NOAA Fisheries and the U.S. Department of Agriculture have opened a new center dedicated to improving oyster breeding in Milford, Connecticut, U.S.A.
“At a time when 75 to 85 percent of our seafood is imported, shellfish aquaculture provides our coastal communities with healthy local seafood and jobs,” NOAA Office of Aquaculture Director Danielle Blacklock said. “The Northeast Oyster Breeding Center is a significant investment to ensure the resiliency of American aquaculture.”
Located inside a renovated hatchery at NOAA Fisheries’ Milford Laboratory, the Northeast Oyster Breeding Center will use advanced breeding methods to develop new strains of eastern oysters that are more resistant to disease and changing environmental conditions.
“There’s a need for oysters that are resilient or tolerant to disease but also retain optimal performance across the Northeast’s oyster production environments,” Agricultural Research Service National Program Leader for Aquaculture Caird Rexroad III said. “More comprehensive information on oyster physiology and genes associated with important traits is needed to facilitate genetic improvement.”
The Milford Laboratory has been renovated to increase capacity and keep lines of oysters separate amid scientists’ efforts to conduct selective breeding. The Northeast Oyster Breeding Center also houses the first high-density flow-through larval culture system in North America and has two photobioreactors it can use to grow food for the oysters.
“The NOAA Fisheries Milford Lab is expanding on our 90-plus year heritage as innovators at the forefront of cultivating shellfish – from developing the Milford Method to breeding and growing shellfish in the 1950s to growing oysters in the first flow-through ultra-high-density larval system in the country,” Milford Laboratory Director Gary Wikfors said. “Our close collaboration with USDA Agricultural Research Service allows the breeding center to benefit from the unique expertise of both agencies.”
Scientists spawned the first generation of oysters in the renovated facility in April.
