Use of Oxygen Readings to Avoid Gas Bubble Disease in Clam Hatcheries
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I.OAtlCOPY ONg NJNSC-G-98-001 C3 g k ~ February 1998 FS906 Use of Oxygen Readings to Avoid Gas Bubble Disease in Clam Hatcheries By Dr. John N. Kraeuter, Haskin Shellfish ResearchLab Rutgers Uni versity and Gef Flimlin New Jersey Sea Grant Marine Advisory Service The major gases in air and water are nitrogen because nitrogen is the dominant gas in air and 8%! and oxygen 1%!. It is obvious that bay water water, and it is not metabolized by the shellfish, contains oxygen, because if it didn't phytoplankton, Nitrogen, like oxygen, enters the organism through shellfish and fish couldn't live there. Everyone has the gills, and then is carried to the tissue by the seen summer fish kills from insufficient oxygen, or blood. Once distributed, nitrogen remains in the suffocated clams under dense piles of seaweed. These tissue while oxygen is used iip. If nitrogen enters the organisms, like humans, need oxygen to carry on the tissue in a supersaturated condition and accumulates, normal functions; however, water of different it will respond by coming out of solution into the temperature, salinity and pressure holds differing organism in the form of bubbles. Divers call these ainounts of oxygen and other gases called air. Too bubbles the bends, in shellfish it is called gas bubble high a concentration of gas or too low a concentration disease. can cause an organism to die. When the concentration of a gas, like oxygen, is the exact amount the water can hold for the pressure, temperature, and salinity; the water is considered "saturated". When there is more gas than the water can hold, it is "supersaturated", if there is less it is "undersaturated". Pressure can increase the amount of gas per unit volume water contains. Thus the deeper the water the more gas the water can contain. Water at higher temperature holds less gas per unit volume because it is less dense. The higher the salinity the less gas water can hold because the dissolved salt takes up rooni the gas could be using. As a general rule of thuinb, if oxygen levels in the water fall below 5 mg/L you need to aerate the water, Oxygen moderately above saturation in water is not a problem because organisms use oxygen to breathe. Splashing water into a raceway or upweller tank The gas that causes most problems is nitrogen, can ei ther de-gas or aerate incoming water. Thereare two conditionsthat commonlycause gas supersaturation of waterin aquaculturesystems. 1. Thesuction line or the pumpseals have a smallleak, Because the pumpis creatinga suctionin orderto movethe water, air can be suckedinto the water as it passesthe leak and it is forcedinto solutionas the water is pressurized by the pump. 2. Manyclam hatcheries are located near shallow bays that canchange temperature rapidly. Cold water holds moregas than warm water. !f temperaturesrise quickly, the amountof gasthe water can hold will godown the water becomessupersaturated with gas!.The problemat inost aquaculturefacilities is that intakesare situatednear the bay bottomin severalfeet or more!of water. At thesedepths the gas is underpressure relatedto waterdepth, but the aquaculturistpumps the waterinto a shallowcontainer, upweller, raceway, etc.This releaseof water pressurecauses additional supersaturation This is similar to the "fizz" of bubbles that is causedby openinga sodabottle. Thesimplest way to preventthis problemis to bounce,splash, or cascadethe waterthrough air beforeit reachesthe animals. The bouncingallows the water to releasethe gas and approachequilibrium with the atmosphere.A secondadvantage to this processis that it alsoallows oxygen to enterthe water if oxygenlevels are below saturation. This should be a standardpractice in all shellfish setting and nursery systemsso that the probabilityof gasbubble disease is reduced. Hard clam culturists are fortunate in that Mer~cl~ri has been shown not to be susceptible to gas supersaturationup to about109% Bisker and Castagna, 1985!. At 115%of saturationlevel, clams did not grow, and otherclam species died at 108%and 114% of saturation.It is importantto realizethat theseexperiments were done with 5 mm or larger seed.There is no information on smaller seedso we can only presuniethat they behave similarly, and keep gas levels below 105%. If youroutinely measure oxygen, temperature and salinity in yoursystem, oxygen levels can be used as a tracer of nitrogen.Oxygen can be used because all dissolvedgases behave as if noother gas was present; usually, if oxygen is lownitrogen will below. THIS IS ONLYAN APPROXIMATION- since oxygen levels, unlike nitrogen levels, can vary dueto biologicalactivity. For instance, before sunup oxygen readings may indicate undersaturation because all organismsincluding phytoplankton use oxygen at night!then if thereis a largephytoplankton bloom, in mid afternoonoxygen levels may be supersaturated because the phytoplankton,through photosynthesis, produce more oxygenthan they consume!.If eitherundersaturation or supersaturationis commonin your system,consider installing passivemeans of aeration and degassing. In thefew experiments that havebeen conducted on bivalves, the percentof saturationof nitrogenin thewater 110%saturated conditions at varioustemperatures and a salinityof 25, 30 and 32 ppt. If you havealready installed somemethod of degassingthe water throughout your facility and your oxygen readings reach the 100%levels listed in the table,you should consider taking some additional action to degasthe water.If youhave dying animals and supersaturationdoes not appear to bethe problem please contact your shellfish specialist at theUniversity or local extensionagent. They may also be ableto supplya list of companieswho sell oxygentesting equipment or meters. Literature Bisker, R. and M. Castagna. 1985. The effectof various levels of air-supersaturatedseawater on Itt~rr~l p~rn~ri Linus!,Mtt~t'ni i~terai' say! andStye arenaria Linea, with specialreference tc gae-bubble disease. J. Shellfish Res. 5: 97-102 Colt,J. 1984.Computation of dissolvedgas concentrations in water as functionsof temperature,salinity and pressure.Amer. Fish Soc.Spec. Publ. 14. 154 pp. This work is the result in part, of researchsponsored by NOAA,Office of SeaGrant, Departmentof Commerce,under Grant No.NA76-RG0091 Project No. A/S-l!. The U.S. Government is authorized to produceand distribute reprints for governmental purposes,notwithstanding any copyrightnotation that mayappear hereon. SeaGrant is a uniquepartnership with the public and private sectors combining research, education and technology transfer for publicservice, This national network of universitiesmeets changing environmental and economic needs of peopleon our coastal, ocean and Great Lake regions. NJSG-88-S78 CooperatingAgencies: Rutgers Cooperative Extension; Rutgers The State University of NewJersey; New Jersey Marine SciencesConsortium NJ SeaGrant Program;New JerseyCommission on Scienceand Technology; U.S, Department of Agriculture;U.S. Departmentsf Commerce,NOAA Sea Grant CollegeProgram; and CountyBoard of RUTGERS Chosen Freeholders, Rutgers CooperativeExtension providesinformation and educatianalservices to all peoplewithout regard to scx, race, color, national origin, or handicap,Rutgers Cooperative Extension is an EqualOpportunity Employer. Table 1. Oxygen saturation at 25, 30 and 32 ppt salinity and various temperatures. The columns entitled 110%saturation provide the oxygenvalues for 110%oxygen saturation at 25, 30 and 32 ppt salinity. If your DO meter reads in this range at the salinity and temperature combination you should 1. Check the meter, temperature and salinity. 2. Find some way to degas the water. If oxygenlevels fall below 5 mg/Lyou needto aerate the water. 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