Attendance: Joe Buttner, Ted Coates, Bob Deresiewicz, Richard Delaney, Cliff Goudey, Harlyn Halvorson, Rollin Johnson, Deirdre Kimball, Dale Leavett, Chantal Lefebure, Curtis Olson, Jack Pearce, Fernando Quezada, Ken Riaf, Scott Soares, Richard Taylor, Alison Thibodeau, and Jack Wiggen

Greetings Dr. Harlyn Halvorson welcomed the group to Univ. Mass. Boston which gives us an opportunity to meet some of the scientists here that will play an increasing role in the sea scallop aquaculture efforts. He acknowledged the presence for the first time of Dr. Joe Buttner, Director of the Northeastern Massachusetts Aquaculture Center and also thanked Dr. Olson for ECOS Department, U Mass Boston, for hosting this meeting.

Graduate School of Marine Studies and Technologies Dr. Curtis Olsen, the new Chair ECOS Department, received his Ph.D. from Columbia University where he worked on the estuary in New York harbor. He then went to Oak Ridge National laboratory where he was using biogeochemical tracers to study linkages between rainfall, watersheds and coastal oceans. He then spent 10 years in Wash. DC mostly with the Dept. of Energy where he managed the Ocean Research Program. The last years were spent with NOAA assisting developing synergy between the scientific projects and Coastal Zone Management. Two of the projects, of interest here, dealt with coastal eutrophication and marine GIS. He was particularly attracted to the interdisciplinary nature of ECOS. He described the background, capabilities and activities of the ECOS staff. He noted the parallel interests between ECOS and SSWG. He then went on to describe the President of U Mass initiative to develop a Graduate School of Marine Studies and Technologies across the Univ. Mass. campuses. This program will share expertise and facilities as well as develop cooperative programs. Some of the details are now being worked out. Students will be trained in the scientific, economic, legal and social areas that are required to solve our environmental problems in the coastal zone.

Political and Regulatory Jurisdiction - Mr. Jack Wiggen, Urban Harbors Institute, U. Mass. Boston, stressed the need to address the political and regulatory jurisdictions associated with sea scallop aquaculture in open water. To support SSWG they have begun to compile the political jurisdictions and the regulatory jurisdictions relating to fishing, shipping lanes, etc. that might become relevant to siting an aquaculture area off shore. Their first task has been to file data (DMF, Fish & Wildlife, etc.) that is available through one single GIS data base. The second task is to compile the relevant rules and regulations. The questions he posed were: 1) From your experience what are the problem areas we should be talking about? 2) Of all the things we are going to map, what are those that would be most important in answering the questions?

Beginning with the political boundaries, UHI has taken the federal jurisdictional boundaries, the state jurisdictional boundaries, and the municipal boundaries. From the previous SSWG meeting, the Cape Cod Bay area was one in which there is some confusion. Especially the difference between municipal and state boundaries. In terms of regulatory jurisdiction involving fisheries, we have obtained some information from some existing maps. Jack Wiggin displayed a map which contained this information. He explained that part of the difficulty is getting from the agency the information they have accumulated. DMF produced the map for them. The mobile gear areas and some of the other regulatory restrictions were included. A lot of the information we need to get is not immediately forthcoming. Accuracy has to be examined and purposes for need of the data have to be prepared. Next we need to determine what are the questions in terms of political jurisdictions and what are the aspects of the fisheries jurisdictions that are important, that people have questions about, and relevant to where we want to go with this group? Richard Taylor inquired about the controversy regarding the gambling ship. Where does the three mile line go? Is this state or federal waters? He recalled that Jim Fair said that the towns were the first layer of permitting. In Cape Cod Bay , there is a considerable area, which is under the jurisdiction of the state for fishing purposes, yet the state has no ability to issue aquaculture permits. There is another area outside Glouchester. Jack Wiggin replied that that issue had not been settled.

Richard Taylor reported that two weeks ago he went to the Farm Bureau , who has a lobbyist in the state house, and urged them to change the law to empower DMF to grant licenses. Dale Leavitt agreed and stated he had an appointment as well to discuss this. DMF has some authority under the scientific permit. Jack Wiggin inquired if there was any desire by the towns to extend their jurisdiction in Cape Cod Bay? Dale Leavitt said from talking to shellfish constables all over the cape, they do not have the support or ability to patrol beyond the town harbors. the last thing they want is a requirement to patrol further. They would prefer that the state assume this responsibility. Harlyn Halvorson asked where does the legal authority lie. Jack Wiggin responded that the Supreme Court action determined the lines of authority. Richard Taylor noted that the next step in the scallop amendment plan is to move scallops from federal waters into this area. The one issue will be water quality. Jack Wiggin noted that there was an area of critical habitat in Cape Cod Bay. Does this represent a barrier? Dale Leavitt said that his proposal was to do bottom ranching - so that there would not be any lines in the water column. Cliff Goudey said that there would only be marker buoys and did not think that this would be a problem. Scott Soares reported that there is a problem with sea grasses near shore that the Army Corps of Engineers was working on in cooperation with DMF. Richard Taylor said that USGS in Woods Hole has by far the most extensive contour data available. Jack Wiggen promised to add the new information desired, including contours, and to come up with another version of the map for distribution. If anyone wants information they can contact us at UHI.

