Tarmac Online

By Christian Martin ’26

Chaminade High School students Christian Martin ’26 and Luke Martin ’28 are leading a Science Research Club project focused on reducing oyster deaths caused by oyster drill snails, a common predator that threatens oyster populations.

The project began when Dr. Kuntz reached out to Christian and Luke with the idea of studying oyster drill snails and their impact on oysters. They agreed to take on the project and became the student leaders responsible for planning the experiment, collecting data, and analyzing the results.

Christian and Luke worked closely with Grady Keopele, a Chaminade alumnus of 2015 and the owner of North Fork Big Oyster. Keopele allowed the students to conduct their research on his oyster farm and helped them understand the real challenges oyster farmers face. Having access to a working oyster farm allowed the students to test their ideas in real conditions. The research tested two different ways of controlling oyster drill snails. The first method involvedbuilding traps designed to catch the snails before they could reach the oysters. The second method used what the team called “scarecrows,” which are Ziploc bags filled with crushed oyster drill snails and placed inside oyster bags. The idea was that the presence of crushed drills would secrete a chemical which would scare away the live ones.

Over several trials from June through September, the team compared oyster bags with no protection to bags containing traps or scarecrows. The results showed that the traps with the scarecrows were the most effective in deterring the oyster drill snails. Oyster bags with scarecrows had fewer drill snails and lower oyster mortality compared to the control groups. “The scarecrows worked better than we expected,” Christian Martin said. “They made a noticeable difference in both the number of drills and the number of oysters that survived.”

Luke Martin added that the project showed how these simple solutions could help oyster farmers protect their crops. The team plans to present their research at a science fair later in April. Through this project, Christian and Luke gained experience in scientific research while contributing ideas that could help support local oyster farming and marine ecosystems.

The project highlights how students at Chaminade can take leadership roles in meaningful research and apply science to real world environmental problems.