Why the shellfish industry is struggling to hire and retain workers

Climate change, immigration crackdowns and housing costs shake up the country's largest shellfish farm

• This piece is co-published with High Country News

Shellfish farmers like Ramiro Cordero, who works for Taylor Shellfish Farms in Bay Center, Washington, are used to being in uncomfortable positions and places. Farmers kneel in the sand, elbow-deep in muck, to pluck oysters from the water. They hack away at mudflats to extract clams. They blow high-pressure hoses into the ground to uproot geoducks that can be as long as their arms, sometimes their torsos.

The job would be difficult anywhere, but it's particularly taxing in Washington. Here, wintertime low tides - when shellfish are harvested - occur in the middle of the night. This means that farmers like Cordero are out at midnight, in the freezing cold, in January.