Many fisheries may have been outraged when they noticed a significant decline in
their yearly catch. Something was causing large numbers of fish and even other
organisms to die. What could it be? The culprit was sea lettuce.
In the summer of 2011, the PEI Department of Environment, Labour and Justice and the PEI Department of Fisheries, Aquaculture and Rural Development conducted a harvesting project on Prince Edward Island located in Canada.
The harvest of sea lettuce has been discussed as a possible means to reduce or eliminate anoxic events in PEI. Although this practice has been attempted in other areas, there is limited information available that would help guide this activity on PEI. This pilot was conducted to determine: (1) the effectiveness and efficiency of a sea lettuce harvest
on PEI, (2) the harvest intensity required to impact sea lettuce populations, (3) the harvest intensity required to prevent anoxic events from occurring and (4) the environmental impacts resulting from the harvest.
The project was successful in harvesting a total of 64.8 tonnes of sea lettuce from Covehead Bay, 29.9 tonnes from Hills River and a total of 146.2 tonnes (99.9 tonnes on the first harvest, 46.3 tonnes on the second harvest) from Mill
River. All harvested sea lettuce was either spread on agricultural land or composted.
The results of this piolot were not successfull in showing any decline in the anoxic events of all cites