Saving Seafood

NOAA scientists set sail on landmark West Coast Ocean Acidification survey

July 21, 2026 — The following was released by the Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration:

On July 20, 2026, researchers embarked on the NOAA Ocean Acidification Program’s West Coast Ocean Acidification mission (WCOA 2026). Departing from San Diego aboard the University of Alaska, Fairbanks (R/V) Sikuliaq, the team will travel north to Washington, adding important new observations to NOAA’s long-term monitoring of ocean acidification and its impacts on marine resources.

WCOA 2026 will couple ocean chemistry, biology, and physics to build a more comprehensive view of how extreme events impact biogeochemistry and ecosystems.

“Results from past WCOA cruises have provided novel insights into acidification rates and impacts in coastal and estuary habitats that provide our nation with rich fish and shellfish resources,” said Dr. Simone Alin, Supervisory Oceanographer, NOAA/PMEL. Resource managers and harvesters can use this information to inform fisheries management decisions.

This intensive 30-day coastal research cruise aboard the 261-foot research vessel offers scientists a unique opportunity of sampling during an El Niño that is on track to become one of the strongest on record. El Niño brings warmer water and can alter upwelling and precipitation patterns in the region. Phytoplankton and zooplankton communities will follow these warmer waters, which impacts food webs and fisheries as seen during past marine heatwaves.

Two days after the Sikuliaq departs, the PMEL SeaTrac will head south from Washington to collect added coastal measurements during peak ocean acidification and hypoxia season and pick up any El Niño signal that may have made to the northern California Current System this summer. These OA cruises provide critical high-quality data for the U.S. Coastal Large Marine Ecosystems, and are essential for modeling and forecasting changes in ocean acidification and hypoxia to better prepare for future impacts to valued fisheries and ecosystems.

Led by researchers at the University of Washington’s Cooperative Institute for Climate, Ocean, & Ecosystem Studies and PMEL, researchers will collect high-quality ocean chemistry data, phytoplankton, zooplankton, and other observations. Scientists will also collect environmental DNA, which can reveal the diversity and abundance of ocean life in different ocean conditions.

Data collected during WCOA 2026 are essential for validating models and forecasts of ocean conditions like J-SCOPE. This short term (six to nine month) forecast is used for the California Current Integrated Ecosystem Assessment. High quality ocean carbon chemistry data is required to forecast the saturation state of calcium carbonate, the mineral building block used by shellfish like Dungeness crabs, clams, and oysters.

Other coordinated regular coastal fisheries surveys, including the California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) enhance the impact of WCOA 2026. By conducting biological net tows at established stations, researchers will gain high-quality data on marine life.

Ultimately, the data collected through WCOA 2026 will serve as a foundational benchmark for monitoring, modeling and research in the region. These data will provide calibration information for sensor networks designed to fill measurement gaps between research cruises. With the potential for sampling to occur as ocean conditions change with El Niño, NOAA and our partners will be able to better understand how extreme conditions alter vital marine resources like Dungeness crabs, krill, plankton and other fisheries.

MASSCHUSETTS: Massachusetts shellfish harvesters to get financial relief fund after Haverhill sewage overflow

July 13, 2026 — Massachusetts shellfish harvesters who were not able to work for nearly two weeks because of a sewage overflow that impacted the Merrimack River and parts of the North Shore will be eligible for some state financial support.

The ruptured pipe in Haverhill was discovered during the night of June 26 following a storm, with a second break found about 100 yards farther along the pipe the next day. Before the overflow stopped, officials estimated that up to 10 million gallons of wastewater were entering the Merrimack River each day.

State officials closed the fisheries across several communities on June 29 and began testing water quality in the region. After seeing water quality improvements, samples of shellfish meats were tested for safety, and those came back negative on July 9.

Read the full article at WCVB

USFWS moves to reclassify squids as shellfish, reduce regulation

March 11, 2026 — The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed reclassifying squids and other cephalopods as shellfish, removing its responsibility for regulating those fishery products and ensuring they are regulated by NOAA Fisheries like other mollusks.

