S Is for … Square One

Being a "foodie" I read with interest the article about Square One, another local restuarant serving farmed abalone. I was especially interested in George's use of the term "sustainaby farmed abalone".

At this point I must reveal myself as the gent featured in another article in this issue of the Independent. I'm Jim Marshall, the former, and hopefully future, abalone fisherman.

While farming abalone may be economicaly sustainable and would appear to have no effects on the enviornment, some background information is advisable before one walks away feeling good about his "sustainable" abalone dinner.

Before I go into it, I would say that I've known Ben Beede, owner/operator of the Cultured Abalone, for many years and know his operation to maintain the highest standards.

When creating an artificial enviornment in which to grow abalone a monoculture is created. This monoculture is also an ideal circumstance for culturing abalone disease and parasites. Such diseases or parasites may then access the natural enviornment through the outfall of water used in the facility.

A herpes virus is currently spreading through the wild abalone population of Victoria, Australia. This virius is devastaing that population. That virus has been tracked to an abalone aquaculture facility in Victoria and has spread from that origin.

Here in California we had a scare many years ago from a worm that originated from South African abalone. These abalone were brought here for mariculture experimentation and with them came an exotic Sabellid worm that spread throughout the abalone mariculture facilities here and devastated those businesses. Some of them just turned off the pumps, shoveled out the abs and started over. Luckily, the worm did not establish itself in wild populations.

Currently, there is or was an effort to culture White Abalone, a federally listed endangered specie, in a captive breeding program. Unfortunately, the white ab brood stock and 10,000 of their progeny recently died from disease in the culture facility. Again, luckily, this disease was not loosed into the wild.

The origins of Whithering Syndrome, which devastated and continues to threaten wild abalone in CA, has been debated ever since it first appeared here in the eighties. Australian researchers have suggested that the profile of the spread of that disease fits monoculture origins.

I apologize for this long-winded comment but I hope it illustrates that we should be cautious when using a "little" word like sustainable.