The Brief
- Wild-caught redfish are a popular recreational fish in Florida but are rarely found in restaurants or grocery stores due to past overfishing.
- A Sarasota-based aquaculture company, Pine Island Redfish, is successfully farming redfish at Mote Marine Research Park and plans to expand significantly.
- The company’s sustainable practices include using nutrient-rich wastewater to cultivate mangroves for coastal restoration.
SARASOTA, Fla. – Redfish, prized by anglers across Florida, have been historically scarce in commercial markets due to overfishing in the mid-1980s, leading to a ban on commercial harvesting of wild redfish.
Megan Sorby’s Pine Island Redfish is working to change this by raising redfish in aquaculture tanks at Mote Marine Research Park in Sarasota.
Local perspective:…