4 June 2010 On a personal note ... It is with great sadness that I report on the passing of Homer Buck on April 30, 2010. I first met Homer during either the late 1960s or early 1970s, while I was still in graduate school. The occasion, as I recall was an American Fisheries Society meeting. Homer was a fisheries biologist with the Illinois Natural History Survey and was highly respected in the profession. He was the type of person who immediately became your best friend when you met him. Homer contacted me late last year to see if I’d be interested in publishing a paper on the potential of Asian carp to help feed the world. The paper, by Homer and a colleague, appeared in the December 2009 issue of World Aquaculture. Homer, who had suffered from a stroke some time ago, called me to express his pleasure with the article and I am very glad that he got to see it before his death. Another friend and colleague, Richard Noble, who was passing through Texas early in April, called to see if I’d be available for lunch. Rich had been on the faculty at Texas A&M with me during my first stint at the university from 1975-1984. A year or so after I left Texas A&M, Rich took a position at North Carolina State University, from which he retired a few years ago. I mentioned that we’d published Homer’s article. Rich said, “I just saw him recently.” I knew that Homer had retired in North Carolina, and of course knew that Rich was one of the multitude who were friends of Homer. In any case, Rich had visited Homer and his wife Ruth several times. We had a nice lunch, reminiscing about Homer for much of it. I had hoped to have the opportunity to get to North Carolina and see Homer, but of course that will never happen. It had been many years since I’d last seen this kind and gentle man, but I am grateful that we at least had some communication recently. Homer was a source of an incredible amount of information that he shared and disseminated through presentations, publications and personal interactions. His was a long and productive career and I kept running into his work as I was conducting my own research. His contributions to both aquaculture and fisheries were significant. Homer Buck will be remembered and sorely missed by those of us who were fortunate to have crossed his path. — Robert R. Stickney Editor-in-Chief Loss of a shrimp culture pioneer Jim Norris, one of the true pioneers of shrimp aquaculture died from pancreatic cancer on May 1, 2010 at the VNA Hospice House in Vero Beach, Florida USA. The 64-year-old native South Carolinian and graduate of the University of Miami designed and operated some of the earliest and most advanced shrimp hatcheries in the Americas. His 35-year work with shrimp hatcheries and genetic improvement programs involved long-term assignments in Honduras, Ecuador and Florida. Creative, and always with a sense of humor, Jim worked his way through the art and science of shrimp larviculture, developing successful operations and life-long friendships. In 1974, Jim interviewed for the post of hatchery manager for the project that Sea Farms, Inc. was developing in Honduras. At the time Jim had been working at the University of Miami shrimp hatchery research project at the Turkey Point Nuclear Plant. Jim’s appearance in those days was not what one would call conservative –long hair and beard – but it was clear that he was a serious marine biologist keenly interested in how best to spawn and rear shrimp and ready to devote himself to making it happen. He was an easy choice for the job. Jim headed to Honduras where over the next several years he put together the finest and largest hatchery facility and team of its time in the Western Hemisphere, if not the world. Jim started by using wild brood shrimp fished off Nicaragua, but gradually developed maturation and breeding programs and a first-class hatchery team that eventually supported over 200 ha of farm ponds. His other activities included shell collecting, fly fishing, dove hunting and Rotary Club meetings on Friday nights in Choluteca. In 1981, Jim returned Miami to head up the hatchery phase of Sea Farms’ international expansion plans. This included refurbishing the original hatchery facility at Summerland Key to house the company’s breeding and maturation program. In 1983, he moved to Ecuador to build the hatchery for Sea Farms’ El Rosario project. Three years later he returned to the Miami office to supervise hatchery operations and investigate other locations for company expansion, particularly in Brazil. Jim returned to Summerland Key in 1988 to refurbish and reopen the hatchery to provide postlarvae (PL) for the Sea Farms Granjas Marinas San Bernardo joint venture in Honduras He also reinstituted the breeding and maturation program that had been temporarily shut down. The hatchery started operating in 1990 and quickly went from its design capac- (Continued on page 71)
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