Supporting Oyster Aquaculture and Restoration.

A closer look at the efforts of The Nature Conservancy to provide COVID-relief for shellfish farmers.

By: PhD. Boze Hancock *

A few months ago, The Nature Conservancy announced the purchase of 5 million oysters from farmers affected by COVID-19 to use them in reef restoration initiatives in the U.S.

Now, in an exclusive follow-up news article Ph.D. Boze Hancock, Senior Marine Habitat Restoration Scientist at The Nature Conservancy, shares with us details of the SOAR project which hopes to restore 27 acres of reef and, based on a reference economic modeling from restoration sites in MD, also produce over US $1.5 million per year in increased fisheries landings alone. Without considering the jobs saved, economic stimulus, or the value of the other ecosystem services.

Imagining a COVID-relief fund for shellfish growers.

Soon after the pandemic hit the US in mid-March, with the massive impacts on restaurants and raw-bars, it was apparent that the shellfish growers had lost the majority of their market, pretty much overnight. In April Pew’s Aaron Kornbluth and I began discussing what COVID-relief for the shellfish growers might look like.

We have both been involved in restoring oyster reefs for the many benefits they provide. Oyster reefs produce huge amounts of extra fish and crabs for commercial and recreational fisheries and improve water quality by filtering water and removing a good deal of the excess nitrogen that causes algal blooms and dead zones.

Oysters in aquaculture gear have been shown to provide many of the same benefits, as well as providing thousands of jobs and taking pressure off the restored reefs by supplying the market with high quality oysters.

So it was immediately obvious that purchasing the excess farm oysters to go onto reef restoration sites was going to benefit everyone involved.

At that point, we were not sure where the funding might come from, perhaps relief from Congress, perhaps private funding, or a mix of both.

We also needed the help of the aquaculture experts, Robert Jones of The Nature Conservancy (TNC), NOAA, the shellfish growers associations, and state shellfish managers.

The Pacific Coast Shellfish Growers Association and Oyster South, the Shellfish Growers Climate Coalition, and particularly Bob Rheault of the East Coast Shellfish Growers Association have been very engaged from the start.

Chesapeake Bay 350t Barge starting deployment reef base. Photo credit: Boze Hancock.

Reef restoration project development.

What was obvious was that any program to purchase oysters from growers to go onto restoration sites would need an assessment of where the growers are located, compared to the reef restoration projects.

You can’t just move oysters anywhere. Any movement comes with the risk that some of the oysters may be carrying oyster diseases or introduced invasive species.

These ‘Biosecurity’ threats are the first consideration and need to be taken very seriously. Fortunately, we know a good deal about the diseases that affect oysters and the distribution of invasive species.

State shellfish managers have been dealing with the problems caused by introduced diseases for years, as have the biologists concerned with invasive species.

With this information in mind, the first task was to map out where the restoration sites were that could accept oysters and which growers are close enough to be allowed to move oysters to those sites.

Not all growers are close enough to a restoration site to be able to take part in the program but in states that have embraced oyster reef restoration, participation is available to all growers.

During the process of mapping out the potential for this marriage between the excess product from growers and reef restoration we worked closely with other groups involved in similar work, NOAA Aquaculture, Sea Grant, the NRCS program and Fisheries Commissions.

We feel very fortunate to have committed donors that are interested in providing COVID relief to oyster farmers and expanding marine restoration efforts that provided the philanthropic support to make this program possible.

Deploying oysters in Great Bay, NH. ©2020 Jerry and Marcy Monkman/EcoPhotography.

SOAR Program.

There are seven states involved in the SOAR program: ME, NH, MA, NY, NJ, MD and WA.

These states represent the intersection of grower needs that have not been addressed by other similar programs, donor interest, and restoration opportunity.

These states have the highest need to build breeding populations to provide the larvae to maintain restored reefs.

Establishing a reef restoration project can take time. Ensuring that the oysters will thrive at the chosen site and preparing the bottom so the oysters are up off the soft sediment or mobile sand is very important. As is engaging the whole community that has an interest in the area to be restored.

