Many Willapa Bay oysters are exported to China and Hong Kong, a trade route that snapped shut with the onset of a new strain of coronavirus that is roiling the world’s economy.

NAHCOTTA — Ken Wiegardt can really shuck oysters. His hands work at a dizzying pace opening the shells, a rhythmic thump, thump, crack, slice. Then oyster meat blurps into a strainer over and over.

Wiegardt, a fifth-generation oysterman, makes his living in the mud of Willapa Bay.

“This time of year we should be shucking 40 to 45 hours a week, and we’re down to 15 to 18 hours,” Wiegardt said.

Right now, all sorts of products aren’t reaching the U.S. because of the coronavirus outbreak that originated in Wuhan, China, officially called COVID-19.

Reciprocally, many U.S. agricultural and forestry products aren’t shipping back into China and other Pacific Rim countries. Global trade watchers say backed-up trade is building up on both sides of the Pacific Ocean.

Slow shucking

Wiegardt says he usually ships about eight pallets stuffed with freshly jarred oysters to Hong Kong every Monday. Now, he’s down to shipping as little as one.

Some of his 19 shuckers have worked for him for decades. He’s had to cut back their hours, or pay them less for cleanup tasks. He’s stoic, but his mouth quivers a bit when talking about what could come next.

“I’m frustrated and scared to death,” he said. “But at the end of the day there are people out there that are suffering, they’re sick and there’s people dying.”

Despite its concentration in Hubei province in the city of Wuhan, nearly 600 miles north, coronavirus means people in Hong Kong aren’t going out to eat and they aren’t buying many oysters.

Most of Wiegardt’s business is built on exports, and even his domestic and Canadian Chinatown business is suffering. His orders have more than halved from places like San Francisco, Los Angeles and Toronto, Canada. He says, it has to turn around soon.

Wiegardt said he desperately doesn’t want to be the last member of his family to carry on this business.

“I want it to be there for [my children] if it’s something they want to do,” Wiegardt said. “My youngest has definitely shown a lot of interest already, and he’s only nine years old, so … fingers crossed!”