10 Oyster Facts You Didn’t Know

Get ready to be a connoisseur, because after you've read these oyster stats, you'll be able to impress your most trusted friends and family with your oyster details. You may also be able to adjust the way you consume oysters and appreciate the tastes you never realized were there.

Oysters are switching their gender.

One of the most fascinating details regarding oysters is that oysters shift their sex over their lifespan, beginning as males and typically finishing up as females. The form of the oysters differs and depends primarily on how many parties there are in the bed when they grow.

The oyster will filter for 1.3 gallons of water per hour.

Oysters pump water through their gills and eat food, including plankton, in the process. Oysters can preserve the equilibrium of the aquatic environment by growing surplus algae and pollution that can contribute to hypoxia or reduced amounts of oxygen, allowing many sea species to perish.

The oysters are placed in their nests.

When an oyster is bound to a bed (a surface shared by a community of oysters), it expands and develops around the surface to which it is bound, as well as the other oysters surrounding it.

Pearls don't only come from oysters.

All oysters are capable of generating pearls, but not bright, perfect pearls of quality. In addition, most pearls are obtained from an inedible form of oyster as well as freshwater mussels.

Humans have been feeding and rising oysters for thousands of years.

Oysters have been consumed by humans since ancient times and have been bred at least since the period of the Roman Empire. The Roman Sergius Orata was the first person known to grow oysters by constructing a device capable of regulating water levels.

The bulk of American oysters are of the same type.

Get your oyster details straight — the oysters picked from the Gulf of Mexico, the Bay of Chesapeake and off the coast of Virginia are all the same oysters, Crassotrea virginica. The oyster population is native to the Gulf Coast and the East Coast. This does not mean, though, that they all taste the same.

The oysters of the Gulf used to have various names.

Other than Gulf oysters, you may have sought Blue Points or Quonset Sticks. They are all the same type of oyster, but they are named after the different areas where they are collected. Once upon a time, Gulf oysters were often called after different bays, but dealers began to lump them all into the same category.

Oysters get their flavors out of their environments.

While most American oysters are of the same species, they have different flavors. Since oysters absorb too much water, they create a taste profile from their climate. Different bodies of water contain differing amounts of salt and various forms of nutrients.

Like foods, Oysters have a broad variety of taste profiles.

The taste of oysters can be defined primarily by the following flavor characteristics: brine, buttery, spicy, metallic and moderate. Experts will also break down certain spices, pick up spices like melon, cucumber, mushroom and more. Keep this little piece of oyster knowledge in mind every time you seek a half shell oyster.

Oysters are very high in minerals and nutrients.

Oysters produce a broad range of vitamins and minerals, including zinc, calcium, magnesium, iron, selenium and vitamin A. They often contain exceptionally high amounts of vitamin B12, iron and monounsaturated fat – the "good" form of fat that is often present in olive oil.