Spat on Shell at Christchurch School Aug 30, 2017
Eyed larvae under the microscope
In addition to the Christchurch oyster farm, CCS is also involved in spat on shell restoration and help the Restore Urbanna Creek project. The first step is to load old oyster shell into the setting tank.
The swimming eyed larvae is placed in the tank with river water filtered down to 5o micron, in order to remove possible predators that may eat the larvae.
The tanks are left with no flow through for three days, then after three days river water is introduced in order to get Algae to the baby oysters.
After four days the larvae become visible to the naked eye. The shell with the spat attached is then placed on reef sites.
