March 20, 2013
Manatee Holdings' Gartley Point Aquaculture Hatchery in Royston will push through with its efforts to develop and implement an adaptive management plan for the coastal waters of British Columbia.
The plan in development is in consultation with the Federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) and Provincial Governments, as well as marine researchers.
According to Manatee Holdings president, Eric Gant, this season's scallop and geoduck clam brood stock have now been brought in and the two species have been successfully spawned. Once the animals reach sufficient size, they will be planted in regulated undersea land tenures around Savory, Texada, Cortes, and Marina Islands. The company has employed this same ecologically sound aquaculture management practice for more than 15 years.
While there are future plans to add other indigenous ocean species to the hatchery programme – including sea urchins, cockles, sea cucumbers and horse clams – this expansion of the programme is still subject to approval. Once underway, it will form part of an extensive marine animal research programme in cooperation with the UBC and Vancouver Island University.
"Our efforts have been instrumental in offsetting the detrimental impact that the local geoduck clam fishery is having on the natural stocks. The inherent problems with fisheries around the world are well known, and can be successfully offset with responsible aquaculture practices. What we are doing is vital to the future health of our coastal waters. Mindfully planting healthy geoduck clam seed into the substrate of the sub tidal areas along our shorelines ensures a genetically viable population, creates an organic heat sink that helps to offset the effects of global warming, and helps to offset pollution resulting from human activities."
Gant says he was initially motivated to create his system of food production because of what he witnessed in his home town farming district, where grain farmers and cattle ranchers had to destroy the natural ecology of the forest in order to intensively culture domestic animals and plants.
"This is getting worse, he says, as free-range cattle ranching (for example) switches to intensive feedlot systems. Manatee's Adaptive Management Programme, on the other hand, fits into the surrounding natural ecology of the ocean. Manatee Holdings has been lobbying with Ottawa for over 18 months, to get the DFO policy makers to understand that what we are doing is a morally and mentally mature transition from hunting to ranching the sea," concludes Gant.
