Baby Oysters

As the weather begins to change our Island Creek Shellfish Hatchery begins the arduous task of creating our shellfish babies. Our hatchery started up in early January, prepping to feed our adult studs and their millions of babies. We began growing small starter cultures of six algae species from around the world and have since progressed to large cultures to keep up with the demand.

We are still early in the New England hatchery season but are already caring for millions of oyster babies with clam babies on the way. They may only be a few days old but just like human babies they are needy, they require lots of healthy algae to eat and lots of well oxygenated water and nurturing people to clean up after them.

Soon they will be at the stage where in the wild they would find an oyster colony and attach themselves to it. Since clumps of oysters are less desirable we trick them to singularly setting and from then on they shoot up like bean stalks. Their deep cups and rough ridges become more apparent with each day.

 

–Elyce is our resident Algae Expert.

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