NOAA Grants Researcher $270K To Train Fish To Swim Into An Entrapment

Boston, MA (AHN) - A research assistant at the Marine Biological Laboratory at Wood's Hole was given a $270,000 grant by the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to teach fish to swim into a net when they hear a specific sound.

Experimenting with a six-month old sea bass, scientists believe that if the testing works, it would open the possibility of releasing trained black sea bass into the open ocean to grow into commercial size and swim into an underwater entrapment once they hear a familiar sound that signals feeding time.

Researcher Simon Miner pointed out that the specially trained fish could bolster the depleting stock of black sea bass. He added that even farm-grown fish might be better off in the wild and be called on a regular basis to feed using a sound specific to that group of fish.

If this happens, Miner believes that it could defray the expensive costs of fish farming.

The president of the National Aquaculture Association, Randy MacMillan, said that fish farmers will not easily accept the idea of "open-ocean ranching".