Oyster Restoration Raft Installed at Quogue Stewardship Site
Oyster Restoration Raft installed near the Post Lane Bridge in Quogue
Launching from a dock generously made available by one of our Quogue Stewardship community donors, site sponsor Andrew Lynch joined the team, lending his personal boat to help transfer the 24 trays of SOS into the Restoration Raft. These oysters will continue to feed on wild phytoplankton and filter the surrounding water.
Spat (baby oysters) growing on recycled shell
Our starting volume this season was 5.3 cubic feet (150 L) of recycled shell, supporting approximately 78,000 individual baby oysters at an average size of 7 mm.
We attached a temperature logger to one of the trays to continuously monitor the site conditions, and our Back to the Bays Aquaculture Specialist will return to collect additional data over the course of the growing season.
Of note is this year, we made the decision to spread a smaller volume of SOS among the 24 stacked trays to reduce weight and help improve survival and growth (compared to last year's raft grow out trial). Natural mortality will occur, leaving only the healthiest animals to thrive once planted at the reef site.
Read our next Quogue Blog to find out how our spat-on-shell are growing in the restoration raft!
On June 19th, a new round of spat-on-shell (SOS) oysters was installed in our Back to the Bays Restoration Raft in Quogue Village waters near the Post Lane Bridge. This is our second consecutive year partnering with Quogue Village, the Quogue Field Club, Quogue Association, and Hampton Jitney to support the growout of SOS oysters in our new Quogue Stewardship Site.
The naturally high current at this site encourages incredible growth for these oysters; hanging in trays under the raft, they for three-dimensional clusters that will be added to bolster the reef that was established in August 2024.
CCE staff Kate Rossi-Snook, Chris Pickerell, and Lorne Brousseau transported the SOS oysters to Quogue from our Southold Hatchery set tank, where they began as microscopic larvae.
Transporting the raft and SOS oysters from Southold Hatchery
Towing the raft into position using Andrew Lynch’s boat