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Quantifying the Effects of Commercial Clam Aquaculture on C and N Cycling: an Integrated Ecosystem Approach

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Abstract

Increased interest in using bivalve cultivation to mitigate eutrophication requires a comprehensive understanding of the net carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) budgets associated with cultivation on an ecosystem scale. This study quantified C and N processes related to clam (Mercenaria mercenaria) aquaculture in a shallow coastal environment (Cherrystone Inlet, VA) where the industry has rapidly increased. Clam physiological rates were compared with basin-wide ecosystem fluxes including primary production, benthic nutrient regeneration, and respiration. Although clam beds occupy only 3 % of the ecosystem’s surface area, clams filtered 7–44 % of the system’s volume daily, consumed an annual average of 103 % of the phytoplankton production, creating a large flux of particulate C and N to the sediments. Annually, N regenerated and C respired by clam and microbial metabolism in clam beds were ∼3- and ∼1.5-fold higher, respectively, than N and C removed through harvest. Due to the short water residence time, the low watershed load, and the close vicinity of clam beds to the mouth of Cherrystone Inlet, cultivated clams are likely subsidized by phytoplankton from the Chesapeake Bay. Consequently, much of the N released by mineralization associated with clam cultivation is “new” N as it would not be present in the system without bivalve facilitation. Macroalgae that are fueled by the enhanced N regeneration from clams represents a eutrophying process resulting from aquaculture. This synthesis demonstrates the importance of considering impacts of bivalve aquaculture in an ecosystem context especially relative to the potential of bivalves to remove nutrients and enhance C sinks.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful to the aquaculturists for providing access to their farms as well as information regarding harvest and cultivation practices. Thank you to Willy Reay for providing historical light attenuation data and Michael Kuschner for modeling the system. Feedback from Mark Luckenbach, Liz Canuel, Anne Giblin, and Lisa Kellogg greatly improved this manuscript. This work was supported by Virginia Sea Grant (NA10OAR4170085, #R/71515 W, #R/715168), the NSF GK12 Fellowship (DGE-0840804), the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program – Defense Coastal/Estuarine Research Program Project SI-1413, and NSF Virginia Coast Reserve LTER Project (DEB 0080381, DEB 0621014). This manuscript is contribution No. 3551 from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, College of William and Mary.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Virginia Institute of Marine Science, College of William & Mary, Gloucester Point, VA, USA

    Anna E. Murphy, Iris C. Anderson & Mark J. Brush

  2. Marine Science Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA, USA

    Kyle A. Emery

  3. Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA

    Kyle A. Emery & Michael L. Pace

  4. Department of Marine Chemistry and Geochemistry, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA, USA

    Jennie E. Rheuban

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  1. Anna E. Murphy
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  2. Kyle A. Emery
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  3. Iris C. Anderson
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  4. Michael L. Pace
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  5. Mark J. Brush
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  6. Jennie E. Rheuban
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Anna E. Murphy.

Additional information

Communicated by Marco Bartoli

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Supplementary Table S2

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Murphy, A.E., Emery, K.A., Anderson, I.C. et al. Quantifying the Effects of Commercial Clam Aquaculture on C and N Cycling: an Integrated Ecosystem Approach. Estuaries and Coasts 39, 1746–1761 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12237-016-0106-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12237-016-0106-0

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