MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • December 12, 2021
The Basin Oyster Project aims to put shells back into the water as well as living oysters to live on top of them in order to kick-start all the beneficial ecosystem services offered by shellfish reefs. No one has yet tried oyster reef restoration this far north. From 2017-19, researchers with The Nature Conservancy set oyster spat (babies) on both tile and shells and placed them, unprotected by any supporting infrastructure, into the Basin. The results of those initial settlements were positive. That work proved oysters were viable in the Basin. But unprotected from predatory green crabs, the yield of mature oysters compared to the amount of spat set was very low. In 2020, about 30 collaborators started setting baby oysters on shell and growing them in the Basin in floating bags like those commercial oyster farmers use. The bags will protect them until they are larger and less susceptible to green crabs.