Saving Seafood

If oysters are polluted, what about the fish?

February 10, 2017 — The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries has sent out a number of releases over the past year about oyster harvesters getting busted pulling up the mollusks from polluted waters. That’s a disturbing trend for consumers who like to like to get a fix on Friday nights from their favorite oyster bars.

But it’s also concerning for South Louisiana’s recreational anglers, who regularly fish the same waters that host polluted reefs. One such bust occurred last month in Hopedale’s Lake Robin, which is heavily fished in the spring, fall and early winter.

But Gordon Leblanc, who administers the molluscan shellfish program for the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals, said just because an area’s oysters are polluted doesn’t mean its fish necessarily are.

“The water goes through a fish’s gills, and the fish is able to move around,” Leblanc said. “An oyster is a filter-feeder. Everything that passes through him goes through his digestive tract.

Read the full story at The Times-Picaynne

Study specifies benefits of shellfish in Cape water quality plans

February 7, 2017 — Why spend millions of dollars if you don’t have to?

Mashpee is turning to one of the oldest wastewater cleanup technologies on earth – the nitrogen removal systems in oysters and clams – to reduce the cost of federally mandated wastewater cleanup. Orleans, Falmouth, Barnstable, Dennis, Yarmouth, Wellfleet and Edgartown are also either using or considering shellfish for water quality improvement.

But, until recently, towns had to use estimates of how much nitrogen the bivalves actually removed from the water. Now, a study released last month in the online journal Marine Pollution Bulletin, is providing more specific information on the effectiveness of the shellfish-based strategy. As part of the study, Barnstable County, Woods Hole Sea Grant, and University of Massachusetts School of Marine Science and Technology researchers gathered both farmed and wild shellfish from around the Cape and analyzed shells and meats to determine how much nitrogen each contained.

“The study was really done to help local municipalities who are approaching this idea that shellfish might be used for remediation,” said Woods Hole Sea Grant agent Joshua Reitsma, the study’s lead author. “It provides values for that where people were using data from elsewhere, like the Chesapeake.”

Read the full story at the Cape Cod Times

MAINE: January 24th Taunton Bay Oyster Co.,Inc. Aquaculture Public Hearing Postponed Until January 25th

January 24, 2017 — The following was released by the Maine Department of Marine Resources:

The DMR public hearing on an application filed by Taunton Bay Oyster Co., Inc. scheduled for Tuesday, January 24, 2017 has been postponed until January 25, 2017 due to weather. The hearing is on an application filed by Taunton Bay Oyster Co., Inc. for a standard aquaculture lease located in Northern Bay, Bagaduce River, Penobscot, for bottom and suspended culture of American/Eastern oysters.

PLEASE NOTE: if the hearing cannot be concluded by a reasonable hour on the 25th, it will be continued to January 31 and, if necessary, February 1, at the same time and location.

The meeting will be held at 6:00 p.m. at the Penobscot Community/Elementary School, 66 North Penobscot Road, Penobscot

Oysters remain king as growers race to meet consumer demand

January 23, 2017 — Demand for oysters continues to trend upward heading into 2017, with production capacity expanding to satiate consumer demand.

According to a panel of bivalve and oyster experts speaking at the National Fisheries Institute’s 2017 Global Seafood Market Conference in San Francisco, California, “the number of oyster growers [is] increasing just to keep up with demand.”

The rate of oyster consumption particularly at restaurants, remains strong, with the popular shellfish serving to elevate complementary species such as mussels, clams and scallops, noted the panel.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Alabama’s first Oyster Shell Recycling Program captures ½ million shells; ready for January expansion

December 22, 2016 — GULF SHORES, Ala. — With an anticipated 130,000 pounds of shells to be collected by the end of a productive pilot period, Alabama’s oyster shell recycling program is set to expand into Gulf Shores and Orange Beach restaurants starting in January.

The successful program — the first multi-partner initiative of its kind in the state — is expected to save nearly 600,000 oyster shells from landfill in just nine weeks and return them to Alabama’s reefs as habitat for future oysters.

“This is an excellent program because it creates a positive cycle,” said Mark Berte, Executive Director of the Alabama Coastal Foundation, which designed the program and secured two years of funding from National Fisheries and Wildlife Federation officials.

“The more shells we collect from restaurants, the more opportunity we give new oysters to grow when we put them in the water, which means more oysters for restaurants to sell…and more to recycle,” Berte said.

The program involves weekly pickups from six seafood restaurants in Mobile along the Causeway who otherwise would toss their oyster shells as garbage or discard them somewhere out of the way on property.

Felix’s Fish Camp Grill, for example, used to line the perimeter of their parking lot with oyster shells; in fact, the restaurant became renowned for it on Travelocity and other tourism websites. A shell recycling event on November 31 filled more than 317 bins, weighing nearly 70,000 pounds, from Felix’s property — an estimated 341,092 shells.

“We had lined those along our parking lot so people weren’t driving off into the grass,” said Julius Harbison, General Manager at Felix’s Fish Camp, in Spanish Fort. “They had been there a year or two so they were some already seasoned shells.”

Harbison’s father was an oysterman so he understood the value of the program when ACF first approached the restaurant.

“Our owner asked me and my chef what we thought, and we said it was really a no brainer,” Harbison said. “It doesn’t take a lot of effort as a business, and for me personally, it’s amazing to be able to participate in something like this.”

Read the full story at the Gulf Seafood Institute 

MASSACHUSETTS: Weeks after shellfishing ban is lifted, Wellfleet worries remain

December 5th, 2016 — A soft rain falls just before sunrise and Jason Weisman is at work on Duck Creek armed with a knife and a bushel basket, scouring the muddy shoreline for food that supports his young family, still asleep in their beds miles down the road.

