Dr. Aaron Welch

Aaron Welch studies aquaculture and the environment. In the picture above, he is the one wearing the hat. Aaron attended the University of North Carolina as an undergraduate and then spent five and half years serving as a Surface Warfare Officer in the U.S. Navy. After graduating from the Emory University School of Law in 2006, he chose not to practice law (couldn't handle the caffeine), but instead came to the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science where he studied aquaculture (attaboy). Aaron received his M.S. from UM/RSMAS in 2010 and began working towards his PhD at the Abess Center the same year (such an ambitious fellow). Aaron’s dissertation research focused on the interaction between large-scale aquaculture and the environment, as well as the political economy of fishing and aquaculture. Aaron’s current field work includes an environmental monitoring project at a large, offshore aquaculture facility in central America that uses Lagrangian techniques to describe the changes in the water mass affected by effluents from fish farming operations. His policy work included an effort to catalogue and analyze all of the fisheries related lobbying efforts reported via the Lobbying Disclosure Act Database. Aaron is more qualified than a hamster that can build a spaceship, go to Mars, and come back with proof of alien life. 

Aaron is now the founder of Two Docks Shellfish, LLC. Email him at: awelch@rsmas.miami.edu

PEER REVIEWED PUBLICATIONS

Welch, A., Hoenig, R., Stieglitz, J., Daugherty, Z., Sardenberg, B., Miralao, S., Farkas, D., and Benetti, D., 2013. Growth Rates of Larval and Juvenile Bigeye Scad Selar crumenophthalmus in Captivity. SpringerPlus, SpringerPlus, 2:634.

Welch, A., 2013. Seafood Watch Report: Farmed Pompano, Asia and the Americas. Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch Program, Monterey, CA. 

Welch, A., 2013. The Second Commons: Rethinking Fisheries Reform for the Political Market. Stanford Journal of Law, Science, and Policy. Published online January 2013, pp. 1-31.

Stieglitz, J.D., Benetti, D., Hoenig, R., Sardenberg, B., Welch, A., Miralao, S. 2011. Environmentally conditioned, year-round volitional spawning of cobia (Rachycentron canadum) in broodstock maturation system. Aquaculture Research, 43(10):1557-1566. 

Benetti, D.D. and A. Welch.  2010. Advances in open ocean aquaculture technology and the future of seafood production. The Journal of Ocean Technology (5)2: 1-14.

Welch, A., Hoenig, R., Stieglitz, J., Benetti, D., Tacon, A., Sims, N., O’Hanlon, B., 2010. From Fishing to the Sustainable Aquaculture of Carnivorous Marine Finfish. Reviews in Fisheries Science, 18(3):235-247.

Bennetti, D., O’Hanlon, B., Rivera, J., Welch, A., Maxey, C., Orhun, M., 2010. Growth Rates of Cobia (Rachycentron canadum) Cultured in Open Ocean Submerged Cages in the Caribbean. Aquaculture 302:195-201.

Benetti, D., Sardenberg, B., Welch, A., Hoenig, R., Orhun, M., Zink, I. 2008. Intensive larval husbandry and fingerling production of cobia Rachycentron canadum.Aquaculture 281:22-27.

Benetti, D., Orhun, M., Sardenberg, B., O’Hanlon, B., Welch, A., Hoenig R., Zink, I., Rivera, J., Denlinger, B., Bacoat, D., Palmer, K., Cavalin, F. 2008. Advances in hatchery and grow-out technology of cobia Rachycenton candadum (Linnaeus). Aquaculture Research 39(7):710-711.