Quantifying the status and success on restored native oyster Ostrea edulis beds in the Solent.

Globally, the restoration of ostreid bivalves is gaining momentum. In European waters the native oyster Ostrea edulis is the focus of extensive restoration efforts and in the Solent, Blue Marine Foundation (BLUE) have been leading efforts to restore native oysters since 2015. The Solent historically represented the UK's largest oyster fishery, but has been in decline since the 1970s and generally has been closed to fishing since 2013. The Solent system represents a good model to understand how best to restore a habitat that no longer exists; insights that can be scaled to the wider Europe and beyond.

Thus far our work has compared the performance of small scale elevated culture of broodstock oysters in suspended cage culture in marinas with elevated reef culture on the sea bed1 and has explored the environmental controls of sex determination and gametogenesis in native oysters2-3. Research is also quantifying the services offered by oysters for nutrient regulation and microplastic removal from the environment.

This studentship will quantify the benefits, including several ecosystem services, provided by relaid oysters in Langstone Harbour, the River Hamble and Newtown Harbour on the Isle of Wight, and will then quantify the impact of that strategy through monitoring. The project in the Solent is one of the largest in Europe.