He’s cooked in kitchens in the North End and Allston. He’s worked on lobster boats. He’s studied painting and has a keen appreciation for art. And now, at his feet, he recognizes the artistry before him.

“It sparkles like a diamond when the light hits it just right,’’ he tells me, holding a freshly harvested oyster, the shellfish that has become his passion and livelihood.

He’s got his eyes on the water and on the horizon, preferring to look ahead and forget about the economic calamity from which he is just emerging — a month-long shellfishing ban that has staggered him and his town.

Read the full story at The Boston Globe 

Florida gets $32M more in oil spill money

November 16, 2016 — PANAMA CITY, Fla. — Florida will receive $32 million for four projects aimed at restoring natural resources damaged by the 2010 oil spill, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) announced Tuesday.

The money is part of a $370 million announcement to finance 24 grants, the foundation’s fourth and largest round to date. Louisiana will receive $245 million, Alabama $63 million, Mississippi $16 million and Texas nearly $12 million.

NFWF was awarded a total of $2.5 billion over five years in settlements and penalties from BP to repair natural resources damaged during the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, which is considered one of the largest environmental disasters in history. It began April 10, 2010, and lasted 87 days, releasing millions of barrels worth of oil into the Gulf.

In Florida, the latest round of grants will go toward conserving oyster reefs, building a sea turtle necropsy facility, better assessing stocks of Florida’s reef fish, and restoring shorebird and seabird populations.

Read the full story at the Panama City News Herald

Oysters, Clams, and More: Future of Green Farming in a Garden State?

November 1, 2016 — Streamlining regulations and getting rid of excessive paperwork could spark an upsurge in “green aquaculture” in New Jersey

In an effort to promote the eco-friendly aquaculture industry, the Senate and Assembly have unanimously passed a bill to reduce the paperwork involved in setting up this type of business. The lawmakers, who hope the governor will sign their bill to encourage “green aquaculture,” believe that fish-farming in New Jersey waters holds the potential to create jobs for the long term.

“We’ve made it virtually impossible for them to succeed. Only the most persistent people have been able to move forward,” said Jeff Van Drew (D-Cape May Court House), who sponsored the legislation (S-317) to drastically streamline regulations so applicants could essentially submit one packet to be distributed interdepartmentally instead of encountering the many conflicting demands they currently face.

Rutgers University estimates that the 160 aquaculture businesses already operating in the state contribute $36 million directly and indirectly to the economy. But considering that surrounding states have grown their aquaculture industries to 30 times the size of New Jersey’s, those aren’t nearly enough dollar signs for the Garden State’s legislators and would-be aquaculturalists; they think the legislation will help to cut out some of the 11 different state, local, and federal agencies with which those aspiring to be part of the industry currently must file paperwork.

The New Jersey Department of Agriculture defines aquaculture as “the raising of marine and freshwater organisms under controlled conditions” and includes “food fish and shellfish, cultured pearls, ornamental and aquarium fish, and plants for food, fuel, garden ponds and aquariums.”

Read the full story at the NJ Spotlight

Study shows oyster reef restoration helps economy

October 26th, 2016 — A 54-acre oyster reef built in Matagorda Bay is benefiting more than sea life.

Half Moon Reef has become a fishing hot spot, adding $691,000 to the state’s domestic gross product each year and creating a dozen jobs, according to a Nature Conservancy study released this month.

About three years ago, the reef was dead. While there was some hard material left to build upon, there were no live oysters, said Mark Dumesnil, the associate director of coastal restoration in Texas for The Nature Conservancy.

The reef was once almost 500 acres, but dredging, major changes in hydrology that altered the amount of water entering Matagorda Bay and, possibly, a hurricane left the reef defunct.

In 2013, when Dumesnil and other researchers began their effort to bring the reef back to life, their main priority was to create a habitat for fish.

“It’s more than just the oysters,” he said. “My goal was to restore it for all of the ecosystem services.”

Oyster reefs can help clean water, provide habitat for a huge diversity of reef-dependent sea life and help reduce the amount and prevalence of harmful algal blooms by removing nitrogen from the water.

But soon Dumesnil was receiving phone calls and emails from fishing guides who were reaping benefits of their own. So, The Nature Conservancy teamed up with Texas Sea Grant to survey anglers and fishing guides to quantify the social and economic benefits of Half Moon Reef.

Read the full story at the Victoria Advocate 

NORTH CAROLINA: 40,000 oysters ‘planted’ in Great Bay

October 11th, 2016 — Your thoughts about oysters may not extend beyond the dinner table, but it turns out the little critters are pretty important to the ecosystem.

Realizing that the local oyster population was greatly depleted, the University of New Hampshire and The Nature Conservatory launched a program in 2009 to bring them back by nurturing millions of microscopic larvae each year and “planting” the surviving young oysters in Great Bay.

Friday was the culmination of the eighth season, when some 40,000 new oysters were heaved into the bay near Nanny’s Island by a group of about 30 volunteers and conservation workers, both adults and children.

“To the oysters!” said Molly Bolster, over an apple cider toast. “May they flourish and spend a lot of time down there,” said Bolster, who is executive director of the Portsmouth-based Gundalow Company, which provided the boat.

Oysters help filter the water, reducing pollution. However, due to diseases, excess silt, climate change and past over-harvesting, the population has greatly declined over the last few decades, said Ray Grizzle, research professor of biological sciences at UNH. Many oysters were not living long enough to produce offspring.

So how does one go about “planting” an oyster?

Millions of larvae each year are sent to the UNH Jackson Estuarine Lab, where the microscopic oysters are reared using shells collected and donated from restaurants around the state. The vast majority of larvae die before reaching adulthood, but those that survive are placed back in the bay after they have matured for several months.

Read the full story at The Portsmouth Herald