Resources Database

Reviews business management skills, such as finance, record keeping, marketing, and personnel management. More aquaculture businesses fail because of poor management than poor production practices.

This brochure explains the benefits of shellfish aquaculture for the environment including improving water quality, increasing species diversity, removing excess nitrogen, and not needing fertilizers, chemicals, or antibiotics.

Webinar about research on scallop aquaculture production and economics including comparisons of nursery and growout gear: lantern nets, pearl nets, ear hanging, pocket nets, rigid trays, and adhesives; tissue sampling and testing for biotoxins such as saxitoxin and domoic acid; evaluation of fouling communities; surveys of producers to understand economic inputs and outputs such as capital, labor, and yield; environmental data matched with growth data to better understand good scallop-farming sites.

Lists all upcoming aquaculture public meetings, hearings, and scoping sessions and give the date, time, town and location for them.

A variety of tenacious myths critical of marine aquaculture practiced in the United States have persisted for decades to be presented as facts to the public and Congress. The reality is U.S. fish and shellfish farmers culture aquatic animals and plants within a very complicated and expensive legal, regulatory, husbandry, and science-driven environment. We believe critics are unfamiliar with this environment or have erroneously assumed marine aquaculture-related environmental damage reported in other countries occurs in the United States.

The Maine Aquaculture Association has released the first Maine Aquaculture Occupational Standards, which specify the current workforce skills and training needs of Maine’s aquaculture sector. Altogether, four standards have been released, focusing on occupations related to (1) Marine Shellfish and Sea Vegetables; (2) Marine Finfish; (3) Land-Based RAS; and (4) Land-Based Shellfish Hatcheries. A supplementary document, the Maine Shellfish Aquaculture Career Pathways Map, is designed to provide an overview of the most common job types, entry points, and career pathway opportunities in Maine’s shellfish aquaculture sector today.

University of Maine System (UMS) micro-credential offers professional development opportunities that result in a verified micro-credential for those who want to update their aquaculture skillset. Coordinated by the Aquaculture Research Institute, this pathway will use the University of Maine System’s extensive aquaculture resources and educational expertise to create hands-on learning experiences.

Oyster aquaculture, like any agriculture operation, has inherent risks with perils beyond growers’ control. However, coastal waters present challenges for oyster farmers in the form of tropical storms and hurricanes.

Free online entry-level oyster farm worker Certificate course. Do all 16 modules to pursue farmhand certification, or simply watch and browse to get a better sense of the industry. Instructors include East Coast Shellfish Growers Association's Dr. Bob Rheault, and amazing farmers Matt Behan, John and Cindy West, and David Roebuck.

In September 2023 the ECSGA updated its 2010 Best Management Practices manual. Building on the 2010 version, this update adds a new section on the management and handling of floating gear, hundreds of embedded links, info on new gear types and a revised bibliography. ECSGA also completely revamped the tool to create your own farm-specific Best Practices document: the Best Practices Form.

In depth document created to provide the information and a framework that will enable a shellfish farmer to write a comprehensive Best Management Practices document focusing on gear/operation and maintenance, user conflicts, permitting/siting, and environmental concerns.

Discusses what marketing is and why it is important including developing a marketing plan, market outlets, and personalizing the products and the business.

A look at the individual Maine farmers who make a living in the growing industry of Aquaculture.

In depth review of sea scallop biology, spat collection, nursery, grow out, gear, husbandry, site selection economic considerations and biotoxins/public health.

This report is based on the research priorities survey conducted in June 2019 of Maine’s aquaculture community and is compared with surveys from 2012 and 2016 to look at trends. There have been some changes in the prioritization of needs since 2016, but many of the same research, development, and education (R&D&E) needs persist and remain unaddressed. As expected, there are different R&D&E priorities for different aquaculture sectors.

In-depth paper on the implementation of the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

Earn a Certificate in Coastal Fisheries & Marine Technology with added industry recognized credentials such as PADI Diver Certification, OUPV Captain's License and ABYC Certifications for free.

This project aimed to identify a gear coating that deters and mitigates predation by oyster drills (Urosalpinx cinerea) and starfish (Asterias rubens) on aquaculture eastern oysters. Identifying potential strategies to mitigate starfish and oyster drill snail predation on eastern oysters could increase oyster survival, which would increase yield and revenue.

Maine Aquaculture Innovation Center, in collaboration with The World Wildlife Fund, is on a mission to get educational resources about seaweed aquaculture into Maine’s 5th-grade classrooms. During the summer and fall of 2023, we will distribute With a Little Kelp from Our Friends– a book on the secret life of seaweed written by Mathew Bate and illustrated by Liz Rowland– to educators. The book will be accompanied by teacher resources to increase literacy about seaweed aquaculture.

Presentation on what was learned from Japan, the world leaders in scallop aquaculture, including lantern nets, spat bags, grading, washing, and recipes.

An ID guide to organisms commonly found in, on, and around oyster grow bags ​and other aquaculture equipment used in the Gulf of Maine and North Atlantic.

As part of an ongoing and productive relationship, a delegation from Maine visited the gear supplier Mutsu Kaden Tokki Co., Ltd. located in Aomori Prefecture, Japan. This video reviews the gear needed for the Japanese scallop aquaculture industry technique called 'ear-hanging'.