Before wild abalone populations can be supplemented with hatchery-reared individuals, those individuals must first be raised. The critical first step is successful spawning of captive abalone. The slideshow below shows one day's efforts to create a new cohort of hatchery individuals. On this particular day, only two females spawned and not enough eggs were successfully fertilized eggs in order to produce a new cohort of pinto abalone. Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) biologist Josh Bouma has spent the better part of the last three years trying to perfect his technique for spawning and rearing these animals but some aspects of this difficult science continue to be as much of a mystery as the continued decline of wild pinto populations.

Photos by Jordan Watson