What began as a way to educate people on productive steps they could take on behalf of the environment became a window into the history of a Japanese immigrant family and the industry its members revitalized.

Port Townsend’s Shelly Solomon has worked as a restoration biologist, landscape architect and water-quality specialist, but it was through her past decade as an environmental filmmaker she felt she had the biggest impact.

“If you watch the news on TV about the environment, it’s all doom and gloom,” Solomon said. “There are so many good environmental projects going on, but people don’t know about them.”

Solomon started Leaping Frog Films in 2008 not only to get the word out about positive and constructive activities on behalf of the environment, but also to make that information less challenging for the general public to assimilate.

“I wanted to communicate the science in an easy way, and for kids, especially, to see that science can be fun,” Solomon said. “By spotlighting the programs we have, I hope they can serve as role models for the next generations.”

“Ebb and Flow,” which is set to screen at The Rose Theatre at noon April 22, wound up breaking the mold for Solomon’s documentaries a few times over. Folks from the shellfish industry, who helped fund the film, contacted Solomon to ask if she was interested in profiling Seattle shellfish farmer Eiichi “Jerry” Yamashita, who did not retire until he turned 88.

“They all told me, ‘Oh, he’s adorable, you’ll fall in love with him,’” Solomon said. “He was in his 90s, but whenever we’d try to focus on him, he wanted to talk about his dad instead. You don’t normally change the subject of a documentary, but it finally got to the point where I said to my husband, ‘If we don’t record these stories, they’ll be lost to history.’”

Yamashita’s father, Masahide, came to Seattle from Japan in 1902, and managed to save oyster farming in the Pacific Northwest by doing the last thing most modern environmentalists would recommend, by introducing a nonnative species to the environment.

Solomon recounted how, in the early 20th century, overharvesting and pollution had devastated the Olympia oysters native to the region, so Yamashita’s father tried importing oysters from Japan. While the adult oysters failed to survive in their new environment, the seeds of new oysters that were attached to the shells stayed alive.

“What we call Pacific oysters now are actually Japanese oysters, even though a lot of people simply assume they’ve always been here,” Solomon said. “Learning about the collapse of the native oyster population back then was shocking to me. Although other farmers brought small quantities of oyster seeds over, Jerry’s father never received the recognition that he deserved for figuring out how to bring larger quantities over, by placing them in wooden boxes, covered in straw and rice mats, with sea water poured on top of them.”

Solomon and her cinematographer husband, Kent Cornwell, would spend three years with Yamashita, now 95, and his family, weaving together their history with the shellfish industry and the nation as a whole. World War II saw the Yamashita family split up into separate internment camps, with Masahide Yamashita taken to Montana, while his son and the rest of his family were sent to California.

“(Jerry Yamashita’s) original Japanese name is Eiichi, but he was given the nickname ‘Jerry’ in the camp,” Solomon said. “His father helped resurrect a dying industry, and his family was incarcerated. We didn’t even intend to cover all this background so extensively, but shellfish farmers are tough people, and we wanted to know what had made Jerry so strong. His story engulfed us.”

Although Solomon is an award-winning documentarian, with honors that include Sustainable Seattle’s 2010 Leadership in Sustainability in the Natural World Award for her film work, she confessed she had not anticipated the interest level generated by “Ebb and Flow.”

“It’s a very different film from what I’m used to making,” Solomon said. “I’ve seen grown men cry at a few screenings. We’ve had attendees come from as far and wide as California, Alaska and Japan. The NHK broadcasting network of Japan reviewed it online and loved it. This story is a testament to sticking with your convictions.”

Following the noon screening at the Rose Theatre April 22, Port Townsend Vineyards is set to host a two-hour after-party, complete with fresh raw Pacific oysters from the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe, local cheeses from Mount Townsend Creamery, Willapa, artisan bread from Pane d’Amore and chocolates from Elevated Ice Cream Co.

The proceeds go to Leaping Frog Films to help it continue to tell socially responsible environmental films. For further details on the screening and after-party, visit: rosetheatre.com/film/ebb-and-flow.