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Colleague Randy Rouse suggested Hodson talk with father\/son team Lee and Harvey Brothers in Beaufort County. “It was the beginning of a great relationship,\u201d Hodson explains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lee Brothers agrees. \u201cI consider Ron a true<\/em> friend,\u201d he says. \u201cRon is a phenomenal man. He’s got so much common sense along with his academic sense.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n And Hodson challenged him to stay focused on the goal \u2014 even if it meant going into a pond in February to sample fish. “If he was going in, I had to do it too,” Brothers adds with a laugh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The first year, the team lost a lot of fish \u2014 but not their determination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lundie Spence, former North Carolina Sea Grant marine educator, recalls going to the farm one Saturday with Ron. A parasite was threatening thousands of baby bass. “Ron was with the family the whole time, sharing the stress, bringing in the experts and added support,” Spence explains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By 1988, the team had the first demonstration crop \u201470,000 pounds of pond-raised hybrid striped bass for the food market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The previous year, Jim Carlsburg, in a private venture in California, had the first commercial production of hybrids in tanks. The combined industry \u2014 including ponds mid tanks \u2014 took off, thanks in part to a moratorium on striped bass fishing in the Chesapeake region in light of declining natural stocks, along with new fishing limits in other states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n North Carolina proved to be ideal for pond aquaculture \u2014 with its clay-\u00adbased soils and flat coastal plain. The Castle Hayne aquifer provided great quantity and quality of water for aquaculture, with especially good calcium levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The N.C. General Assembly recognized economic potential in coastal aquaculture, and appropriated $400,000 for NC State to hire researchers and extension staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The group included researcher Craig Sullivan, who joined NC State to focus on the reproductive physiology, and later genetics. Hodson, Sullivan and others worked with the Brothers at Carolina Fisheries, and with other new fish farmers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Ron provided great service to these ‘green’ farmers,\u201d Sullivan says. \u201cHe took them under his wing, and worked boot-to-boot to teach them about critical factors \u2014 spawning, grading, and dealing with parasites, pathogens and water quality management.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n At one point, the state had more than 20 hybrid striped bass farms. Today, 19 are still operating. About 3 million pounds are produced here annually \u2014 a quarter of the 12 million pounds produced nationally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A founding member of the Striped Bass Growers Association, Hodson helped write the bylaws and served as president, secretary and on the board of directors. He continues to serve as the “special scientific advisor” to a national breeding program to develop a domesticated broodstock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “In my view, Ron Hodson is the father of the pond-reared hybrid striped bass,\u201d Sullivan says. “It was a visionary undertaking on his part.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Copeland agrees. “From research to big business \u2014 it is a world-\u00adfamous accomplishment.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 1997, Hodson was named interim director for North Carolina Sea Grant, and in 1998 became full director.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Less than a year later, his life would change dramatically.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After a national aquaculture meeting in Florida in January 1999, he and Ruthie were visiting friends. A flight in the friend’s small plane ended in a tragic crash. Ruthie and the pilot’s wife died from extensive injuries. Ron and the pilot would spend weeks in hospitals and months in physical therapy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite physical pain and emotional trauma. Hodson found strength in family, friends and his work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I never once heard him complain about his situation. I only saw his determination to continue to live life to its fullest,” says Johnson, who often seeks out Hodson’s table at banquets and meetings. “We love listening to him talk and listening to the passion he has for Sea Grant and coastal North Carolina.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hodson now uses canes to walk short distances and a wheelchair to maneuver along longer routes \u2014 and as a comfortable seat for long meetings. The accident also changed his management style. “I had to learn to delegate more,\u201d he says with a smile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In his nine years at the helm of North Carolina Sea Grant, Hodson says he has seen the program’s “buying power” decrease in light of rising costs. “We must change the way we do business. We will be looking for additional sources of funding,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While they have different personalities and styles, Hodson says that he continues to use lessons he learned from Copeland. “B.J. showed the strength of a diverse program based on needs identified by stakeholders.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n During his tenure, Hodson says he has strengthened the review process for research proposals. And many Sea Grant projects are multidisciplinary in order to provide the best science on pressing coastal topics, he adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We’ve always had a great staff: extension, communications and administrative,” Hodson says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many new outreach staff members are arriving with advanced degrees \u2014 a sign of the times. “They’re not teaching folks how to catch fish better. We are helping people deal with regulations and manage coastal resources,\u201d Hodson says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sea Grant also has administered the state’s Fishery Resource Grant Program (FRG) since 1997. “Every year, the quality of the proposals improves,” Hodson says. “This was our strongest year yet.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n The FRG program, along with the Blue Crab Research Program also funded by the state, strives to pair researchers with academics. Rather than ”butting heads,” the two groups often now partner to test theories based on local knowledge of fisheries and ecosystems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “If we are going to solve some of these management questions, they are going to have to work together,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hodson has provided leadership to the national Sea Grant network as well, including serving on the board of the Sea Grant Association and as the directors’ liaison to the Assembly of Sea Grant Extension Program Leaders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A few years after the plane crash, Hodson was ready to start thinking about dating \u2014 a daunting task for someone who had been married for 36 years. He tried a modern tactic, online dating services, with varying success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But it was an old-fashioned introduction by friend Joan Messina, a former Sea Grant But it was an old-fashioned introduction by friend Joan Messina, a former Sea Grant employee, along with encouragement from Todd, that led Ron to ask Kay to dinner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What was her response? She wondered what took him so long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They were married within a year. She brought two married daughters to the family, and Todd married the next year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Family \u2014 which now includes five grandchildren \u2014 will play a leading role in Hodson’s “so-called” retirement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And a new van will get mileage as he and Kay plan some travels, especially during winter months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hodson also plans to stay active professionally, with an emeritus role in NC State’s zoology department and an interest in new marine aquaculture opportunities. Folks are already asking him to serve on state and national committees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He also will make time for personal projects, albeit with the family flair. He plans an expanded garden on his 20 acres near Apex, to provide fresh vegetables for his table and others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And he may even raise a ”heritage breed” of chicken known as Buckeyes. Not a bad plan for a farm kid from Ohio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This article was published in the Early Summer 2006<\/a> issue of <\/em>Coastwatch.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"Hodson](\"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2017\/04\/Hodson-checks-hsb-eggs_web.jpg\")
A Lesson in Leadership<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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New Plans<\/h2>\n\n\n\n