Current U.S. law describes shellfish narrowly as “an aquatic invertebrate having a shell.” Despite being mollusks and being considered shellfish by NOAA, squids and octopi do not have external shells, precluding them from falling into the shellfish category under U.S. law

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

Despite obstacles, US restaurants still banking on seafood for growth

April 18, 2025 — Though Americans’ economic concerns are driving many consumers to make more meals at home, U.S. restaurants are still banking on seafood for growth, and several seafood restaurant chains are expanding throughout the country as a result.

The prevalence of shellfish grew 3 percent on U.S. menus year over year in 2024, driven mainly by strong growth from shrimp, according to market research firm Circana. Servings of “other seafood” rose 1 percent due to strong growth from calamari, but fish dishes fell 3 percent during the year.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

MAINE: Maine Department of Marine resources halts shellfish harvest due to water contamination

August 7, 2024 — Areas for shellfish harvesting have been closed due to contaminated runoff from recent heavy rainfall.

Maine’s Department of Marine Resources says it’s closed areas of the Freeport-Harpswell coast after rain showers carried animal waste into waters where shellfish feed.

Parts of Scarborough, Brunswick, and Yarmouth are also closed due to waste runoff.

Bryant Lewis at MDMR says that filter feeders like the shellfish in these areas are of special concern when water is contaminated like this.

Read the full article at WMTV

South Coast oyster growers say sewage-related restrictions will hurt

May 7, 2024 — After a storm wiped out Luke Sebesta’s Dartmouth aquaculture business in 2022, he was looking forward to purchasing 20,000 seed oysters this spring to get it back up and running. But this March, the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries announced new restrictions on shellfish beds in parts of Buzzards Bay. Now, his re-opening of his Nonquitt oyster farm — Buzzards Bay Oysters — is at a “standstill.”

“It’s making me question whether it’s even worth it,” he said.

On March 12, the state announced new regulations of the shellfish beds surrounding the New Bedford and Fairhaven wastewater treatment plant outfalls — the main discharge pipes for treated sewage. These changes are part of a statewide effort to expand the areas around these pipes that are closed to shellfishing — called “buffer zones” — to comply with requirements in the National Shellfish Sanitation Program.

These buffer zones are based on computer modeling of how treated sewage flows from treatment plants out of these pipes, and dilutes and disperses into its receiving waters near shellfish beds. They are meant to protect consumers from the risk of getting sick when eating shellfish grown near a wastewater treatment plant, if it fails and dispenses untreated sewage into the water.

Roughly 90,000 acres of Buzzards Bay shellfish beds, stretching from Dartmouth to Mattapoisett, changed from fully approved to conditionally approved as a result of the computer modeling. That means oyster growers using these beds could now be shut down for seven to 21 days after episodes of “rainfall or seasonally poor water quality or other predictable events.”

Read the full story at the New Bedford Light

Oyster shells sell for top dollar as biologists scramble to protect shellfish beds

August 30, 2022 — Sitting atop the crow’s nest of a small barge, the boat captain shielded his eyes from the July sun and pitched his gaze to the commotion below.

The hum of heavy equipment and the clatter of oyster shells broke the morning’s silence as work crews piled thousands of pounds of dried shells on the deck, eventually creating a mound 12 feet high.

When the last shell had been placed on the pile, the captain maneuvered the barge away from Russ Point Landing and down a tidal creek near Fripp Island on a mission to save wild oysters.

The state-sponsored work was part of an effort to protect imperiled oyster populations by returning shells from restaurants, backyard oyster roasts and other sources to tidelands. Putting shells back in the mud rebuilds reefs, the refuges baby oysters need to grow and multiply.

But efforts to restore oyster reefs in places like Beaufort County face a threat that could affect virtually anyone who depends on the harvest of wild oysters.

South Carolina and nearby states are having trouble finding the shells they need to put back in tidal areas to restore oyster populations.

At one time considered marine trash, oyster shells have become a valuable—but limited—commodity along the South Atlantic coast.

“This definitely is a multi-state, national problem: finding shell,” said Ben Dyar, an oyster specialist with the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources.

Without adequate supplies of shells, oyster populations could suffer, curtailing the commercial harvest and driving up the price of shellfish in restaurants. Fewer oyster reefs and lower populations could also mean more polluted waterways because oysters filter out contaminants in water.

