Developing clam aquaculture in Australia: a feasibility study on culturing Donax deltoides and Katelysia rhytiphora on intertidal and subtidal leases in South Australia Mark Gluis and Xiaoxu Li August 2014 FRDC Project No 2009/208 i © 2014 Fisheries Research and Development Corporation and South Australian Research and Development Institute All rights reserved. ISBN 978-1-921563-67-6 Developing clam aquaculture in Australia: a feasibility study on culturing Donax deltoides and Katelysia rhytiphora on intertidal and subtidal leases in South Australia 2009/208 2014 Ownership of Intellectual property rights Unless otherwise noted, copyright (and any other intellectual property rights, if any) in this publication is owned by the Fisheries Research and Development Corporation and the South Australian Research and Development Institute. This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth), no part may be reproduced by any process, electronic or otherwise, without the specific written permission of the copyright owner. Neither may information be stored electronically in any form whatsoever without such permission. This publication (and any information sourced from it) should be attributed to Gluis M.R., Li X. South Australian Research and Development Institute (Aquatic Sciences) 2014, Developing clam aquaculture in Australia: a feasibility study on culturing Donax deltoides and Katelysia rhytiphora on intertidal and subtidal leases in South Australia. Adelaide, August. Creative Commons licence All material in this publication is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia Licence, save for content supplied by third parties, logos and the Commonwealth Coat of Arms. Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia Licence is a standard form licence agreement that allows you to copy, distribute, transmit and adapt this publication provided you attribute the work. A summary of the licence terms is available from creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/au/deed.en. The full licence terms are available from creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/au/legalcode. Inquiries regarding the licence and any use of this document should be sent to: [email protected]. Disclaimer The authors warrant that they have taken all reasonable care in producing this report. The report has been through the SARDI internal review process, and has been formally approved for release by the Research Chief, Aquatic Sciences. Although all reasonable efforts have been made to ensure quality, SARDI does not warrant that the information in this report is free from errors or omissions. SARDI does not accept any liability for the contents of this report or for any consequences arising from its use or any reliance placed upon it. Material presented in these Administrative Reports may later be published in formal peer-reviewed scientific literature. The information, opinions and advice contained in this document may not relate, or be relevant, to a readers particular circumstances. Opinions expressed by the authors are the individual opinions expressed by those persons and are not necessarily those of the publisher, research provider or the FRDC. The Fisheries Research and Development Corporation plans, invests in and manages fisheries research and development throughout Australia. It is a statutory authority within the portfolio of the federal Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, jointly funded by the Australian Government and the fishing industry. Researcher Contact Details FRDC Contact Details Name: Mark Gluis Address: 25 Geils Court Address: PO Box 120 Deakin ACT 2600 Henley Beach SA 5022 Phone: 02 6285 0400 Phone: 08 8207 5400 Fax: 02 6285 0499 Fax: 08 8207 5406 Email: [email protected] Email: [email protected] Web: www.frdc.com.au In submitting this report, the researcher has agreed to FRDC publishing this material in its edited form after December 2014. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARY ...................................................................................... 1 2. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .............................................................................................. 5 3. BACKGROUND............................................................................................................. 6 4. NEED ............................................................................................................................ 9 5. OBJECTIVES .............................................................................................................. 10 6. SUMMARY OF EXISTING CLAM FARMING TECHNIQUES AND AUSTRALIAN RESEARCH ................................................................................................................ 11 7. HATCHERY AND NURSERY CULTURE OF CLAM SPAT ......................................... 12 7.1. Methods ...................................................................................................................... 12 7.2. Results ........................................................................................................................ 20 8. EFFECTS OF KEY ENVIRONMENTAL PARAMETERS ON CLAM PERFORMANCE IN LABORATORY TRIALS .......................................................................................... 25 8.1. Methods ...................................................................................................................... 25 8.2. Results ........................................................................................................................ 27 9. PERFORMANCE OF CLAMS IN FIELD TRIALS ......................................................... 35 9.1. Methods ...................................................................................................................... 35 9.2. Results ........................................................................................................................ 42 10. DISCUSSION .............................................................................................................. 52 10.1. Pipi (D. deltoides) ........................................................................................................ 55 10.2. Vongole (K. rhytiphora)................................................................................................ 57 10.3. Other Species ............................................................................................................. 61 11. BENEFITS AND ADOPTION ....................................................................................... 62 12. FURTHER DEVELOPMENT ....................................................................................... 63 13. PLANNED OUTCOMES .............................................................................................. 64 14. CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................ 65 15. REFERENCES ............................................................................................................ 66 APPENDIX A: LITERATURE REVIEW ..................................................................................... 69 APPENDIX B: CLAM CULTURE WORKSHOP ....................................................................... 115 iii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. Location of clam collection and cage deployment sites ..............................................13 Figure 2. D. deltoides broodstock on spawning tray ..................................................................14 Figure 3. Male and female D. deltoides separated while spawning ...........................................14 Figure 4. Early larval stages of D. deltoides: fertilised eggs 30 minutes post-fertilisation (L), trochophore 12 hours post-fertilisation (C) and straight hinged veligers, 40 hours post- fertilisation (R) ...........................................................................................................................15 Figure 5. D. deltoides pediveliger ..............................................................................................17 Figure 7. K. rhytiphora broodstock ............................................................................................19 Figure 8. Intra-annual trends in gonad development of D. deltoides on Younghusband Peninsula, SA in 2010, Figure reproduced with permission from Ferguson et al. (2013). See Table 3 for description of gonad stages ....................................................................................21 Figure 9. Temporal variation in the reproductive condition of K. rhytiphora and K. scalarina, measured as mean gonad index. Data includes all collected individuals greater than the size of first maturity (i.e. ≥ 32 mm shell length (SL) and ≥ 27 mm SL, respectively). Figure reproduced, with permission, from Gorman et al. (2010) ...............................................................................23 Figure 10. K. rhytiphora pediveligers on the left showing extended foot and post set, juvenile spat on the right, showing foot and early gill development ........................................................23 Figure 11. Average growth of K. rhytiphora larvae. ...................................................................24 Note: These groups were graded tightly during the larval period ...............................................24 Figure 12. Plan view of a raceway divided into four replicate sections ......................................25 Figure 13. D. deltoides length after 40 and 80 days cultivation with