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CapitalPress.com
December 8, 2017
People & Places
Quest for sustainable aquaculture
Ron Hardy built a
fisheries research
program respected
around the world
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
Ron Hardy has built a
world-class fish research fa-
cility at the University of Ida-
ho and is one of the top schol-
ars in his field worldwide.
His work has advanced the
scientific knowledge of fish
nutrition and genomics and
sustainable aquaculture and
has contributed substantially
to fisheries management.
His dedication, commit-
ment and tenacity no doubt
have played a huge part in that
success — but it might not
have happened without fate’s
intervention.
“I wanted to be a doctor,
or I thought I wanted to be a
doctor,” Hardy said, sitting in
his office at the University of
Idaho Hagerman Fish Culture
Experiment Station.
He enrolled in a pre-med
program at the University of
Washington and worked at
the Northern Pacific Railroad
moving boxcars to pay his
way through college.
After earning a bachelor’s
degree in zoology in 1969,
he went to work at the uni-
versity’s medical school as
a research technologist for
doctors working with patients
with kidney diseases. He
worked there for two years
but decided medicine was not
for him.
He instead wanted to go
into agriculture like his father,
who had moved the family
from Canada to Washington
when Hardy was a baby to
manage Washington State
University’s poultry farm.
Zoology was a little too
academic for his taste, how-
ever, and he wanted to pursue
practical research. That took
him to Washington State Uni-
versity to work on an inter-
disciplinary degree from the
departments of animal scienc-
es, biochemistry and food and
human nutrition.
The book
And it was there, on a rou-
tine trip to the library, he hap-
pened upon a book that would
change his life.
That book — “Fish Nutri-
tion” by John Halver — had
never even been checked out,
but it was groundbreaking, he
said.
The state of knowledge
about fish nutrition at the time
was “zip” and 30 years behind
the progress that had been
made on nutrition for other
animals, he said.
The concept was “some-
thing new” and the book was
a “gold mine,” he said.
Halver’s book was pretty
advanced for fish nutrition,
but research on nutritional
needs and requirements was
just getting started in that are-
na.
Halver was a biochemist
working for U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service and ap-
proached fish nutrition from
a biochemical and physio-
logical standpoint. He was
the first person to put fish
nutrition in line with pigs,
chickens and humans, Hardy
said.
“So that appealed to me a
Calendar
Carol Ryan Dumas/Capital Press
Ron Hardy, director of the University of Idaho Aquaculture Research Institute, examines a sample at
the Hagerman Fish Culture Experiment Station on Nov. 27.
lot. He was a visionary,” he
said.
Halver’s knowledge would
make it possible to develop
fish feed in pellet form to effi-
ciently raise fish on farms.
“I saw that right off the
bat when I read his book,” he
said.
After earning a master’s
degree in nutrition in 1973,
Hardy went back to the Uni-
versity of Washington to study
fish nutrition in a doctoral
program. In the middle of his
studies, Halver took a position
as a professor at the university
and was a member of Hardy’s
supervisory committee. He
was Hardy’s main adviser on
his Ph.D. research project on
fish nutrition, and Hardy was
his teaching assistant.
Their association would
last decades and result in their
publishing a third edition of
Halver’s book together.
In the field
After earning a Ph.D.
in fisheries in 1978, Hardy
joined the university’s fish-
eries research faculty, taught
some classes — including
Halver’s introductory class
for undergraduates — and
procured grants and contracts.
A federal fisheries labora-
tory — with nice equipment
— was nearby, and he started
going there to use that equip-
ment. Eventually, he was
invited to work there at the
Northwest Fisheries Science
Center in a two-year intergov-
ernmental exchange program.
Upon completion, he was of-
fered a permanent position at
the laboratory.
He was advised to take
a leave from the university
without pay so he could return
and take over Halver’s posi-
tion when he retired, which
was expected in the not-so-
distant future.
“There was just one flaw
— Halver didn’t retire,” he
said.
Hardy remained at the
Northwest Fisheries Science
Center for 12 years and was
being groomed for an exec-
utive position when he got
a call from an associate at
the University of Idaho who
wanted him to apply for a po-
sition with the university.
He wasn’t interested, but at
the associate’s insistence re-
luctantly visited the universi-
ty, where a meeting had been
arranged — unbeknownst to
Hardy — with the university
president.
What was presented was a
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Western Innovator
Ron Hardy
Occupation: Director, University of
Idaho Aquaculture Research Institute
since 2002
Career: 1996 to present — University
of Idaho, professor, animal and vet-
erinary sciences; director of Hagerman Fish Culture Experiment
Station (until 2016). 1984-1996 — Supervisory research chemist,
Northwest Fisheries Science Center, NOAA Fisheries, Seattle.
1984-1996 — research assistant, associate and full professor,
University of Washington School of Fisheries, Seattle
Education: Ph.D. in fisheries, University of Washington, 1979;
master’s degree in nutrition, Washington State University, 1973;
bachelor’s degree in zoology, University of Washington, 1969
Author or co-author: More than 300 scientific papers on fish
nutrition
Honors: World Aquaculture Society lifetime achievement award;
Jean’ne Shreeve National Science Foundation EPSCoR research
excellence award; University of Idaho innovation award.
brief synopsis of what univer-
sities in the West were doing
in aquaculture and what the
University of Idaho was as-
piring to do.
