Tag Archives: Dana Morse
As Maine’s climate changes, scallop farming offers optimism
“One of the reasons we started farming scallops was because even though there’s a hesitancy for most people to admit it, there’s an awful lot of storms on the horizon for the lobster industry,” said Alex de Koning, of Bar Harbor-based mussel and oyster farm Acadia Aqua Farms. “It’s a tough nut to crack, but if you crack it, your potential benefits are just tremendous.”,, Marsden Brewer, owner of PenBay Farmed Scallops in Stonington, has been a commercial fisherman for most of his life. When his son, Bob, was in high school, Brewer worried about what the future would hold. Neither ground fishing nor lobstering seemed like a stable occupation,,, “I got tired of worrying about limitations,” he said. “I wanted to do something where I could maybe realize my potential.” >click to read< 13:11
Maine: Scallop farm first of its kind in local waters
Just about one year after father-and-son fishermen Marsden and Bob Brewer returned from Japan, where they learned new scallop-farming techniques firsthand, Bob Brewer was granted a 3.23 acre experimental aquaculture lease southwest of Andrews Island. It is the first scallop farm of its kind in Penobscot Bay. The Brewers can grow up to 200,000 Atlantic sea scallops using lantern nets, where mesh nets, each 10 floors deep, hang from a 600-foot longline. “It’s a big circular tube with floors,” Bob Brewer said. “They’re used in Japan. That’s where we learned how to do it.” click here to read the story 10:42
DMC to host a talk on fishing and farming of scallops in Maine
On Friday, July 7, Dana Morse will give a talk on scallops and their impact on Maine’s fishing and farming industry. The seminar will take place in Brooke Hall at the University of Maine’s Darling Marine Center beginning at 10:30 a.m. The event is free and open to the public, but registration is requested (by clicking here). The sea scallop is an important offshore commercial fishery that extends from Atlantic Canada to Virginia. The inshore fishery for scallops in Maine is a vital source of winter income for fishermen. Over the years, there have been many attempts to establish a scallop aquaculture industry in Maine. Through collaborative work with fishermen and scientists in Aomori Prefecture, Japan, scallops are en route to become a commercially viable option for producers. click here to read the story 08:50
