October 27, 2016 — Local fisherman Marsden Brewer and his son, Bobby Brewer, have recently returned from a one-week excursion to Aomori, Japan, where they spent time studying the Japanese methods of growing scallops through aquaculture.
Growing scallops, as opposed to fishing them, has become a topic of interest in the area over the last few years; however, Brewer said it is something the Japanese have been doing for decades.
“They’ve long since brought their fishing industry to its knees as of several years ago, so they had to come up with an alternative way to still use the ocean to feed their families,” said Brewer at his home Tuesday, October 18. “That’s why we went over there, to learn how they do it, because they’ve discovered so many ways of becoming more and more efficient. It’s really quite amazing.”
Brewer said the technique he was most impressed with was a 600-foot-long line that went 15-feet down into the water. Scallops are hung on that line to grow.
“The thing I liked most about that is the line is hung from three buoys. So, if you look at it from above, all you see on the surface are those three buoys. It doesn’t look like a whole system coming out of the water,” he said.