker “Bay Raised” could boost name recognition in other markets, said Matt Scales, who leads seafood marketing for the Maryland Department of Agriculture.

Scales’ division works with an annual budget of $170,000, which helps promote events like “Chesapeake Oyster Week” and a trip to a major industry expo this month.

But Tim Mortus, president of the Cecil-Harford Watermen’s Association, argued during a legislative hearing this week that this state appropriation isn’t nearly enough to buoy the Chesapeake’s struggling seafood industry.

Meanwhile, Mortus, who owns a Harford County crab house, suggested a modest step: Why not enlist Moore for a promotional job?

“Come to our crab houses,” the waterman said. “Eat an oyster. We’ll get him put on TV.”