Seafood CRC: safe spat rearing experiment

Funded Activity Summary

A FRDC funded University Sydney/EMAI project investigating the biological behaviour (epidemiology) of POMS has identified an additional need that falls outside its original project aims.

The recent incidence and subsequent loss of the industry in the Hawkesbury River, NSW also devastated test stock placed in the water by ASI. The industry must invest in all options to safeguard national production; breeding resistant oysters and alternate husbandry.
The objective of this project is to provide scientific evidence that water treatments can be applied to enable safe rearing of spat in holding tanks in a POMS affected area until the window of infection closes. There is evidence to suggest that a similar approach is used in the French oyster industry to cope with POMS.

The project objective is to treat water in land-based tanks holding spat to interrupt putative transmission mechanisms. If successful, this can be used by hatcheries to hold stock in safe rearing conditions adjacent to a potentially infected estuary until the window of infection closes, and then they will be stocked out into the estuary. This is of use for growers with leases in infected waters who require a method for rearing/conditioning hatchery spat on-shore from the time of receipt until it is safe to put them in the estuary. If POMS spreads to affected waters near hatcheries in Tasmania, they will also require a solution for safe spat production.

Objectives:
1. Confirmation of the efficacy of water treatments for maintaining viable spat during a POMS transmission season in an infected environment
2. Information to benefit commercial hatcheries to enable production of spat from eggs through highly susceptible larval stages, in the face of POMS
3. Information to benefit growers who receive spat from hatcheries during a POMS transmission season
4. Information which can be integrated with husbandry (growing height modifications) to reduce mortalities in adult oysters and enable production of C. gigas in the face of POMS
5. Information which can be used to plan trials on how spat might be grown to a specific size (as distinct from just maintained) during a POMS transmission season in an infected environment

Funded Activity Details

Start Date: 01-04-2013

End Date: 30-05-2014

Funding Scheme: Funding Scheme not available

Funding Amount: $16,731.86

Funder: Fisheries Research and Development Corporation

Research Topics

ANZSRC Field of Research (FoR)

There are no FoR codes available for this funding activity

ANZSRC Socio-Economic Objective (SEO)

There are no SEO codes available for this funding activity

Other Keywords

Aquaculture | Disease | Husbandry | Mortality | Safety | Water quality

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