Mussel farming has a long history. As early as the 13th century, the French gathered mussels from poles driven into the seabed. In Australia, though, the first mussel farm wasn’t established until the mid-1950s. Nino Ruello began an enterprise in Botany Bay, south of Sydney, but his wire trays rusted,  bream preyed on his shellfish, and the business failed. The industry didn’t really get started until the 1970s, when some experimental farms were established in New South Wales.

For millennia, freshwater mussels were a staple food for Indigenous Australians. Found in rivers, lakes and billabongs,  there are many species, all unique to Australia and New Guinea. Some species are now critically endangered. The marine Blue Mussel, which is the one farmed today, is similar to and shares the same scientific name as mussels from southern Europe, but is native to Australia and has been found in ancient Aboriginal middens. The species has likely hybridised with mussels that arrived on the hulls of European ships.

For more than 150 years after colonisation, mussels were rarely eaten by white Australians. They were generally regarded as bait, although by the early 20th century, bottles of pickled mussels were being advertised for 9 pence per jar. The arrival of post-WWII immigrants from Europe, and particularly from Italy, began to change the way the molluscs were regarded.

Among those immigrants was Beppi Polese, who, in 1956, opened his eponymous restaurant in Sydney and is credited with changing the city’s dining habits. Mussels were on the menu, along with the equally unfamiliar squid and octopus. Unable to source supplies for his Zuppa di Cozze, Polese bought an inflatable boat and harvested the shellfish from the wooden pylons of the old Spit Bridge in Sydney Harbour. The dish, now with clams added, remains on the menu at Beppi’s.

As mussels became more acceptable, a dredging industry developed, scooping mussels from the seabed in Victoria’s Port Phillip Bay. Dredging caused considerable environmental damage and many reefs were destroyed, leading to interest in commercial farming. Aside from Nino Roello’s failed mussel farm, the first experimental ventures in New South Wales were at Jervis Bay in 1974 and Nelson Bay in 1975.

In Victoria, the first mussel farm was established offshore in suburban Beaumaris in 1978 by Duncan McLean, Chris Twikler and Brendon Maloney. The farm covered about 200 square metres, with three lines of floating plastic drums roped together and moored to the seabed. Nylon ropes hung down from the raft, and the mussels grew in thick clusters on the ropes. Called the “Spanish raft” method, this produced mussels that were free of the sand, grit and barnacles found in the dredged shellfish. The Beaumaris mussel farm produced its first crop in 1982. As well as being supplied to restaurants, they were sold off the wharf for a shilling (10 cents) a dozen.

Also in 1982, experimental mussel farms were established at Queenscliff near the entrance of Port Phillip Bay. By 1988, there were 18 farms on the Bellarine Peninsula. Port Arlington, on the peninsula, continues to be the focus for mussel farming in Victoria. There are also significant operations on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula, at Tasmania’s Spring Bay, in Southern New South Wales at Jervis Bay and Eden and on Western Australia’s Leuwin Coast in the Albany area.