Esraa Elsayed Abou-Elmaaty
Research Assistant at The National Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries
Doing my masters on Venus clam biology in lake Timsah and I
recorded the first presence of Callista chione in Suez Canal as an
anti- lesspesian migrant clam.
Biology and culture for endangered pearl
oyster (black-pearl oyster)
•
Pinctada margaritifera (Black-Lip Pearl Oyster ), a saltwater pearl
producing clam.
•
Although a number of species of pearl oysters have been identified,
only a few have been found to produce pearls of good quality and
commercial value, one of these is P. margaritifera .
•
They occur in several seas of the tropical belt and in the sub-tropical
region.
Pinctada margaritifera
•
The pearls from Pinctada Sp. is the highest quality out of all the pearl
oysters.
• In
Egypt
Pinctada sp. have been exposed to exploitation due several
reasons as to the considerable value of the pearls and the nacre, or
“mother of pearl”, of the shell and because of the animal’s sessile nature
and tendency to occur in sufficient densities at shallow depths for
relatively easy collection.
•
Another factor which may be the cause of limiting the distribution of P.
margaritifera is the substrate availability.
•
As a result during the last decade, there is a sharp decrease in the
density of the animals in the reefs (EEAA, 2007).
•
This decrease motivated the Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency
(EEAA) for suggesting the black-lip pearl oyster among other
species, to be added to the list of the threatened species in the red
data book published by the International Union for Conservation of
Nature (IUCN).
•
Many studies recommended pearl oyster farming due to its
endangered status.
The aim of my proposal is to design a conservation plan by
using different propagation techniques and develop a mari-culture
technique that introduced to the off shore (Open Ocean Aquaculture ).
• In Germany mariculture is existing in a very hight level.
•
Most mariculture organisms there, are produced in coastal areas,
where space is scarce and user conflicts exist.
•
For extensive cultures, farming off the coast at offshore sites could be
a solution to eliminate these problems and facilitate further
expansion of environmentally sustainable aquaculture.
I have Communicated with Prof. Karsten Reise from Alfred
Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research and she
told me that there are no pearl oysters at the coasts of Germany
but there are introduced Pacific oysters all over the
coast, Crassostrea gigas.
Thank You For
Listening