Oyster Recovery Partnership Inc

Programs: Oyster recovery and habitat creation in maryland: oyster recoverty partnership undertakes a synchronized oyster recovery effort. Leveraging the resources and capabilities from all the partners and usingthe recommendations of the 2008 oyster advisory commission report and the chesapeake bay program's oyster management plan, this project begins to implement the bay wide strategy to restore oysters as identified in the president's eo 13508 strategy and to implement the md governor's oyster restoration plan. Major activities will include: 1) continued multi-year restoration process of targeted large scale restoration and enforcement, 2) conducting restoration in targeted tributaries using spat on shell, natural set, and alternative substrate as appropriate, 3) establishing and applying common monitoring protocols to evaluate project performance and 4) expanding aquaculture initiatives. Up to 750 million seed oysters produced at state hatcheries were placed in targeted tributaries to accelerate recovery. Follow up monitoring of oyster health and disease pressure, reef associated fishes, and nearby shallow waters will be conducted to evaluate success of each technique. The reefs are expected to immediately be among the largest contiguous oyster reefs in chesapeake bay. Shell recycling: to support the maryland department of natural resources' shell collection program, the oyster recovery partnership initiated a shell recycling program to collect discarded shell from restaurants, catering businesses and seafood wholesalers. Shell is a vital material needed for oyster recovery activities. Electronic harvest reporting: under contract from the maryland department of natural resources, orp managed a program to develop a robust electronic reporting and hailing system to track and increase the accountability of crab harvests. Since then, more than 200 watermen have participated in the program.