The consortium \u2013 which comprises the University of Stirling\u2019s Institute of Aquaculture, Fassfern Mussels, the Scottish Shellfish Marketing Group, The Fishmongers\u2019 Company, the Association of Scottish Shellfish Growers, and the Sustainable Aquaculture Innovation Centre (SAIC) \u2013 will trial different conditions among varying species at two Scottish sites to find out whether shell strength is related to genetics, environmental conditions or the harvesting process itself.<\/p>\n
In Scotland, shell breakage is estimated to cost the sector around 2% of its average annual output. In extreme cases, it can prevent farmers from harvesting or cause sites to shut down completely.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe mussel sector is a growing part of Scotland\u2019s aquaculture landscape, providing sustainable jobs in rural and remote communities,\u201d said Heather Jones, chief executive at SAIC.<\/p>\n
\u201cShell breakage is among the biggest challenges to its growth and tools that can better inform how the sector grows mussels, selects sites and undertakes harvesting will be invaluable in supporting development.<\/p>\n
Depending on the results of the initial phase of the study, the project could develop a molecular tool that will assess juvenile mussels for shell strength, a location screening system for mussel farms, or a new process for harvesting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Aquaculture researchers in Scotland are trying to determine the cause of shell breakage in different species of mussels, one of the biggest challenges facing the sector.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5958,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"sponsor":[],"class_list":["post-5957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aquaculture"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5957"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5957\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5959,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5957\/revisions\/5959"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5957"},{"taxonomy":"sponsor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.worldfishing.net\/icefish-conference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/sponsor?post=5957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}