Virginia Sea Grant supports safe and sustainable seafood processing and product development through applied research and extension work. Extension staff at VIMS and Virginia Tech work with the seafood industry to provide marketing and product development assistance, seafood safety information and worker safety training, and equipment calibration and quality assurance.
Extension projects at VIMS include:
Extension projects at Virginia Tech's Virginia Seafood Agricultural Research and Extension Center (VSAREC) include:
Virginia’s shellfish growers sold 28.1 million oysters and 171 million clams in 2012, according to an annual survey of shellfish aquaculture operations in the state. Those numbers represent a 21 percent increase in oyster sales, while clam sales have remained fairly stable over the past few years.
The “Virginia Shellfish Aquaculture Situation and Outlook Report” has been produced annually by
The Chef Seafood Symposium is a Virginia Sea Grant annual event that invites professional, apprentice, and student chefs for a day of learning about seafood and the science behind the products chefs serve.
Talk to any of the five interns at Virginia Tech’s Seafood Agricultural Research and Extension Center (VSAREC) in the days leading up to the cobia larval run, and the word that you’ll hear is intense. Or as Hannah Mark, a second-year student at Dalhousie University in Canada, puts it: “I’m equal parts excited and terrified.”
As a Virginia Sea Grant marketing intern, Yangyang is hitting the streets to determine whether a community-supported fishery (CSF) would be viable in Williamsburg.
Katie Thatcher is researching organizational, legal, and sustainability framework for the ideal community supported fishery the Williamsburg area.
Virginia’s oyster aquaculture industry is growing steadily despite the struggling economy and some setbacks in hatchery production, according to a report from Virginia Institute of Marine Science and Virginia Sea Grant.
Even if you’ve tried raw oysters, you may have never really tasted one. Like wine, oysters grown in different areas taste different because they take on the characteristics of their environment. Simply slurping your oysters means you miss these delicate flavors.
At the second annual Halfshell Oyster Tasting event in November, the Tidewater Oyster Gardeners Association (TOGA) helped more than 200 people learn to really taste oysters. Attendees put their taste buds to the test trying to differentiate oysters from six growers who raise oysters at different places along the Chesapeake Bay. Virginia Sea Grant (VASG) and our extension partners were proud cosponsors of this fun event.
The new buzzword in oyster marketing is “differentiation” as Virginia Sea Grant Business and Marketing Specialist Dan Kauffman explained at the recent Differentiated Halfshell Marketing Workshop sponsored by Virginia Sea Grant, Virginia Tech, Virginia Marine Products Board, and Virginia Institute of Marine Science.
Researchers, watermen, business owners and other aquaculture enthusiasts gathered in Williambsurg for the Virginia Aquaculture Conference.
Summer Communications Intern Kate Schimel reports on research into the spawning and food needs of the Atlantic spadefish. Studies like these are the first step towards developing a new species for aquaculture.
When you think of eating local, what foods fill your imaginary plate? Maybe you think of vegetables and eggs, but what about fish? Would you even know where to find locally caught or farmed seafood if you wanted it? This spring Virginia Sea Grant will lead a team to determine whether it would make sense for local seafood producers could bring their catch to a community supported fishery.
Virginia oyster growers and researchers found that simply moving oysters to saltier waters before harvest is just as effective at reducing Vibrio as more costly treatment methods, such as high-pressure treatment or low-dose radiation. Local growers secured research funding through Virginia Sea Grant’s partner Fishery Resource Grant Program and may have found an alternative treatment that could save time, money, and jobs.
The VIMS Aquaculture Genetics and Breeding Technology Center (ABC) conducts oyster breeding and research aimed at developing oyster breeds that will perform well in oyster farms throughout the state. Triploid oysters, which have three copies of each chromosome instead of the usual two, can be bred in the lab and have a number of characteristics [...]
Americans eat more fish than we catch, and while some of the difference gets made up by seafood imports, researchers are looking for species of fish that can be grown in the U.S. for human consumption. Michael Schwarz of VT, Dan Sennett of VIMS, and Jesse Trushenski of Southern Illinois University at Carbondale will research [...]
Harmful algal blooms occur regularly in the Chesapeake Bay, and these blooms could have negative effects on oysters grown for human consumption and for restoration. Kimberly Reece, Wolfgang Vogelbein, Thomas Harris, and Ryan Carnegie, all from VIMS, will study the effects of algal bloom toxins on larval and adult oysters. By understanding the toxicity of [...]
When scientists talk about mercury in fish, they often refer to one of three types of broad categories of fish: bottom feeder, middle predator, or top predator. But, says Mike Newman of VIMS, these categories don’t provide consumers with useful information about the risk or benefit of local seafood they might eat. Using samples caught [...]
Adenovirus and norovirus are viruses that can be released from wastewater treatment plants and can contaminate shellfish and cause gastrointestinal illness in people who eat those shellfish. However, routine and reliable methods to measure the presence of norovirus in water have not been developed. This grant will support a student working with Howard Kator and [...]
…and waterman. One Virginia fishing family is taking on all of these roles and more to sell their catch directly to consumers at farmers’ markets. They are also spreading the word to other watermen about the increased profits that can be gained by this strategy.
Virginia Tech’s Zhiyou Wen is looking for a way to capitalize on a chance connection between the biodiesel industry and the demand for omega-3 fatty acids. Algae that grow on waste glycerol from biofuel production can turn that byproduct into omega-3s for use in a variety of foods and nutritional products.
The new workforce in seafood processing is a growing population of seasonal migrant workers—almost all of them Hispanic. Virginia Sea Grant is helping these workers and the foods they process stay safe by providing specialized on-the-job training in Spanish.
