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Final Report Beneficial Environmental Effects of Marine Finfish Mariculture

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Final Report Beneficial Environmental Effects of Marine Finfish Mariculture Final Report Beneficial Environmental Effects of Marine Finfish Mariculture Prepared for: NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service National Sea Grant College Program, Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research Washington D.C. NOAA Award # NA04OAR4170130 22 July 2007 J. E. Rensel1/ and J.R.M. Forster 2/ 1/ Rensel Associates Aquatic Sciences, Arlington, Washington 2/ Forster Consulting, Port Angeles, Washington Table of Contents Table of Contents ..................................................................................................................................... ii List of Figures ........................................................................................................................................... iii List of Tables ............................................................................................................................................ iv Executive summary ................................................................................................................................. 1 1. Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 3 Floating net pens regulation ............................................................................................................... 3 Finfish aquaculture ............................................................................................................................. 4 Fish farm habitat and biocolonization ................................................................................................ 6 Study Design Overview ....................................................................................................................... 7 2 Biocolonization at Net‐pen Farms: Literature Review ........................................................................ 7 3. Site Description ................................................................................................................................. 10 4. Methods ............................................................................................................................................ 12 Collection and transport methods .................................................................................................... 12 Floats ............................................................................................................................................ 12 Nets ............................................................................................................................................... 14 Lines .............................................................................................................................................. 14 Sample Transport and Processing ................................................................................................ 14 Colonization Assessment .................................................................................................................. 15 Analyses Methods ............................................................................................................................. 15 Stable isotope analysis methodology ........................................................................................... 15 Normalization ............................................................................................................................... 16 Elemental Mass Fraction .............................................................................................................. 16 Quality Control ............................................................................................................................. 16 5. Results of Standing Stock Assessment .............................................................................................. 17 Types and quantities of submerged substrate ................................................................................. 17 Overview of Species Assemblage ...................................................................................................... 18 Species list ......................................................................................................................................... 19 Biomass estimates ............................................................................................................................ 24 Standing Stock: Dominant species analyses ..................................................................................... 26 Floats ............................................................................................................................................ 26 Nets ............................................................................................................................................... 26 Lines .............................................................................................................................................. 30 Dominant Species Analyses Functional Grouping Analysis: Diversity............................................... 31 Dominant Species Characterization .................................................................................................. 33 Caprellids (skeleton shrimp) ......................................................................................................... 33 Amphipods .................................................................................................................................... 35 Anemones ..................................................................................................................................... 36 Ectopleura (Tubularia) marina (Pink‐top hydroid) ....................................................................... 37 Hiatella arctica (Nesting Clam) ..................................................................................................... 37 Alaria marginata (Ribbon or Winged Kelp) ................................................................................... 38 Costaria costata (Five Rib Kelp) .................................................................................................... 38 Beneficial Environmental Effects of Fish Farming ii Nereocystis luetkeana (Bull or Bullwhip Kelp) .............................................................................. 39 Ulva and Enteromorpha (Sea Lettuce) ......................................................................................... 40 Gobiesox maeandricus (Northern or Flathead Clingfish) ............................................................. 41 Sabellid Polychaete “Feather Duster” Worms .............................................................................. 41 Other Species ................................................................................................................................ 42 6. Colonization Study Results ................................................................................................................ 42 Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 42 Results ............................................................................................................................................... 43 Floats ............................................................................................................................................ 43 7. Stable Isotopes Assessment .............................................................................................................. 44 Background ....................................................................................................................................... 44 Stable Isotopes and Fish Farms Literature ........................................................................................ 46 Hypothesis ......................................................................................................................................... 47 Stable Isotope Results and Discussion .............................................................................................. 47 Stable Isotope Summary ............................................................................................................... 50 8. Sea Bird Use .................................................................................................................................. 50 9. Discussion ......................................................................................................................................... 52 References cited .................................................................................................................................... 53 List of Figures Figure 1. Collection of diverse invertebrates populating the undersides of a walkway float at the Deepwater Bay net pens. 5 Figure 2. Project vicinity map (above) and aerial photograph of all three AGS sites at Deepwater Bay, Cypress Island with arrow pointing toward Site 3 (right, photo by K. Bright). 11 Figure 3. Fish stock biomass in kg during the study. 12 Figure 4. Water current direction rose indicating percentage of time current flows in any one compass direction for subject site (Rensel 1995). 12 Figure 5. Removal of cage float for sampling by Bill Clark, AGS Inc. Deepwater Bay site manager. 13 Figure 6. Sampling by scraping biocolonization from different surfaces of
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