Microalgae plays an important role in marine ecosystems with its clustered growth to develop seaweed beds or marine forests where provide habitats for marine animals’ feeding and spawning. Its effective fish aggregation increases the survival rate of released fry, therefore, the development of seaweed propagation and cultivation technology becomes a critical task for marine life’s restoration.
Grateloupia sparsa (aka. seaweed spaghetti), a kind of red seaweed with highly dietary and economic value, mainly grows on stones and boulders along low-tide lines and can live with its huge body size up-right in waters. Its growth peaks from winter to spring and reaches mature from March to May every year, when fishermen snorkel to pick 6-10 cm length of Grateloupia sparsa and sell to seafood restaurants. After fixation with boiling water, vacuum packaging, and refrigeration, people can enjoy dishes of the harvested seaweed such as cold seaweed spaghetti or seaweed spaghetti with scrambled egg all year round.
Lee Meng-Chou (李孟洲), an Assistant Professor at NTOU, said Grateloupia sparsa, an algae native to Mao'Ao Bay along Taiwan's northeastern coast that is under threat from global warming, and production of the seaweed has been on the decline due to global warming and overharvesting. In this project, mature Grateloupia sparsa has been collected from Mao'Ao Bay and cultivated in laboratories before being transplanted on algal cultivating ropes and placed in low-occupancy abalone pools in Gongliao, creating an artificial breeding process. In the future, the propagation in Mao’Ao Bay can provide an inhabiting, feeding, and spawning field for fishes, shrimps, and clams and become a seaweed farm as a demonstration area for fisheries cultivation.
According to Agriculture Department of NTC, Grateloupia sparsa is one of the native marine microalgae species with high economic values to northeastern coast in New Taipei City. In addition to the joint research study for new restoration opportunities conducted with NTOU, the future microalgae culture technology can provide benefits including the increase of production and productivity for economic microalgae cultivation, and raising fishery villages’ revenue by transferring the breeding technique of microalgae. By doing so, it also helps to restore local marine resources, enhance primary production, and effectively improve marine environment.