Shellfish research and restoration efforts nearby, formerly led by the University of Delaware and the Center for the Inland Bays, are gaining traction with new help.
Delaware State University officials plan to commit almost $300,000 over the next three years to expand shellfish research efforts and support the Center for the Inland Bays-sponsored oyster gardening program, a university official confirmed this week.
Through the center’s program, residents living along Sussex County’s inland bays grow young oysters, which are eventually planted on reefs and other hard surfaces in the bays. The program’s mission is to promote the ecological value of shellfish restoration here and prove oysters can survive in Delaware’s inland bay system.
Officials plan to use the United States Department of Agriculture grant funds to study — mostly through students who will be supported by the funds — the habitat on the reefs and in the floats citizens use to grow the oysters, and the potential habitat in nearby lagoons.
Funds will also be used to support additional education and outreach activities and to purchase additional supplies for the center’s program. Details on monetary support specifically earmarked for the gardening program are not yet available.
“I am really determined to move on my research program,” said Dr. Guilinhal Ozbay, a professor in Delaware State University’s Department of Agriculture and Natural Resources who has been working with program officials in the area for a couple months. “It is very important that we keep moving on these shellfish studies,” she said, adding that all funding will be allocated through the university. “They are very important. They are kind of the kidney of the rivers and bays.”
Officials working on the oyster-gardening program claim they are “improving habitat” and proving oysters can survive in nearby waters. No formal, detailed research yet supports those claims, however: Enter DelState.
The university’s goal, Ozbay said, is to add “a research component” to ongoing efforts.
“What is the habitat value of this Taylor float?” she asked. “What is the habitat value of the reefs? We want to expand (research) and select some of the gardening sites as study sites.”
The program would be an extension of a partnership between the CIB, DelState and John Ewart, a University of Delaware aquaculture specialist who helps run the gardening program. Patrick Erbland, a DelState graduate student, worked with program officials last year, researching oyster habitat.
“They want to direct the efforts into the work we’ve been doing. It’s a positive step,” Ewart said earlier. “The question is what do you get and how is it going to work? That’s what we’re working on right now.”
“It’s looking promising,” Center for the Inland Bays Executive Director Ed Lewandowski added.
Among other species, students and faculty in the university’s aquaculture center, an extension of the agriculture and natural resources department, study oysters and other shellfish, such as freshwater mussels, all of which have positive impacts on water quality and underwater habitat.
Scientists estimate that one full-grown oyster can filter 50 gallons of water each day. Like clams and shellfish, oysters feed on microscopic plants and suspended particles in the water, removing excess nutrients that lead to low oxygen levels, an unhealthy ecological environment and fish kills and improving water quality.
Submerged vegetation benefits from a healthy oyster population because more sunlight can reach a waterway’s floor and stimulate its growth.
Experts also call oysters a “keystone” species — the center of the bays’ underwater habitat. Oyster reefs provide a habitat for smaller species, such as worms and grass shrimp, which in turn support populations of crabs, fish and other, larger predators.
An $11,000 National Fish and Wildlife Grant in 2003 helped initiate the center’s program. It has since survived on a budget funded by Sussex County and Fenwick Island governments, the CIB and personal contributions. But that budget has not exceeded $15,000.
To have an overreaching impact on pollution or underwater habitat, the program would require a lot more help than even DelState could provide, officials have noted.
At least $2.75 million has been spent on restoration efforts in the Delaware Bay. In an even larger commitment, the State of Maryland spends about $5 million annually on oyster restoration but still has yet to see major improvements.
Disease, there and in the Delaware Inland Bays, is still a deterrent for growing oyster populations. Mainly because of that threat, shellfish have not yet been a part of any government-supported pollution control strategy and have been dismissed as not cost-effective.
Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control officials are currently attempting to approve an unprecedented Pollution Control Strategy to curb pollution in the Inland Bays. If approved, the PCS would regulate septic systems, buffer requirements and agricultural lands to reduce the daily nutrient input, which leads to low oxygen levels and an unhealthy underwater environment in the bays.