Monitoring Bay Scallop Recruitment

Monitoring Bay Scallop Recruitment_5

Monitoring Bay Scallop Recruitment

Large bay scallop (Argopecten irradians) spat on the inside of a recruitment collector.

FWRI scientists continually monitor bay scallop spat recruitment in the Gulf of Mexico by deploying collectors. Recruitment collectors are composed of a citrus bag weighted to a concrete block and float-array. The citrus bags emulates seagrass which spat will attach to. These traps are switched out every 6-8 weeks and the number of spat are recorded.

Image Credit: FWC



FWC Facts:
Seagrasses occupy only 0.1 percent of the sea floor, yet are responsible for 12 percent of the organic carbon buried in the ocean, which helps reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide.

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