Ideally, you will return them to CBF in late spring/early summer. These big, nine-month-old oysters have a greater chance of surviving once they are planted on sanctuary reefs than they would if we simply took them right from the hatchery and planted them.Īfter nine months of growing your oysters, you return them to CBF for planting on sanctuary oyster reefs. Keeping oysters in cages allows them maximum exposure to oxygen and plankton, which means they will grow faster than they would in their natural habitat on the Bay bottom. You then tend these oysters for about nine months. New gardeners are required to attend a training session, from which you will leave with everything you need to grow oysters, including cages and about 1,000 to 2,000 spat (baby oysters). Once grown, the adult oysters are returned to the Chesapeake Bay Foundation for planting on sanctuary reefs. The Chesapeake Bay Foundation's oyster gardening program gives people the opportunity to help bring back this vital species by growing oysters alongside their docks. Unfortunately, though, today's oyster population is a fraction of its original level. They also provide essential habitat for fish and other Bay creatures. Oysters are the Chesapeake Bay's best natural filters. Can you give me a quick overview of how the oyster gardening program works?Ī. We will catchup with Goetsch and Viens again to follow the oysters as they are relocated to offshore beds in November to finish their growth.Q. The oysters we visited a month ago have already grown an additional inch and will soon be relocated to larger oyster beds elsewhere in the Long Island Sound. Oyster growth: July (left) to August (right) The tumbler is not only used to break excess cement off of the oysters, it is also used to clean the oysters that are in the process of growing. Viens utilizes a large stainless metal tumbler, to clean the oysters and remove excess cement. Once the oysters have been removed from the hats, any remaining cement is removed. Since the plastic disc itself is flexible, the cement and oysters fall off easily. The hat is then held over a box or tarp and tapped to remove the baby oysters. After the oyster spat have had time to attach to the hats and settle, they are removed from the water. In the Bridgeport area, oysters will begin mating naturally in late August once the water reaches a certain temperature. The oyster spat is being produced from young oysters a short distance away upriver. Viens was the first one to do it in 2015 and now other companies are looking into utilizing this process as well.Ī close look at the cement covered plastic discs Viens has been pioneering this oyster farming method along the Yellow Mill. This farming process is not only new to Bridgeport, but also new to Connecticut. Goetsch and Viens both use this method however, the hats at this Bridgeport location belong exclusively to Viens. As the tide rises the hats will become completely submerged under water. Then 20 cement coated hats slide right over the rod already in the water. Once a spot is chosen for planting, a 4ft long half inch diameter metal rod is tapped into the ground. After this process is completed the hats must be left to dry for about two days. Once the hats are coated in cement they are shaken to remove any excess cement. The hats are coated with a cement-like mixture that oyster spat latches on to. This season, Viens expects about 2 million offspring to attach themselves to the hundreds of hats deployed in the Yellow Mill Channel. From there, oysters are put in an upweller, which is a floating dock circulating water to bins full of young oysters to ensure consistent feeding. These hats are the base onto which naturally spawning oyster larvae commonly called “spat”, attach themselves. These stacked discs, named for their unique shape, are often called “Chinese Hats”. More than a month later on a warm August morning, the tide of the Yellow Mill Channel slowly rises over hundreds of plastic discs embedded within the floor of the river. displayed the two million young oysters that were being grown on a dock on the Yellow Mill Channel and discussed the economic and environmental benefits of oyster farming in Bridgeport. In July, Oyster farmers Charles Viens of Charles Island Oyster Farm L.L.C and Ben Goetsch of Briarpatch Enterprises Inc. Part 2 of a series following the growth of an oyster
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