Acadia Harvest vaccinates their 2nd batch of California yellowtail from the CCAR hatchery
Acadia Harvest vaccinated 2,300 California yellowtail in preparation for moving the fish to a new tank system. The juvenile fish were hatched in the CCAR hatchery in July 2015 and for the past few months the company has been growing them in the Unit 3 nursery production system. The stock will soon be transferred to a pair of 11,000 gallon (42 m3) tanks in the newly renovated Business Incubation room located in the CCAR Marine Hatchery. The fish were vaccinated so that they could start life in their new environment with a strengthened immune antibody response to marine bacteria that are known to cause disease outbreaks in stressed fish. The vaccine was developed by Kennebec Rivers Biosciences and consists of a proprietary multi-species combination of killed bacterial cells. The fish are anesthetized and graded into two size categories before being injected with the vaccine. It was all hands on deck as the entire Acadia Harvest crew pitched in to help Bill Keleher and Peter Merrill of Kennebec River Biosciences get the job done.