over the years, bill croxton takes on more bed leases, expanding operations to 200 acres and puttinge to the business, the rappahannock river oyster company. he harvests about 7,000 bushels a year and sells to grocery stores, shuck houses, even the campbell's soup company. >> we really loved selling the oysters that ended up with campbell's soup because they wanted a small oyster, so we didn't have to leave them overboard as long. >> so it lessened the risk. >> but by the 1980s, decades of pollution and overfishing have taken a huge toll on harvest numbers -- less than 2 million bushels in the chesapeake bay in 1985, a mere fraction of the 14 million at the turn of the century. what happened? >> we took too many oysters, it got out of hand. >> you kill a whole ecosystem. >> that's what we did in the chesapeake bay and up and down the east coast. >> the croxton brothers say their father's ledgers tell the story of the oyster harvest decline, year after disappointing year. were there any significant losses? >> yeah, there's one that is really sad. it's "total loss". he lost $100,000, w