Producing young, single and meaty oyster Crassostrea iredalei (Faustino, 1932) in grow-out culture using pouches suspended from rafts

Growth and survival of the slipper oyster Crassostrea iredalei using traditional (tires and oyster shells) and new methods (pouches and trays) suspended from floating rafts were compared. After six months of grow-out culture, mean shell length (mm SL) and body weight (g BW) of oysters were significantly highest in those reared in pouches (89.32 +/- 0.41 mm SL, 87.70 +/- 0.70 g BW), followed by those in trays (83.16 +/- 0.31 mm SL, 87.06 +/- 0.72 g BW), then those harvested from oyster shells (76.42 +/- 0.88 mm SL, 67.35 +/- 1.03 g BW), and lastly from tires (72.30 +/- 1.21 mm SL, 55.07 +/- 1.49 g BW). Growth rates both for length and weight were almost comparable between oysters reared in pouches (6.05 +/- 1.28 mm mo(-1), 10.98 +/- 2.05 g mo(-1)) and trays (5.01 +/- 1.46 mm mo(-1), 10.77 +/- 2.58 g mo(-1)). Although 60.7% of the oysters harvested from pouches (n = 1071) were classified as large (85-100 mm SL) and jumbo (100-120 mm SL) and only 39.5% of those from trays (n = 1048), their meat yield did not significantly differ (pouches = 22.60 +/- 0.86%; trays = 24.76 +/- 0.93%). Survival in pouches (95.2 +/- 0.77%) and trays (93.15 +/- 2.10%) was almost parallel at harvest. Growing oysters using the new methods produced single, larger, meatier oysters of almost the same size at a shorter culture duration.

Automated summary

Using new methods for growing the slipper oyster Crassostrea iredalei resulted in larger, meatier oysters compared to traditional methods, with similar survival rates at harvest.