Incorporating ecology into the design of built structures or “eco-engineering” is becoming
increasingly common worldwide to mitigate impacts from coastal development and help restore
biodiversity to urban seascapes. Restoration of biogenic habitats such as shellfish reefs, on built
structures enhance biodiversity through the reintroduction of key habitat features. Shellfish
reefs support significant biodiversity throughout Australasia through habitat creation. However,
these reefs have experienced significant global declines due to overharvesting, loss of habitat,
and increasing intensity of environmental stressors. This study investigates eco-engineering as
a tool to facilitate the recruitment of native bivalves and support shellfish restoration efforts.
The first part of this research investigates drivers of recruitment, settlement, and population
development of New Zealand native habitat forming species to design artificial structures that
can promote native biodiversity in built marine environments, using the bivalve Perna
canaliculus as a model organism. The second part of this research investigates mussel
distributions and demography among eco-engineered habitats with differing complexities in the
field. A thorough understanding of how populations change with differing surface complexity
both in the natural and artificial environment can be used to inform and enhance management
plans for restoration in human-altered environments. However, do eco-engineering and
shellfish really get along?