Comments on: Fish farming endangers wild salmon

By: Nomlas

Nomlas — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 19:32:57 +0000

I am on the EAST COAST where all this mess started! The Industry and DFO sing the same song:::SHOW US THE SMOKING GUN!!

OK here is another bullet in the chamber. Salmon farming started in the Bay of Fundy in the late 70’s. By 1986 it was up to full commercial production. By the late 80’s we noticed our our population of Inner Fundy wild salmon stocks were crashing. Same old story from Industry and DFO: NOT US!! Really.

The Inner Bay stocks were unique since they only migrated to the Quoddy/Grand Manan area to return as grilse a year later.

Want to guess where the salmon pens are? Yes right in the middle of their feeding areas. The pens were fighting of sea lice and ISA from the get go just like Norweigh, Scotland, Ireland and Chile.

The cycle goes like this in the pens. Sea lice infestation, treat with Slice or Alphamax, sea lice return, treat again stressing the fish in the pen and BINGO ISA appears in the farm.

At the same time our wild stocks are swimming outside the pens in the same water. ISA is transmitted through the water to our wild salmon. WHO has inoculated our wild stocks? Who treated them for sea lice? Who asked the people of the bay if we were willing to sacrifice our Public Resources to generate a profit for the Industry?

Right now the Chile industry is in free fall from ISA and sea lice, ISA has reappeared in Scotland and Norweigh. The Bliss Harbour Salmon Industry in New Brunswick now has SLICE RESISTANT sea lice and they have stepped up to the next most stressful and deadly chemical. There is only one small problem. The chemical kill more that the sea lice. It also kills lobsters, clams,mussels, and it builds up in scallops.

ISA will reappear just like it has everywhere else the industry is located.

There is only TWO SOLUTION to the problems caused by the Salmon pens! GET THEM OUT OF OUR WATERS or CLOSED CONTAINMENT!!

Do it now before everything is gone including YOUR industry!!!!!!!

By: WestCoaster

WestCoaster — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 17:17:08 +0000

For links to Aquaculture infomation you can visit: www.aquacultureassociation.ca www.salmonfarmers.org Or if you want to visit the official DFO page at: http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/aquaculture/aquaculture-eng.htm

By: WestCoaster

WestCoaster — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 17:03:43 +0000

The living conditions of these fish are the best possible.
The farms are positioned in areas of high tidal flow and high dissolved oxygen when possible.
When neccessary we add oxygen into the water by diffusing microbubbles and have a number of different methods to protect them from harmful algae blooms.
Fish are naturally gregarious and will school closely together even when in low densities ( fish are entered into the ocean at roughly 100 grams into about a 15000 cubic meter pen )
When they grow to a harvestable size ( around 5 kilograms ) they will still be at densities of less than 18 kg per m3.
Stress causes low growth rates and death.
Low growth rates and death cost money.
It is in our best interest to have the fishes best interest in mind with everything we do.
When they are handled, euthanized or harvested it is always done humanely.
Salmon can be fragile creatures and if we did not provide the best possible environment we would not be able to raise such an excellent product.

By: Barrie Hawes

Barrie Hawes — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:56:05 +0000

WestCoaster
You are making all kinds of claims, but where is your science?

By: Mi Kai Lee

Mi Kai Lee — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 05:54:36 +0000

WestCoaster — you make some very good points. But in the end, all creatures are sentient and intelligent, and they get stressed when they are removed from their natural habitat and their freedom of movement is limited. Just like humans, stress takes a toll on health. It is no different for any creature — unless you think they are somehow without intelligence and without feelings, which would be a pretty arrogant presumption to make.

So I think the focus here should really be on the living conditions of these salmon, how they are being treated, what they are being forced to sacrifice in the name of profit (other than their lives). Surely this ‘profit’ thing is only (arguably) a benefitt for humans, not a benefit to the whole of creation on earth. In the big picture what is the merit of salmon farms, or any other kind of institution that incarcerates and kills living creatures? (This is a rhetorical question, not one that I am inviting a debate on.)

