Animal husbandry – Aquatic animal culturing – Mollusk culturing
Patent
1994-10-31
1996-04-30
Manahan, Todd E.
Animal husbandry
Aquatic animal culturing
Mollusk culturing
119238, 119241, A01K 6100
Patent
active
055115144
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
TECHNICAL FIELD
This invention relates to the cultivation of shell fish, particularly shellfish such as scallops, oysters or the like which do not naturally produce means for securing themselves indefinitely to a suitable cultivation support means, and also shellfish such as mussels which do naturally produce means for indefinitely securing themselves to a suitable cultivation support means.
The term securement means as used herein should be interpreted as a means which is produced by a shellfish and is suitable for enabling the shellfish to be indefinitely and reliably secured to a cultivation support means for cultivation purposes. The term should not be interpreted to mean for example the cement gland of an oyster.
The term retaining means as used herein should be interpreted as a means suitable for retaining shellfish to a cultivation support means for a limited amount of time, whereby the retaining means is capable of being burst by the growing shellfish or is capable of degrading over time such that it is at least substantially wasted by the time the shellfish are of a harvestable size.
BACKGROUND ART
Various methods for the cultivation of scallops, oysters and other like shellfish are known in the art; see for example the disclosures of New Zealand Patent Specifications 164532, 165145 and 207152. Broadly speaking, these methods may be divided into two distinct groups, namely, those in which the shellfish are distributed loosely in baskets, cages, mesh floored trays or the like, and those in which each shell fish is secured to a suitable cultivation support means such as, for example, a culture rope or tarred stick. In conventional scallop or oyster farming, where the second of these cultivation methods is used, artificial retaining devices, such as plastic or metal pins, monofilament nylon, metal rings or chemical adhesive must be used to secure the growing shellfish to the culture rope or the like.
It will be appreciated that there are significant disadvantages inherent in each of the two above mentioned broadly stated methods of shellfish cultivation. Briefly, among the more obvious disadvantages is the high cost of equipment and/or labour in setting up and maintaining a shellfish farm which relies on any of these known methods of cultivation. For example, where the shellfish are loosely distributed in baskets or the like the capital outlay for equipment is high and the equipment requires on-going maintenance, further, the shellfish require frequent manual servicing in the form of respreading and removal of marine fouling organisms etc. While the capital cost of equipment may be lower for farms cultivating shellfish where the shellfish are secured to cultivation support means high labour costs are incurred in setting up the farming operation as each shellfish must be individually secured to the culture rope or the like.
DISCLOSURE OF INVENTION
Accordingly, in a first broad aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of cultivating shellfish, wherein the improvement comprises retaining a plurality of live juvenile shellfish on a cultivation support means by way of a retaining means, said plurality of shellfish comprising a first type of shellfish having the potential for producing securement means at a future date such that said first type of shellfish can become secured to said support means by said securement means, said plurality of shellfish also comprising a second type of shellfish not having the potential for producing securement means, wherein said second type of shellfish can become secured to said support means by way of said securement means when said securement means has been produced by said first type of shellfish.
In a further embodiment of the invention there is provided a method according to the immediately preceding paragraph wherein said plurality of shellfish are placed in a suitable cultivation medium after said plurality of shellfish have been retained in said support means by said retaining means, and said plurality of shellfish are allowed to grow such
REFERENCES:
patent: 3811411 (1974-05-01), Moeller
Hearn Bruce J.
Hitchins Michael W.
Jamieson Hamish T.
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