National Recreational Fishing Conference bursary 2019

Lack of easy access to fish health veterinary services is limiting the expansion of aquaculture in Western Australia. This project will fund a Principal Investigator to complete an intensive aquatic animal health fellowship program at the The Australian College of Veterinary Scientists to benefit the fisheries industry.

This project, an Industry Partnership Agreement (IPA) between Fisheries Research and Development Corporation (FRDC) and Oysters Australia (OA), was instigated to manage project development between and within OA's member states and co-ordinate access to the most suitable funding sources for RD&E goals. During the life of the four-year project, 33 oyster R&D projects to the value of $10.1 million were conducted, with the IPA involved in all but three projects.

This project made critical findings on flesh colour variation in Atlantic Salmon in Tasmania. The investigation into the correlation of colour variation with high seawater temperature delivered new insights into thermal tolerance and genetics in Atlantic salmon, and their performance in a context of climate change and global warming.