Bay Scallop Ecology and Reseeding Project

In collaboration with local baymen and researchers from the Marine Program of Cornell Cooperative Extension (Suffolk County) and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Professor Stephen Tettelbach has worked extensively on several projects since 1987 to restore Peconic Bay scallop populations following their decimation by brown tide algal blooms of the mid- 1980's.

More than a dozen of his students have worked with him on these projects. His work has focused on several topics: (1) examining overwintering survival of transplanted bay scallops, (2) improving the methodology for reseeding wild and hatchery-reared bay scallops, so as to increase survival rates, (3) comparing the reproductive patterns of transplanted wild and hatchery-reared scallops, relative to scallops from natural populations, and (4) examining the effects of brown tide algal blooms on the survival, growth and reproduction of bay scallops in the field.