ECOS Shuttle Dr. Bernie Gardner described the ECOS shuttle that he developed together with Bob Chen, an organic geochemist specialist in ECOS. Although designed for measurements of pollutants, it may serve a role to locate sea scallop spat in the water column. This is a vehicle that allows standard oceanographic instruments to be deployed in measurements in the upper 50 meters of the water column. It provides instant data as well as delivering constantly water samples back to the ship. Depending on the instruments it can do biology and chemistry. It has fluorimetry at various wave lengths, measures temperature and depth. It is also designed to be deployable in shallow areas as 5 meters. Regarding fluorescence instrumentation, one measures chlorophyll in the water, another is a UV excitation emmission flurometer that measures dissolved organic matter, and a third is a higher UV excitation emission to look for hydrocarbons. The three of these work reasonably well. The primary instrumentation is a Seaburg CDC . It is easy to unplug one sensor and plug in another. Also attached is a backscatter which has a 25 cm tranmissometer. The shuttle is a new one designed in England basically as a flat wing. It contains en elevator in the aft end with a computer so that you can give it instructions. It automatically flies between 5 and 30 meters. The shuttle space is very efficient. A half inch cable is attached to the Shuttle which contains wires and a small Teflon tube for returning water samples to the boat. The shuttle has both an external and an internal pump for delivering the water samples. The system works very well, the only problem has been the noise from the pump. The Shuttle was first used last year to assay Boston Harbor, next Chesapeake Bay and most recently San Diego Harbor. Bernie Gardner reviewed the two and three dimensional data collected from Boston Harbor and identified several peak areas of hydrocarbons were identified.

Dr. Gardner then asked for parameters which could be helpful in modifying the Shuttle to identify sea scallop spat. Dale Leavitt referred to the pioneering work of Dr. Scott Gallagher of WHOI, using diffraction patterns with polarized light to identify larvae. Gardner thought that unless there was a bandwith problem, the hydrocarbon flurometers could be replaced with an instrument (scallop specific VPR) to measure the diffraction pattern from the spat. The latter would have to be developed with possibly fiber optics to the boat for continuous measurements. Richard Taylor has been in contact with Scott Gallagher, who expressed interest. Harlyn Halvorson reported that Hydros, Inc of Falmouth has developed an immunofluorescent assay with antibodies against sea scallop. The assay takes about 15 minutes and can use samples delivered from the Shuttle pump to the boat. The feasibility and specificity of this assay has yet to be tested. Samples could be saved for confirmation from DNA sequence analysis. Dale Leavitt reported that many people have attempted to develop specific probes for bivalve larvae without success. Any immunofloresent probe used in this survey will have to be tested for specificity.

Mass. State Initiatives Mr. Scott Soares, Mass. Aquaculture Coordinator briefly reviewed the creation of his office following adoption of the White Paper for Aquaculture in Mass, and the interaction he has established with different state agencies. Regarding the 2000-year state budget, funds for aquaculture are scattered over a number of different agencies. Food & Agriculture: level funding at $140,000. Also included in the overall F&A budget is an earmark for $20,000 for shellfish propagation project in Westport: DMF $50,000 for shellfish propagation on Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket. The House version of the budget includes $100,000 for shellfish propagation in Barnstable County to be administered through SEMAC: This item is not in the Senate version of the budget. Office of Labor and Workforce Development, has $8,000 for state programs for continuation of the aquaculture development program. In the bond cap for Executive Office of Environmental Affairs, there is $300,000 for the three Aquaculture Centers. The total state budget is about $608,000 for aquaculture, about half will be administrated through F&A.

Last year the state budget had $130,00 for an aquaculture grants program. Scott Soares described the support for shellfish propagation and the development of upwellers for this rapidly growing industry. On the bond side, funds are still available for aquaculture support. Funds were obtained from the Mass Economic Development. Office to support an interactive Web site which will assist online trading of fish and shellfish products. In May a Memorandum of Understanding was reached with the three Aquaculture Centers. This will be revisited in the fall and the Mass. Farm Bureau wishes to become a signatory to that agreement. We are reactivating the Farm Land Advisory Committee, developed as a result of legislation in 1994 (revised Wetlands Protection Act which put new requirements into Chapter 131), that allow for no maintenance exemptions for improvement of aquaculture. A six-page regulation prepared by DEP was pulled off the table when the Rivers Act was approved. Scott Soares intends to revisit this on June 24th.

