Tampa Tampa Bay Bucks Hatchery Searches for New Home

By Mary Kelley Hoppe

The Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) is searching for a new site on which to build a state-of-the-art marine fish hatchery to replace an aging facility at Port Manatee, which now needs the land for additional spoil material.

More than 4 million hatchery-reared redfish fingerlings (top left) were released into Tampa Bay from 2000 to 2004 as part of a state pilot project to evaluate stock enhancement methods. Releases won’Äôt be resumed until a new hatchery is constructed to replace the aging state facility (above) at Port Manatee.

One option is to relocate on site. ’ÄúWe’Äôre talking with them about using the uplands on our Hendry site, which may fit nicely into our environmental education plans,’Äù says George Isiminger, Port Manatee’Äôs director of engineering and environmental affairs. That might allow for joint-use facilities enabling public tours of the hatchery and nearby environmentally sensitive lands.

A final decision hinges on results of a site feasibility study due this summer. Meanwhile, research continues at the old hatchery as operations are consolidated to make room for spoil from port construction and maintenance dredging.

Construction of a new hatchery could take three years and cost between $8 and $15 million. The Florida Legislature allocated $2 million this year for site evaluation, planning and preliminary engineering.

Planners envision a high-performance production and research facility for multiple fish and invertebrate species, with both ponds and re-circulating tanks and an advanced filtration system to control water quality. The new technology offers several significant advantages over the present facility’Äôs pond-based system, which leaves fish vulnerable to predation and disease.

Indoor tanks with sophisticated water filtration and recycling systems will enable scientists to control water quality. ’ÄúSo if problems like come up like red tide we won’Äôt have to interrupt operations,’Äù says Luiz Barbieri, FWC’Äôs Marine Fisheries Program Administrator. Parasites and cataract disease wiped out a year’Äôs class of redfish at the current facility, which lacks such controls.

Researchers prepare to move an adult sturgeon raised at Mote Marine Lab’Äôs aquaculture park in Sarasota. The bottom feeders lose their teeth as juveniles.

The filtration systems work by removing large particulates before the water is sterilized with ozone and ultraviolet light. ’ÄúYou end up with a very thick sludge,’Äù organic material that someday be used as fertilizer for growing plants or for habitat enhancement, Barbieri says.

The technology will make it possible to raise more fish and grow them faster. Additionally, utilizing tanks with recirculating water systems will eventually eliminate the need to place saltwater hatcheries on the coast where land is costly and environmental impacts are greater.

A new facility, most likely on Tampa Bay, would be the hub of statewide network of saltwater hatcheries led by FWC in partnership with Mote Marine Laboratory and Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute. Both outfits currently operate hatcheries where they are conducting cutting-edge research ’Äì Mote, at a 200-acre aquaculture park in Sarasota, and Harbor Branch at a 60-acre facility in Ft. Pierce. While details have not been finalized, the partnership is likely to result in expanded operations at both sites, where new technologies are being tested.

’ÄúI see stock enhancement playing an important role in the marine fisheries recovery toolbox ’Äì but it’Äôs not a silver bullet or panacea,’Äù says Barbieri. ’ÄúA brand new facility will let us take major steps forward not only in stock enhancement but in research and development of alternative methodologies that help us do it in a responsible way.’Äù

Redfish stocking on hold

Redfish stocking in Tampa Bay has been at standstill since December 2004 when 400,000 fingerlings were released and won’Äôt be resumed until a new hatchery is constructed. Altogether, more than 4 million hatchery-reared reds have been released since the pilot project began in 2000.

Barbeiri says the delay isn’Äôt a setback, but a chance to monitor the success of recruits into the fishery. The pilot project was designed to evaluate stocking efforts and ideal size at release. Most of juvenile fish released have reached adult size, but so far only 200 hatchery reared fish have been found in sampling identified through fin clips and genetic tags.

While inch-long fish are relatively inexpensive to produce ’Äì roughly 10 cents apiece versus a dollar or more to rear six-inch four-month-old juveniles, the larger fish is 15 times likelier to survive. Still, rearing a combination of class sizes may be most cost-effective by allowing for year-round releases.

’ÄúAt this point we’Äôre still looking at which size is best for release,’Äù Barbieri says. ’ÄúAfter we get an answer to that, then we’Äôll start full-scale production,’Äù he adds, somewhere on the order of 5 to 10 million fish a year.

International Stock Enhancement Symposium Scheduled

The Third International Symposium on Stock Enhancement and Sea Ranching, sponsored by NOAA Fisheries Service, kicks off in Seattle Sept. 18-21 with a world-wide look at many of the challenges we face in Florida. Topics include the technologies and approaches needed to responsibily release hatcheryreared juveniles, and strategies to rebuild spawning biomass and overcome recruitment limitations. For more information, visit www.searanching.org.