Native oyster spat (babies) try the Estuary as home

Twelve months ago to the day, the Port River Shellfish Restoration Project began trials with 312 native adult oysters, Ostrea angasi, to test if they would survive in the Port River.

Since the adults have done well, today we’ve deployed about 1000 spat from SARDI, weighing perhaps 40 gms in total. They have gone to 4 of our sites to grow out, including private pontoons in North Haven and the ASC.

The spat are housed in ‘baby baskets’ (fine mesh with sock inset) until they are large enough for larger mesh oyster baskets.