Dataset: Salinity Effects on Oyster Spat Growth: Wild Spat

Higher salinity habitats tend to support faster oyster growth, while lower salinity habitats act as a refuge from predation and disease but tend to slow growth. Two experiments were performed to investigate the effect of salinity juvenile oyster (also known as spat) growth. One experiment used wild oyster spat collected from three distinct Delaware Bay salinity zones that were then transplanted into various salinity conditions in the laboratory where growth was monitored (results reported in this dataset). Transplanting into low salinity led to decreased growth compared to transplanting to higher salinity, and growth of oyster spat was overall highest for spat from the lowest salinity source. A second experiment used hatchery reared oyster larvae set in one of four different salinity conditions (see "Related Datasets" section for methods and results of hatchery spat experiments). Lower final salinity treatments were associated with lower growth, lower initial salinity treatments were associated with faster final treatment growth, and final growth depended on the interaction between initial and final salinity. As increased freshwater events due to climate change are expected in the Delaware Bay and regionally in the Northeast, these results indicate that nonlinear early life stress responses are important to quantify to better understand oyster stock resilience and plan management.