Conservation aquaculture - culturing a species to support conservation goals - is becoming an important tool to support marine species recovery and meet human needs. However, this tool comes wit h risks as well as rewards, which must be assessed to guide aquaculture activities and recovery efforts. Here, we present a range-wide approach to strategically planning the use of aquaculture to promote recovery of the most severely declined Olympia oyster ( Ostrea lurida ) populations, while also benefiting people.
We identified 12 benefits and 11 risks of culturing Olympia oysters. Benefits included identifying climate-resilient phenotypes that add diversity to growers’ portfolios, while risks included potential negative ecological and genetic consequences of transferring hatchery-raised oysters into wild populations. Informed by these trade-offs, we identified ten priority estuaries along the range of the Olympia oyster where aquaculture is most likely to benefit the recovery of wild populations and where the benefits clearly outweigh the risks.
By integrating social criteria, we also evaluated which project types would likely meet the goals of local stakeholders in each estuary. Community restoration was most broadly suited to the priority areas, with limited commercial aquaculture and no current community harvest of the species, although this is a future stakeholder goal.
The framework we developed to evaluate aquaculture as a conservation intervention can be used with marine species globally; we provide a guide to prioritizing local knowledge and developing recommendations for implementation via transparent criteria. Our collaborative process engaging diverse stakeholders including managers, scientists, Indigenous Tribal representatives, and shellfish growers can be used elsewhere to seek win-win opportunities to expand conservation aquaculture where benefits are maximized for both people and imperiled species.