Southeastern Mass Aquaculture Center Dr. Dale Leavitt stated that SEMAC is just finishing their mini grant program. Two sea scallop projects were included: a small grant to SSWG and another to support the Seasted Project. There are several RFP's. One is to determine the feasibility of a shellfish hatchery on Cape Cod. SEMAC has agreement with the townson Cape Cod to order their seed together. They have an outstanding order for 14 M quahogs. The other RFP is to contract with someone to work with the shellfish industry to develop best management practices. This project is to address some of the resistance's to the industry due to existing practices. SEMAC recently held a bay scallop summit that highlighted the potential of this industry but also pointed out the low stocks available. They are looking at techniques for developing a critical mass. From this they published a review paper on current strategies for bay scallops.

Northeastern Mass Aquaculture Center Dr. Joe Buttner described their new facilities in the former Marine Fisheries Lab. It is a 16 acre site which has undergone renovation and an 8 acre tidal pool which we can control water flow. There is a residual populationin the tidal pool dominated by hard clams and oysters. We surveyed it 3 or 4 times by diving. Adjacent to this is a 5400 sq. ft. wet lab which contains 36 tanks. However the water inflow system is problematic. He invited everyone to come to Salem State to see the facility. The institution is a 4 year college primarily interested in education. While they do not have a graduate program they will focus on training people. In addition the laboratory will provide space for some brood stock. We have finfish and some shellfish. NEMAC also has some freshwater fish for high school projects of integrating aquaculture into the classrooms. The center has 3 small grants - some of this from industry. One of the fish models they are exploring is perch; other species include talapia and some marine fish. The efforts are primarily outreach. NEMAC works closely with the Glouchester community. to use aquaculture as a science teaching tool.

Summit Blueprint Review Dr. Rollin Johnson commented that the current draft is a very useful compendium of the background to this industry, the experiences to date, and includes the recommendations of SSWG. He first asked the various authors to check the accuracy of their own contributions. In some cases the text was derived from the tapes. Our main task is to put together the final recommendations. He brought a more recent set of revised recommendations which incorporated suggestions at our last SSWG meeting. At this meeting Ron Smolowitz suggested that we focus a recommendation on rotational farming. "To promote the regulatory, technical, siting and research capability, to launch the demonstration of spat collection, seeding of the ocean floor, and rotational farming, of sea scallops in state waters with associated social and ecological analysis." Comments and suggestions were invited. It was suggested in the preamble that we avoid the use of technical terms that the public would not understand. Dale Leavitt suggested instead of referring to closed areas we speak of state waters. Cliff Goudey, noting that Seasted was in Federal Waters, thought we should not restrict recommendations to state waters. This could be accomplished by adding "in state and federal waters". There was some discussion about the motive for issuing the Blueprint. It was agreed that the motive of SSWG was to promote the industry in a general way not just to raise funds. Richard Taylor reminded us that through the council action there was a set aside of funds for aquaculture (including a scallop research fund) from the days at sea. This amounts to 1% which s a considerable amount of support - about $1 M per year. Spat removal was among the opportunities discussed. It was agreed to include this among the recommendations. Rich Taylor said we should support the actions of the Council in this regard. Cliff Goudey agreed to draft a revised version of recommendation #5 and to check this with the Council.

Rollin Johnson distributed the SSWG recommendations for action 1999 (Appendix A).
Support, Jurisdiction, and Demonstration Recommendations. This included 13 recommendations. from our last meeting. #1. There was a broad discussion regarding focus on state or federal actions. Rollin agreed to redraft along the points discussed. #2. This was a summation of recommendations in the first draft. It was agreed to remove the word bias, as the membership of the Council represents many interests, and rephrase this in a more positive tone. At the previous meeting it was agreed to offer to the Council SSWG assistance in writing an amendment in which these various items would be raised. Cliff Goudey expressed the view that the Council does not have the funds to support that effort but would probably be supportive of our request. This could be accomplished by including this in #1. We should be more specific about the audiences for the workshops. The remaining phrases in #2 were agreed to. #3. There was strong support for this. #5. Agreed. #6 Describe as unifying concept. #7 Include catastrophic compensation and crop insurance. A separate recommendation for each was suggested. #8 Permission to harvest seed from federal waters: It was suggested that this recommendation be included as part of #4. It was agreed that this was an important issue. #11 User conflict issues. #12 We should assemble what we already have in information regarding sea scallops. #13 FMC reference had to do with help in writing the amendment itself. The Fisheries Survival is an industry group in New Bedford. Both of these organizations were considered as supporting the writing of the amendment. Concern was expressed that current support is primarily for short term activities; there remains need to collect further studies on the life cycle, etc. Technical recommendations. #1 accepted. #2 Idea was to characterize the food resources. Change language to encourage NFMS to continue and expand this monitoring. #3-#5. Accepted #6 Change to efficiently and carefully harvested with minimal impact. #7 . Areas for economic research. #1- #2. OK. #3 Need to rewrite for clarity. #4. Reclarify .

Next Meeting - It was agreed not to hold a meeting during the summer, but to delay this to September. Notice of the date will be sent later.