Written by Phoebe Jekielek, Director of Programs and Research
Greetings from the Island!! We are missing the “normal” hustle and bustle of students, teachers, bird banders, first responders, visitors and the broader community as a whole out here on the Island. BUT, there is a lot that has been happening in the research and facilities worlds and we are still hustling. The scallops are still growing, on our farm and in the wild, and some of our research is helping to better understand how that looks in the wild population.
In Spring 2019, we received Maine Sea Grant Program Development funds to conduct a scallop tagging study in collaboration with Maine Department of Marine Resources. This tag-recapture study will improve area-specific growth rate models to inform and assess rotational management strategies and to specifically address DMR research priorities. This study will provide spatially explicit growth information, help identify areas for closures and enhancement, and shine light on the scale of movement, the potential for exchange of scallops between management areas, and potential size ranges at which scallops are less likely to disperse away from an enhanced area. Learn more about how Maine manages the wild scallop fishery here.
We worked with local wild scallop harvesters to identify ideal areas for collection around Hurricane Island and communicated with our local lobster fishing industry, the second largest in the state, to have as little impact on the benthos and surrounding lobster fishing activity. Once the scallops arrived on the Hurricane dock, we drilled a 0.8mm hole in the corner of the right hinge on the top side of the scallop shell using a Dremel tool with a tungsten carbide tip in a drill press. We then threaded a 0.6 mm wire with a labeled tag through this hole and recorded the tag number, shell height, and shell width. Each tag was printed with the tag number and DMR contact phone number.
We tagged and measured 800 scallops in the Lower Penobscot Bay rotational closed area and then redeployed them. The hope is that, when caught again during the scallop season in the Lower Penobscot Bay management area, the tag number, catch location, and shells will be returned to us by fishermen so that we can better understand scallop movement and growth in the rotational closed areas. The shells will be sent to DMR to record the same measurements, shell height and width, that we collected this Spring. We are growing 200 tagged scallops in our aquaculture site as a comparison for growth and to understand tag retention and mortality.
A very important part of this effort was working with local wild scallop harvesters and the local Vinalhaven community, it would not have been possible without their support, knowledge, and assistance. THANK YOU!! Now we just have to wait for 1.5 years, the next open scallop season in our rotational management area, to collect the rest of our data. Stay tuned!!