“I was blown away. I was
amazed,” he said.
Later, the university flew
him in to meet with legislators
and industry people and to see
a federal laboratory in Hager-
man that had been mothballed
by U.S. Fish and Wildlife.
“The university had leased
it and wanted me to create
something out of it,” he said.
It was a small cinder-block
facility that didn’t even meet
fire codes, but Hardy would
have money to get started and
the university’s blessing to do
whatever he wanted.
“How can you resist that?
So I took the job,” he said.
He was set at his job in
Washington, was offered the
directorship of the fisheries
center if he stayed, and no
one could believe he walked
away, he said.
“But I decided it was time
for a change. I jumped at it.
Six months later, I thought I
made the biggest mistake of
my life,” he said.
Creating something out of
nothing — something new
that’s not bumping up against
entrenched, successful labora-
tories — and making it work
is not easy, he said.
“That’s when I decided to
put the emphasis on genom-
ics,” he said.
Technology and equip-
ment to study genes was just
becoming available, and ge-
nomics could be used to mea-
sure how the body responds at
the gene level, he said.
“It’s going down a whole
other level to see how life
works,” he said.
But getting a start-up pro-
gram off the ground wasn’t
easy.
Growing an institute
The research program Har-
dy was trying to develop came
under the university’s Aqua-
culture Research Institute.
A research institute operates
outside the culture of colleges
within the university, which
each have a dean and their own
faculty positions. It’s meant to
facilitate interdisciplinary sci-
ence programs and research
efforts, and there are no posi-
tions just sitting there, he said.
He was unable to get fac-
ulty positions for the program
within the colleges, making it
hard to hire top people. The
fledgling research station was
operating with post-doctoral
graduates and temporary posi-
tions. Undeterred, Hardy con-
tacted USDA and proposed
setting up an Agricultural Re-
search Service fish program at
the station.
The response was “we’d
love to do that if you can find
the money,” he said.
He found that money in
1999 through then-Sen. Lar-
ry Craig, who created an ear-
mark for that funding in the
federal budget and over time
moved into base funding for
USDA and four full-time re-
search positions at the station.
The station’s work in pop-
ulation genetics for Native
American tribes, hoping to
bring back salmon popula-
tions in the Columbia River,
also created positions at the
station. That work proved so
useful the Columbia River
Inter-Tribal Fish Commission
set up its own program in col-
laboration with the station in
2004.
The university’s partner-
ships with USDA-ARS and
CRITFC expanded the sta-
tion’s capacity and technolo-
gy, particularly in genomics,
which has been its driving
force.
Genomics has a funda-
mental capacity to allow re-
searchers to go in different
directions, such as population
genetics to better manage
fisheries, enhanced food fish
production, selective breeding
and sustainable aquaculture,
Hardy said.
And those are exactly the
things Hardy and the teams
at the station have been doing
for the past two decades.
Hardy’s research has been
focused on fish nutrition, in-
cluding developing sustain-
able feed sources for the glob-
al aquaculture industry.
“We’re really known for
that, and we’re really known
for the trout selective-breed-
ing program with USDA,” he
said.
Research at the facility has
doubled the growth rate of
trout, enhanced disease resis-
tance and led to fish that can
thrive on a vegetarian diet —
all geared at sustainable aqua-
culture.
“The things we do here
are applicable worldwide,” he
said.
What’s next
Hardy’s goal is to integrate
nutrition and genetic selec-
tion into a holistic program
to address all components of
fish health across the globe.
He also wants to expand the
university’s efforts into fish-
eries health management, and
a new facility on the Mos-
cow campus for research into
salmon and marine species is
set to come online next year.
The most rewarding part of
his career is “making this hap-
pen out of nothing,” and he’s
had a lot of support in that
endeavor from the university,
elected officials and industry,
he said.
“When you have that sup-
port, you can do a lot,” he
said.
“To build a sustainable,
smoothly running, respected
research laboratory is just a
dream come true,” he said.
What he’s most proud of,
however, is training graduate
students and researchers from
all over the world, he said.
In addition to directing the
university’s Aquaculture Re-
search Institute since 2002,
Hardy also works on salmon
and steelhead hatchery and
recovery issues in the Pacif-
ic Northwest with state and
federal agencies and Native
American tribes.
He has traveled extensive-
ly throughout the world to
present lectures, consult and
work on behalf of internation-
al organizations, such as the
Food and Agriculture Organi-
zation of the United Nations
and the European Commis-
sion.
Just recently, he was rec-
ognized for his contributions
with a lifetime achievement
award from the World Aqua-
culture Society.
As for the future, he’s com-
mitted to getting the new re-
search facility at Moscow up
and running and will probably
do a “soft” retirement until
he’s sees that through. He’s
also planning to put out a new
edition of “Fish Nutrition” and
fully retiring “someday.”
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Index
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Dairy .................................... 17
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Opinion .................................. 6
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