Report: Offshore Fish Farms Could Thrive In California

In the clear waters 10km (6 miles) from Huntington Beach, California, a 40-hectare (100-acre) cluster of shellfish rafts will yield its first commercial harvest this spring. Phil Cruver, founder of Catalina Sea Ranch, says seafood wholesalers have lined up to buy what he expects will be 680,000kg (1.5 million lb) of mussels.

Cruver’s enterprise is also experimenting with the cultivation of seaweed, oysters, sea urchins, scallops and even lobster. “But mussels are our cash crop,” he said. He hopes to be growing seafood across 400 hectares (1,000 acres) of the ocean within a few years.

In 2012, Catalina Sea Ranch became the first commercial aquaculture operation permitted in federal United States waters, and Cruver’s expansion vision reflects the consensus among some researchers and proponents that growing seafood in offshore waters could be a winning deal as wild fish catches flatline or diminish.

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