Building lines for "Suspended Singles" Yaquina Bay single shellstock oysters

At The Last Place On Earth we take great pride in the preperation of all of our aquaculture gear.

We build the floating lines in advance for our "Long Line Suspended Bag Culture" for oysters. The lines being built in advance without the nets connected gives us the ability to stage and store them in large numbers for planting at a later time. Any large production environment will benifit from a modular production capability. We have found that at 225 oysters / net, that approximately 15 lines are needed for every quarter million seed you intend to plant. This seed quantity appeals to most seed producers.

During the summer we build lines out of doors while in the winter we moved the process under cover. We developed an inexpensive jig that requires little space to set up and use. The line while being constructed is merely pulled forward from the jig and stacked until completed. The lines can then be stored.

We use a 3/8" PolyDac line for the main line connecting the buoys.The purpose of this line is to seperate the buoys and maintain the spacing between them. A 5/16" man line is used for the longer line to go under the nets and support the oysters. This is to maintain the shape of the bags

We experienced some of the lines pulling from the buoys during early tows against the current and when trying to go faster. It turns out that a nail or screw in each knot of the first buoy prevents this altogether. When planting the lines a 36' leader line is attached to each end of the line to allow for small variations in the distancing between anchors and for small fluctuations in line lengths.

Building Suspended Lines