November 24, 2014 — Shellfish farming is not new but with federal waters opening up to aquaculture, it may play a bigger role in the future of New England’s seafood industry.
By the time the sun rose on a chilly November morning, Matthew Moretti and his two-man crew had steamed into Casco Bay, tying up alongside three square rafts bobbing in calm waters. Clambering onto the planks, they began hauling 35-foot ropes from the deep, each laden with hundreds of pounds of slate-gray mussels.
“Demand is huge for rope-grown mussel,” said Moretti, co-owner of Wild Ocean Aquaculture, which grows and sells the branded Bangs Island Mussels. “It’s way bigger than we have been able to fill.”
Moretti’s business represents what marine biologists, federal officials, and some fishermen say may be the future of New England’s seafood industry, one that increasingly raises, rather than catches, shellfish and finfish. With the appetite for seafood growing, even as regulators impose tighter catch limits, researchers and policy makers are looking for ways to expand aquaculture and tap into a growing global market for seafood.
Read the full story from The Boston Globe