May 17, 2019 — Vietnam War veteran Dan Barth thinks that shellfish can help soldiers handle post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as well as save his fellow veterans from isolation, and ultimately suicide.
Soon after Barth graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in forestry in 1969, he was drafted to fight in the Vietnam War, where he served from 1970 to 1973.
After returning home from the war, he worked for Washington State Department of Resources, beginning in forestry, then moving to the department’s marine programs. He supervised the department’s statewide aquaculture leasing program for decades.
“Wouldn’t you know it, 30 years went by in a flash,” he told SeafoodSource.
After retiring in 2002, Barth began consulting shellfish growers in Puget Sound and also in Ireland, where he helped to start an oyster farm in Galway Bay.
When Barth returned to Washington State from Ireland, his son Brendan joined the U.S. Army, was deployed to Iraq, and returned with a service-related disability, just as his father did when he returned from the Vietnam War.
Brendan’s experiences coming home from war got Barth thinking about how he could use his expertise to help veterans. He said he was inspired by a book by Stephanie Westlund, a Canadian author, called “Field Exercises: How Veterans are Healing Themselves Through Farming and Outdoor Activities,” in which she writes that “eco-therapy” can be incredibly helpful for veterans with PTSD.