Generating solutions

The oyster industry in Atlantic Canada is expanding rapidly and this growth cannot be sustained by relying solely on wild-caught oyster spat, a risky strategy due to large annual variations in recruitment. The incorporation of a rigorous selective breeding program for the Eastern oyster, which would increase the profitability of oyster farms, is constrained by the lack of genomic tools (such as high-density SNP chip) which would allow implementing genomic-based selection. The overall goal of this project is to enable L’Étang Ruisseau Bar Ltée, Eastern Canada’s largest seed supplier, to produce the first production-ready strain of selectively bred Eastern oyster.