To be able to get COVID-19 relief to the growers quickly, it has been important to identify restoration projects that have the necessary permits and are operational.

Montauk, NY Farm-Red Vault Productions. ©2020 Jerry and Marcy Monkman/EcoPhotography.

The primary objective of the different restoration sites can vary but they generally include increased fish production, improved water quality, sediment stabilization and coastal protection.

There are a number of restoration projects across the range of states involved.

New Hampshire has several active projects and has tested the use of aquaculture oysters to increase the spawning potential of the reefs with good results.

In 2019, TNC New Hampshire purchased mature oysters from several of the state’s growers with excellent survival to the 2020 spawning season.

Maine doesn’t have an active restoration site, but New Hampshire has agreed to take product from areas of Maine that are not known disease areas and with testing for pathogens and invasive species.

MA has a limited number of restoration sites in the Buzzards Bay area so the growers in that area have access to the program.

The states further south have a better distribution of restoration sites with MD having a network of 51 sites in the state, including 5 tributaries with large restoration under the Chesapeake Bay Restoration Agreement.

The SOAR program hopes to restore 27 acres of reef. Based on the economic modeling from restoration sites in MD, that area of reef would produce over $1.5Million per year in increased fisheries landings alone (Knoche, S., Ihde, T., Townsend, H. and Samonte, G., 2018). Without considering the jobs saved, economic stimulus or the value of the other ecosystem services.

The logistics involved in harvesting 5 million oysters, establishing biosecurity protocols, transporting and deploying them to restoration sites involves considerable logistics.

An operation that would not be possible without the support of the many groups from state regulators, universities, growers, conservationists well beyond just Pew and TNC, and many more.

The good-will displayed to make the program a reality has been incredibly heartening.

Harvesting oysters for deployment to reef-GreatBay, NH. ©2020 Jerry and Marcy Monkman/EcoPhotography.

Foreseeing shellfish production and continuity of SOAR.

With COVID-19 relief programs like SOAR, and similar programs such as those run by the Department of Agriculture’s NRCS program in Rhode Island and Sea Grant in several states, we hope the growers survive the COVID-19 pandemic to the point where restaurants eventually re-open and the market recovers.

The SOAR program has also set aside approximately $1Million to start a Shellfish Growers Resiliency Program. A portion of these funds will be set aside for a small grant program to fund developments in the industry that will help buffer it from similar disruptions in the future.

Though we hope that we don’t see a global pandemic again anytime soon! These could include diversified markets and product lines, payment for ecosystem services, or other ideas brought to the program.

We will be working with NOAA, NRCS, and industry to develop priorities for this part of the program which is due to release the first request for proposals by March 2021.

The announcement will be advertised on the program web-site at www.nature.org/SOAR .

Oysters ready for deployment to restoration site. Little Bay, NH. ©2020 Jerry and Marcy Monkman/EcoPhotography.

Alternatives for restaurants and consumers.

There are options for anyone to help with both the aquaculture and restoration of our scarce oyster reefs.

Anyone who is missing our marine delicacies is encouraged to look online where oysters are available for direct delivery.

Raising the awareness of the value of shellfish reefs by talking about the importance of shellfish reefs in our coastal ecosystems is a huge benefit to the restoration work.

There are also volunteer opportunities with many of the coastal restoration projects, and when restaurants do re-open, look for those involved in recycling the oyster shells for restoration!

*Boze is the Senior Marine Habitat Restoration Scientist for TNC’s Global Oceans Team, based at the University of Rhode Island’s Graduate School of Oceanography. Boze has over 30 years of experience in marine research, working on the ecology, fisheries, management and restoration of coastal marine resources and habitats. Habitats of particular interest include shellfish and coral reefs, salt marsh, seagrass and mangroves with a particular emphasis on the restoration of reef habitats (shellfish and coral). Boze provides technical support to project managers and teams within TNC and partner organizations. He also helps provide the science to support and scale up marine habitat restoration.

Correspondence email: bhancock@tnc.org Editor’s note: references cited by the author in the article are available under previous request to our editorial team.