Apalachicola Bay
System Initiative

Seawater and air systems ensure all animals have access to clean, filtered water constantly, and the hatchery staff grows all the food for the animals in house! Hatchery technicians culture between 4-7 species of microalgae to feed any larvae, spat, or broodstock housed in the hatchery. Algae is cultured in a climate-controlled space. The algae culture is the base of nearly all hatchery operations, making sure any animal in the hatchery has high quality food to eat.

The hatchery is capable of caring for all stages of oysters throughout their life cycle. The broodstock (adult animals used to spawn) are kept in a climate-controlled room. Adults are cared for and fed daily by technicians.

The hatchery is capable for caring for millions of larvae at a time, in fact a single larval tank can hold up to 8 million larvae at a time! Larvae get water changes daily to remove waste that has accumulated in the water, and they also get fed the cultured microalgae every day.

Once metamorphosed into spat, the hatchery can house spat-on-shell or single set spat (used for experiments) in tanks, tables, and bottles. Once again, the systems are cleaned and provided food daily.

Once animals are too big to be housed in the hatchery or broodstock are used for spawns, they can be housed on lease spaces, if not being put into the field. The leases are open water farm spaces, and animals are held in floating aquaculture bags.