By: WestCoaster

WestCoaster — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 02:10:49 +0000

I am sorry that humour was one of things to have been lost on the path to equal capacity.
Salmon stocks have been reduced from their once bountiful numbers by humans acting in every possible manner of irresponsibility.
Entire runs have been decimated by commercial ventures including canneries dotting the entire coast which would process and ship huge numbers of fish.
Sockeye, being the most sought after suffered the most.
Along with them the Chinook and Coho were targeted by ever increasing numbers of technologically advanced seine and gill net fleets.
Recreational fishing ( which I admit I enjoy at every possible opportunity ) also takes its toll.
To make matters worse we ( irresponsible humans ) have logged the watersheds which clean and cool the river water salmon rely on and ruined countless waterways with urban development.
The only chance that salmon have to stay part of our world is for us to stop eating them, put money into enhancement hatcheries and save some of their spawning grounds from ruin.
Aquaculture feeds people effectively and has a very low impact. Its that simple.
It is efficient – fish convert food at nearly 1 to 1 ( and less than half of that is protein ) Any warmblooded creature will never break 3 to 1 ( and most are fed fishmeal )
It is clean – fish poo released back into the ocean is utilised by microoganisms and bivalves as well as crustaceans – which all form the bottom of the food chain. It also helps to keep the acidity of the ocean down and provides calcium for shellfish and zooplankton to form their shells and exoskeletons.
To compare it with landbased farms such as chickens, pigs or cows is completely inaccurate. Warm-blooded poo was never meant to be part of the oceans or freshwater systems.
Polyculture involves harvesting multiple species out of one farm with salmon being at the top of the trophic chain. Fish poop goes all the way down through mussels, barnacles, oysters, sea cucumbers and feeds them.
Salmon farms are not wastelands in the ocean, they support a huge variety of life.
When positioned properly the tidal flow diffuses the waste and turns it into manna from heaven for all sorts of things on the bottom.
Farmed salmon only receive medication if they are sick. On average less than 2% of all feed given to any fish will contain any sort of drug.
Any poultry, pork or beef product will have been given antibiotics in almost all of their feed.
This of course excludes any organic farms.
Sea Lice – The sea lice that have been found to affect Pink and Chum smolts entering the ocean( the only ones small enough at that point to be affected by these parasites ) are a different species than the ones we deal with on salmon farms.
You mean they are not all the same thing? Thats right. Sea lice come in many forms.
The sea lice that have decimated the Atlantic salmon and sea trout stocks are passed by the Atlantic salmon farmed in the same waters. They are a particularly nasty species of louse that will actually consume the fish and not just live off the slime and scales.
There is more to it than the fearmongering, anti-everything leaguers like to lead you to believe.
Aquaculture is the way of the future and should be supported.
When was the last time you ate anything “wild” that you didn’t shoot, trap or catch yourself.

By: Mi Kai Lee

Mi Kai Lee — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 20:20:33 +0000

Salmon are “not that smart”? Since humans are about the dumbest creatures out there (judging by their actions) – how could a human possibly know whether a salmon is smart. Did you ask the salmon?

Wherever did we get this idea that homo sapiens is the best game in town? I thought all of creation was endowed with the same innate intelligence – since we all share the same creator. How can a human be smarter than a salmon? I think all creatures have equal capacity – it’s just that humans don’t seem to want to know that, want to act like they are above everything else.

Where on earth did we get that elitist idea?

By: Barrie Hawes

Barrie Hawes — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 17:34:57 +0000

WestCoaster;
Please tell us about the “misinformation”. Where is your “information”?

Thanks

By: WestCoaster

WestCoaster — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 17:31:37 +0000

Hi there Mi Kai Lee!
I figured you would have something to say about this!
Of course I should have used the term “raise”.
I feed them, they grow.
I think that you and Alexandra would get along “swimmingly”
The fact remains that there are so few salmon left because they are not that smart, not because of lice.
If they were smart they would come back to different rivers every time and we wouldn’t be waiting with different types of nets and canneries to so efficiently wipe them out.

By: Mi Kai Lee

Mi Kai Lee — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 06:35:44 +0000

You grow our own salmon, really? I thought the salmon grew themselves, or maybe nature grows them… but are humans really so cocky as to think they do the growing for these little fishies, lol

I think ‘growing’ salmon is kinda like raising GMO corn – if you do it around the wild varieties you are gonna cause ecological problems from interfering with nature. That appears to be the case here.