Glyn J Sharp1, Joshua T Sharp2
1KCME Inc, 42 Duffy Drive, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada,B3Z4B9, 2Tidal Organics Inc, 2433 Highway #3, Pubnico, Nova Scotia, Canada, BOW2WO
Correspondence: Glyn J. Sharp glyn.sharp@gmail.com
Area based management of Ascophyllum nodosum Le Joli in the Canadian Maritimes has advanced over the past 60 years from open buying stations in Bays to quota based area management under coastal leases. In 1989 the resource was divided into geographical sectors containing .9 to 17.6 ha containing 92 t to 2105 t of biomass. Sectors are the units of management plans under guidelines of the provincial government. GPS tracking mechanical harvesting to Nova Scotia began in 2017 in a pilot harvest. The yield was corelated with the time, distance, and cutting swath. Harvests were conducted within target bed polygons of 200 m-2 to 1280 m-2. Production per hour averaged 1120.7 + 164 kg h-1 yielding 4.9 + 2.1 kg m-2 of swept track. The exploitation rate was calculated for 12 polygons based on the preharvest harvestable biomass of 10 kg m-2. The average exploitation rate at this scale was 11.12 + 3.23 %. This level of geographic resolution of the harvest permits significant improvements in management practices, control of management plans, pre and post assessments of the resource. It is a tool to address landscape scale questions related to ecologically sustainable harvesting.