On-farm
February 2024
Anyone who’s dipped their toes into an innovative pilot project knows it's a journey of patience, learning, and pivoting. Our Project Lead, Rebecca Barclay, shares a behind-the-scenes view on how we’re positioned in stage 3, as we ready to scale.
“This year is a significant one, in which we are looking to scale. We’ve had a steep learning curve over the last few years, that’s seen us delve into seaweed biology and fine-tune our cultivation methods. It’s been a constant challenge to adapt to the ever-changing environmental conditions, including light levels and water temperatures, but as a result we’ve innovated and tested new solutions. We’ve also navigated aquaculture regulations that are essential for our long-term success. All of this makes it immensely satisfying to witness our seaweed growing.
This next phase is all about refining our farming logistics and testing our modelled assumptions. This year truly sets the foundation for sustainable growth in seaweed cultivation. Together, with our partners and programme champions, we’re not just cultivating seaweed, we’re cultivating knowledge, resilience and a sustainable future.”
April 2023
To date, over 2.3 km of seeded rope has been outplanted at the Esk Point farm and 1.5 km at the eastern Pōnui farm site.
We have been testing techniques to help protect seedlings and increase survival during outplanting. We are also starting to introduce automation in the outplanting process. We replaced the manual winding of the seeding twine onto grow ropes with a purpose built outplanting machine developed by the University of Waikato aquaculture team in collaboration with the School of Engineering which has reduced the number of people required to outplant.
November 2022
Across our Esk Point and Pōnui marine farm sites we have outplanted 2273m of seeded twine.
Monthly outplantings will continue to the end of Stage 2.
