Gifts to White Abalone Captive Breeding Program - Bodega Marine Laboratory contribute to...
We met our initial goal! Please support our new stretch goal of $12,500.
Join us to support the Endangered White Abalone Restoration Fund
Abalone are a group of culturally, ecologically, and economically important marine organisms. Once highly prized, white abalone populations declined over 99% in just a decade during the 60s and 70s due to overfishing. In 2001, they became the first marine invertebrate to be listed as endangered.
In 2011, when the white abalone captive breeding program moved to UC Davis’s Bodega Marine Laboratory, no one had spawned the animals in captivity successfully in nearly a decade. Through innovative research and a lot of persistence, the program has emerged as an ocean restoration success story. Over 18,000 white abalone produced in the program have made their way into the ocean, and thousands more are sent out every year.
The success of this program continues to reach new heights and you can make a difference today by accelerating this critically important work of saving white abalone and helping us to meet a $50,000 1 to 1 match from a local foundation.
White abalone are at a turning point. We have the science, the partnerships, and the momentum to bring this species back from the brink, but we can’t do it without you. This Crowdfund will directly shape what we can accomplish this upcoming spawning season. Your support this season will increase the number of animals spawned and improve larval culture capacity, bolstering restoration efforts that are the first crucial steps to recovery. With your support, we can continue advancing our captive breeding success and continue the work to secure the future for white abalone recovery.
On October 1st, the White Abalone Captive Breeding Program launched a Crowdfund campaign to support our 2026 spawning season and thanks to the incredible generosity of over 33 donors, we raised over $5,000! These funds will allow us to conduct a full spawning season at Bodega Marine Laboratory, increase the number of animals spawned, and improve larval culture capacity which are all vital steps toward white abalone recovery. We’re so grateful for the amazing support from our community!
Now we’re reaching for our stretch goal of $12,500 to further strengthen recovery efforts through coordinated partner spawning events across California. These efforts, which will span from early 2026 through early summer, bring together facilities statewide to synchronize multiple spawning attempts. This coordination is essential for introducing new genetic diversity into the program and for sharing larval culture and settlement responsibilities among specialized partner facilities, thereby, increasing both the survivability and total number of animals we can collectively produce for restoration.
If you’d like to help secure the future of white abalone and see every donated dollar doubled by a local family foundation, please consider contributing to this project: https://crowdfund.ucdavis.edu/whiteabalonecaptivebreeding
Thank you from all of us at the White Abalone Captive Breeding Program!
#CrowdfundUCDavis #whiteabalone #haliotis #endangeredspecies #oceanrecovery #californiacoast #NOAASpotlightSpecies #restoration #MarineConservation
329 days ago by Nora Frank
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