There are multiple reasons for the shell shortage, including the toll that over-harvesting has taken through the years in South Atlantic states. But people also are throwing away the shells after serving oysters in seafood houses or at community oyster roasts. People are using shells to pave driveways and enhance gardens. And they’re crushing shells to sell for chicken feed or as ingredients in cosmetic products.

The shortage is so pronounced that some states have spent millions of dollars through the years purchasing shells to restore and rebuild oyster reefs—sometimes competing for the limited shells offered by shucking houses from Texas to Virginia.

Prices have increased from well under a dollar a bushel two decades ago to many times more than that today. The cost is now running from $3 to $7 a bushel, say some shucking house owners and .

South Carolina, with vast marshes and hundreds of seafood restaurants, spends, on average, about $100,000 annually buying shells from other states, according to the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources.

All told, the state, using a variety of funding sources, has spent nearly $1 million since 2012 acquiring more than 407,000 bushels of oyster shells, which equates to about 22 million pounds, according to the DNR.

South Carolina had been paying less than $3 a bushel, but the average price has jumped above $3 in the past two years, the DNR says.

Read the full article at PHYS.org

Milford laboratory working to make sure CT’s shellfish industry survives

August 23, 2022 — Thousands of people came to Milford this weekend for the Milford Oysterfest. They served up some 30,000 oysters, all grown in the water off Connecticut’s coast. As they enjoy those tasty shellfish, they may not know that, right nearby, scientists are constantly studying those oysters.

Just across the harbor is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service laboratory. The scientists working there try to make the shellfish industry thrive.

“Among our main projects are to improve the hatchery techniques so that it’s more effective and dependable to have shellfish seed to plant,” explained Dr. Gary Wikfors, Aquaculture Sustainability Branch Chief of the Northeast Fisheries Science Center.

Shellfishing is a $30 million industry in Connecticut, and Connecticut’s senior senator wants to see more funding to study it.

Read the full story at WTNH

 

MASSACHUSETTS : Shellfish areas remain closed in New Bedford as city works to fix old sewage system

August 9, 2022 — When there is heavy rainfall — and sometimes when it’s dry — openings along New Bedford’s shoreline function as relief valves for the city’s old and overloaded sewer system, spewing into nearby waters a mixture of stormwater and untreated sewage from homes and businesses.

Some of these receiving waters contain beds where people recreationally or commercially harvest little necks, cherry stones and chowders — all types of quahogs.  But when the openings release enough effluent, those areas must temporarily close due to possible contamination.

The state department overseeing fisheries determined in 2020 that New Bedford’s closures due to releases into Clarks Cove and the outer harbor were no longer predictable or manageable, with some overflows going unreported by the city.

As a result, “conditionally approved” areas for shellfishing in those waters have been continuously closed since late 2019 to 2020. More than two years later, a staff member with the Massachusetts Division of Marine Fisheries (DMF) has expressed concern that these shellfishing areas in waters shared by New Bedford, Fairhaven and Dartmouth will be permanently closed due to the sewage releases.

“I am concerned that due to these issues FDA will require both areas be downgraded and reclassified to Prohibited,” wrote the state’s shellfish program manager Jeff Kennedy in a May memo to DMF Director Daniel McKiernan.

The city is engaged in a multi-year improvement plan, under a decree from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and laid out a plan to spend more than $260 million through at least 2036 to upgrade the system. As this work moves along, the city is still grappling with remediating problems created by old, costly-to-fix systems.

According to the EPA, sewage discharges are a “major problem” in the country and cause some bodies of water to remain unsafe for swimming and fishing, with the problem being “especially acute” in New England, where more than 100 communities are affected.

These openings, called combined sewer overflows (CSOs), have decreased in number since the 1990s, and consequently, the city through sewer separation efforts has reduced the amount of sewage outfall from an estimated 3.1 billion gallons in 1990 to about 183 million gallons in 2016, according to a city report.

It was further reduced to 181.9 million gallons from July 2020 through June 2021, according to a city spokesperson.

While the city’s work to improve the system has resulted in thousands of acres of previously closed shellfish areas opening, the affected areas currently closed are about 4,000 acres.

Read the full article at The New Bedford Light