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Abalone Coast Watch Forum
Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre
February 27 to March 1, 2007
Opening
Night
Main
Page | Opening
Night | Participants
Intoductions
Interview
Excercise | Forum
Outcomes | Forum
Evaluations
The
Abalone Coast Watch Forum started in the evening of February 27th.
Anne Stewart, Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre (BMSC),
made introductory comments and introduced the speakers. John Richards,
president of the Bamfield Huu-ay-aht Community Abalone Project (BHCAP),
gave the keynote address. Tom Bird, Scientific Diving Officer at BMSC
talked about the success of abalone out-planting in Barkley Sound.
The evening’s finale was an abalone “night-show” starring
the nocturnal abalone. John Richards started his keynote address with
background on how abalone landed on the Threatened species list and
how that led to the establishment of BHCAP.
In
2001 BHCAP was established as a non-profit society with three diverse
partner organizations: Bamfield Marine Sciences Centre, Huu-ay-aht
First Nation and the Bamfield Community School Association. The
strengths of
each of these organizations are what made BHCAP a success. BHCAP
first started with an 18-month permit by DFO to establish an abalone
hatchery
in 2001 as part of DFO’s abalone recovery strategy plan. After
the initial permit expired, DFO issued the BHCAP a five-year permit
to continue on with the project. BHCAP has accomplished a lot in
those five
years:
- Completed
wild abalone inventory and brood-stock population assessments under
the supervision of DFO
- Collected,
tagged and contributed DNA samples from all brood-stock adults
to DFO
- Conditioned
brood-stock adults
- Successfully
spawned abalone
- Raised
larvae through metamorphosis and through to sexual maturity
- Learned
the techniques and skills needed to run an abalone hatchery
- Developed
the techniques for out-planting abalone to the wild
- Responsible
for successfully out-planting millions of larvae and thousands
of juveniles into Barkley Sound.
The
aquaculture operation has had a few financial struggles but has
persisted and grown stronger over the years.
It is now a
leader in
Canada, and
abroad, in Pinto Abalone culture and out-planting.
Today, BHCAP is starting to sell some of their
abalone to restaurants,
evaluate
out-planting
success,
working at setting up kelp farms to maintain
natural abalone feed needs, and continue to spawn and raise
abalone. Currently,
BHCAP
is looking
for ways in which they can produce abalone seed
for out-planting along the west coast of BC to help rebuild
natural abalone
stocks. Many coastal
communities are interested in out-planting abalone
in their areas along the BC coast.
James
Mortimer, BMSC’s previous dive officer,
began the abalone surveys and out-planting
of both larvae and juvenile abalone for BHCAP,
and Tom Bird has picked up where James left
off. Tom is now involved in assessing the success of
out-planting in Barkley Sound. In 2001, BHCAP
conducted abalone surveys in many areas of
Barkley Sound. They have since continued to survey these
areas and train divers in abalone survey and
recognition techniques. In 2003, BHCAP started
out-planting both larvae and juveniles. There
have been millions of larvae out-planted during
2003 and 2004. This past December, Tom Bird,
and volunteer divers, surveyed the out-planting site
to determine population numbers and size classes.
They found 409 abalone in the 3-4mm size range;
they had never seen this
many small juvenile abalone before. Abalone
that are 1-3 year olds are about 3-20mm in size. The
results of the out-planting survey show an
increased number of juveniles in this size
range, which are more than likely abalone that were released
as larvae 2-3 years ago. Tom has plans
to do more surveys and out-planting in Barkley
Sound, and hopes to do some genetic testing
to determine the origin of the juveniles.
To
finish off the first evening of the Abalone
Coast Watch Forum, John Richards led the
entire group on
an abalone “night show.” Flashlights
in hand, we all followed John down to the hatchery
to view the juvenile abalone coming out of
hiding to feed; abalone tend to be most active
and visible at night. Michelle Van Boven showed
participants around and explained how the hatchery
worked. Many of the participants were very
interested in finding out about the hatchery
and
how BHCAP was raising their abalone. Everyone
left the hatchery inspired and looking forward
to the events of the next day.
Main
Page | Opening
Night | Participants
Intoductions
Interview
Excercise | Forum
Outcomes | Forum
Evaluations
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