It could take millions of years for oysters to evolve to live out of the Gulf of Maine waters — assuming they are naturally selected to make the move. But one Maine aquaponics farmer wants to bring the mollusks onto dry land for at least part of their life cycle.
On Wednesday Matt Nixon, owner of Muddy River Farm Aquaponics in Topsham, outlined his plans and preliminary work in bringing juvenile oysters, known as spats, to adulthood in land-based tanks he calls oyster pods.
He presented his oyster growing plans during an online meeting hosted by E2Tech, a Maine-based energy, environmental, clean technology and economic development organization.
Nixon is working with composite researchers at the University of Maine and the Maine Technology Institute to use 3D printers to create the pods out of a polymer and using scrap wood for the flooring.
The pods and associated feeding, temperature and water quality controls will allow Nixon to grow the oysters faster than they ever could naturally in the Gulf of Maine. It will also remove the bivalves from an environment increasingly at risk due to toxic algae blooms, fluctuating temperatures in the rapidly warming Gulf of Maine and competing uses from private landowners.
“I started this company to try to find sustainable solutions to climate change, even though we may be too late to reverse some,” Nixon said. “I want to slow and blunt the changes as best we can, which is what growing oysters is all about.”
His pod technology prepares oyster farmers for the inevitable climate change and will let them speed up the oyster growing process, Nixon said.
Like most northern latitude states, Maine’s multi-million-dollar aquaculture industry is seasonal. In winter companies either place their farmed products into onland freezers or sink them lower in the water to force the mollusks into dormancy.
“That leaves them five to six months to work their butts off for a return on their investments,” Nixon said. “That’s not counting the three years it takes oysters to go from spat to market-ready or the time to get needed permits.”
Muddy River Farm pods will fill in the winter growing gap by housing the oysters in the pods and force feeding them a special algae diet to promote growth. That will give oyster farmers a headstart in the spring, Nixon said.
“We will buy the (spats) from Maine farms in the fall,” Nixon said. “They will spend the winter growing to sub-market size and then will be sold back to the farmers for a few extra dimes per piece.”
That way, instead of starting with tiny oyster spats in the spring, farmers will start out their seasons with oysters near maturity and ready for sale much earlier than normal.
The oysters have to spend the last months of their lives in the Gulf of Maine because exposure to salt water and the unique organism they dine on is what gives the mollusks their distinctive and desired flavors.
Nixon explained that his business model is buying the oysters instead of leasing pod space to the farmers because it is too expensive to insure the oysters for the farmers.
“This way I am assuming much of the risk,” he said. “I want to provide a value-added service and not compete with the industry.”
His pods also bring added value to the state’s woods industry. He is using biomass and wood waste from timber harvesting and lumber mills for the pods’ floors.
Commercial-sized pods — each capable of holding 20,000 oysters — are being printed at the University of Maine. Nixon hopes to have 100 pods up and operating soon in a 15,000-square-foot building he acquired in Bath.
“The plan is to have a salt water circulation system disconnected from the ocean and it’s unpredictable nature,” Nixon said.
