Ed Hale
Assistant Professor, Marine Science and Policy University of Delaware
Media
Social
Biography
Industry Expertise
Areas of Expertise
Media Appearances
Aquaculture leaders look to further expand oyster opportunities
Delaware Business Times online
2025-06-06
Dr. Ed Hale, assistant professor at the University of Delaware and the Delaware Sea Grant, as well as a member of the Delaware Environmental Coalition (DECO), told Sussex County Council members this week that the First State’s aquaculture industry is nowhere near capacity yet. Support will be needed to see it continue to grow in ways that could also benefit the local tourism industry, he added.
VIDEO | Migrating fish returning to the Brandywine, with dam partial removal underway
WDEL online
2025-08-07
"Large schools of shad used to swim up the Brandywine every year. We're on our way to welcoming them back through reconnecting fragmented habitat corridors," UD Professor Ed Hale said.
Could a blue crab hatchery be coming to Delaware?
Cape Gazette online
2025-10-24
Ed Hale, an assistant professor in the University of Delaware’s School of Marine Science and Policy, and fisheries and aquaculture extension faculty with Delaware Sea Grant, sits on the council. One of his recent projects was overseeing the creation of the state’s first oyster hatchery at the university’s Lewes campus a couple years ago.
UD Oyster Hatchery in Lewes Begins Distributing Baby Oysters to Local Farmers
WBOC online
2024-08-30
Assistant Professor Edward Hale, who is leading the project, believes that growing oysters in a facility and distributing those seeds to local farmers will provide a significant boost to Delaware’s economy. "The more oyster farmers we have, the more oysters we can grow, and the better we're going to do for our local environment," Hale said. "Making that connection is really important."
‘Who owns the river?’: Wilmington residents call for historic dam protection while environmentalists work to protect fish species
WHYY online
2024-03-21
After the city of Wilmington removed a Brandywine dam in 2019, University of Delaware scientists discovered American shad returning to the area to reproduce. One fish the researchers tracked even made its way to Nova Scotia, Canada, and back, said assistant professor Ed Hale, who helped lead the research.
Oyster fight: The humble sea creature could hold the key to restoring coastal waters. Developers hate it.
MIT Technology Review online
2023-10-10
The person who best understands the nascent aquaculture industry is a professor at the University of Delaware. Edward Hale, a marine biologist, could not be further from the stereotypical researcher with tenure.
Whales are washing up on the Jersey Shore. Here’s what we know about what may be killing them
Penn Live online
2023-01-14
And Philly Voice spoke with Ed Hale, an assistant professor of marine science at the University of Delaware, who said he would be more worried about ship collisions causing the incidents than the wind work.
New oyster hatchery coming to UD Lewes campus
Delaware Public Media online
2022-03-08
“There’s a group of us that have essentially been trying to really develop what would be a shellfish hatchery in the State of Delaware," Hale said. "So this is an effort that I’ve been working on with a colleague of mine - Dennis McIntosh at Delaware State University - as well as a couple other folks. We’re just trying to determine the feasibility of how to do this and how to execute it properly.”
Articles
A satellite-based mobile warning system to reduce interactions with an endangered species
Ecological Applications2021-04-18
Earth-observing satellites are a major research tool for spatially explicit ecosystem nowcasting and forecasting. However, there are practical challenges when integrating satellite data into usable real-time products for stakeholders.
The North American Freshwater Migratory Fish Database (NAFMFD): Characterizing the migratory life histories of freshwater fishes of Canada, the United States and Mexico
Journal of Biogeography2022-04-24
Migratory freshwater fishes are those that must access discrete habitats to complete their life cycles. Freshwater fish migrations occur around the world and provide numerous ecosystem services for humans and natural systems; however, many migratory species are in decline globally.
Environmental drivers of biogeography and community structure in a Mid-Atlantic estuary
Oecologia2024-02-14
Estuaries include some of the most productive yet anthropogenically impacted marine ecosystems on the planet, and provide critical habitat to many ecologically and economically important marine species. In order to elucidate ecological function in estuaries, we must understand what factors drive community dynamics.
Acoustic‐tagged American Shad utilize historic habitat following dam removal in northern Delaware
Marine and Coastal Fisheries2024-12-18
The anadromous American Shad Alosa sapidissima, a once commercially important species in the mid‐Atlantic region, experienced population declines due to overfishing, poor water quality, and impediments to accessing freshwater spawning habitat.
Assessing the spatial variability of cage movement and velocity attenuation of an off-bottom oyster farm and its influence on eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica) growth performance
Aquaculture2025-01-30
The global shellfish aquaculture industry has expanded over the last seven decades. Similarly, the size of individual shellfish farming operations has grown in some states. Circulation processes in natural water bodies are dynamic and vary across multiple temporal and spatial scales. How gear installation affects the circulation of currents and waves, and subsequent phytoplankton delivery to crops within farms, is largely unknown.
Annual Relative Abundance Variability and Biological Characteristics of Age-0 Shortnose Sturgeon in the Lower Tidal Delaware River
Northeastern Naturalist2025-05-16
Little has been reported about the distribution and dispersion of age-0 Acipenser brevirostrum (Shortnose Sturgeon) in the Delaware River or elsewhere, with most of what is known about this life stage inferred from laboratory studies of hatchery-reared individuals.
Performance of two selectively bred strains of eastern oyster, Crassostrea virginica, in Delaware Bay, USA with implications for living shoreline features
Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution2025-07-02
Oyster-based restoration projects, particularly living shorelines, are being installed to protect coastal ecosystems and infrastructure. While these installations often successfully create aquatic habitats, further refinement in optimizing the growth potential of shellfish on shoreline installations will increase the success rate and efficiency of restoration projects.
Education
Stockton University
B.S.
Marine Science
2007
University of Delaware
Ph.D.
Marine Biosciences
2012
