Farmed and Dangerous...

[Birdsnest]

Strong post.

Ya sure. Not so much after you actually READ the link I put up.

Here it is again.

http://tidescanada.org/wp-content/u...Hicks_-_The_History_of_Salmon_Aquaculture.pdf

The link is from tides canada, a trusty source of info!

 

[Birdsnest]

Weird. New Zealand bans farm salmon but farms them too. HMMM how could that be? What a bunch of whack jobs or is the article just not accurate.

 

[Birdsnest]

Any salmon without its color is going to be blah grey coloured. Look at white springs. Nothing wrong with them.

 

[agentaqua]

I read the link BN. Not sure how you obtain an informed rebuttal out of:
The Perfect Storm
• Within about 4 years about 127 farm sites were leased to the industry.
• Salmon farms were established on the Sunshine coast and Gulf Islands
• Followed by farms being placed in the Alberni Canal and Tofino Inlet

Maybe you could elaborate?...

 

[agentaqua]

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/04/13/salmon-confidential.aspx

 

[Birdsnest]

GLG post this:

Explain this Pal....

in the 70's and early 80's Coho smolt survival rates were 10 to 15%
Your industry shows up and the Coho smolt survival rates drop to less then 1%

In the 70's and early 80's Chinook smolt survival rates were 4 and 12%
Your industry shows up and now the Chinook smolt survival rate drop to 0.2 to 0.6%

I got those numbers from DFO....

I guess I have to spell it out for you since you missed it and I suspected you might.

From the article:

Public salmon ranching was very popular in the Pacific from California to Alaska.
• There was great expansion of salmon hatcheries and the ranching of salmon throughout the 70’s and early 80’s
• Salmon ranching remains the dominant form of aquaculture on west coast of North America.

By 1986/1987 several farms were established on the Sunshine coast

Seems to me that alaskan salmon ranching aligns perfectly with the dates GLG posts. IT is obvious you don't want to go there.

On the topic of feed, look who uses more feed than canada on their salmon operations:

http://alaskasalmonranching.wordpre...-his-less-than-sharp-opinion-about-fish-meal/

 

[agentaqua]

so from 1988 to 1992, the industry expanded from a few sites on the Sunshine Coast (i.e. the entrance to the Discovery Islands area that Cohen identified) to 127 sites, including the Broughtons. This (if I am getting you correctly) had no impact? on migrating wild stocks through these areas?

 

[Birdsnest]

I certainly would not say no impact. And whats your answerer to your question in regards the alaskan salmon ranching and its timelines they seem to align perfectly or, are you just not going there? Why is that. Dang! that star spangled banner tune is in my head now. lol

 

[agentaqua]

IF one had all the data - one could put it all through some sort of multivariate analysis to sort-out what proportions of decreases in ocean survival are found with what data. One would need both large-scale and watershed-specific ocean survival rates, as well as exact dates and expansion by biomass of the open net-cage industry. It would be a bit of an undertaking beyond my time and capabilities to do such an analysis.

Yes - there is an upper limit to the ocean's productivity and typically fish get smaller at returns when food is limited. If they get small enough - it could affect ocean survival. However, some of these potential size effects would be compounded by selective fishing for the larger individuals by gill net mesh sizes. So, it would be difficult to tease that exact component out of this mega data set.

I think the easiest way (as I mentioned) would be to compare Northern and Southern farm and no-farm ocean survival rates, using the time frames for farm expansion as a potential indicator of effects.

 

[Dave]

A wasted life followed by a curious retirement, how sad. I hope you can golf or garden well, or at least have a child or two you are proud of. Sorry to be so personal, but you need to understand it's not too late for you to make a positive contribution to something/anything before you can't.

Wow, that's the best one yet! I've been told to go away, go home to my mother, f*** off but never that I've wasted my life doing something I loved.
I do appreciate your concern for my future after my 'curious' retirement, though. Very thoughtful.

Thanks Birdnest.

 

[Englishman]

Agent, you realize that in one sentence you promote open honest dialogue then the next moment you go and hand pick the topics you want to discuss. What about my concerns about whats I honestly believe to be false?

What you “believe” is false or what you have independent scientific evidence proving it is false? There is a difference Birdsnest. Myself and Agent post scientifically researched information and links to the original papers published in reputable journals, but you and Dave ignore the evidence and never respond in any reasoned and scientific manner to them. You just fall back on your “beliefs”.

Englishman plays the same card. One moment suggesting in this discussion that pinks are doing well for they may not take a northern rout. Then the next moment he is saying that skeena socks poor returns are likely tied to salmon farms anyways. WTF?

What I did was respond to Dave’s (continued) sneering dismissal of the evidence in the links to the papers I put I up and countered his claim that everything is fine cos’ the pinks are great now and next year the Fraser sockeye will be too. This is the same silly argument climate change deniers use when they say “hey we had a really cold winter in Redneck, Wis, this year so all the scientists must be wrong”!. The science uses data that looks at many factors over a long period of time and produces overall conclusions, trends and analyses for the various constituent systems and the whole system where possible.
Pinks and sockeye are two different species which spend different lengths of time in freshwater and in coastal feeding areas. I pointed out the pink runs need to be analysed to see which way they migrated (inside or outside)and which went past salmon feed lots before drawing conclusions. Diseases may or may not affect pinks and sockeye the same. Also diseases do travel. In 2010, tons of Fraser sockeye were taken north to Prince Rupert for processing just as wild salmon were passing through this effluent and entering the Skeena. The generation of juvenile sockeye that were in the system rearing, are the generation that crashed this year and are now dying before spawning in unprecedented numbers. So the distinct possibility that these mortalities are tied to salmon feed lots is there. The dedicated researchers looking at this problem now will tell us the answers – not your “beliefs”.

Back to the topic, you can thank films like salmon confidential and now this water brothers piece for fuelling the fire. Like agent says we need to have honest dialogue and information and these pieces are works of art crafted far a cause that lacks honesty. Hey but what the heck eh as the courts has stated with staniford case if you honestly believe what you are saying as true than you are not guilty of anything but this leaves the public guessing or mislead.

For you to attack the cause for which these films have been made as “lacking in honesty” is the height of hypocrisy on your part. The research and science is there. But you ignore it or denigrate the hard working people who produce it, and hint darkly at “conspiracies or agendas”. Get real, your industry is dishonest because all it cares about is money, not wild salmon, not the environment, not first nations culture.

The moderators are not going to say anything so the public who reads this stuff probably gets a poor impression of the sport fishing community that I am a part of. Embarrassing. Their website....whatever......probably some americans that own it.

On the contrary, people like Agent have put up some very well reasoned and full posts that explain the science of the feed lot impacts and the very poor legislative oversight that this government and the DFO have applied to the salmon feed lot industry. It really shows up your industry as you “devout believers” cannot answer it in an informed and logical way but attempt to do so with posts like this one.
And there you go again. Hinting at conspiracies…the Americans are to blame etc etc. Climate change deniers do that too and try and convince the gullible there is a giant scientific conspiracy and that IPCC are part of it. Totally ludicrous!!

 

[Charlie]

I certainly would not say no impact. And whats your answerer to your question in regards the alaskan salmon ranching and its timelines they seem to align perfectly or, are you just not going there? Why is that. Dang! that star spangled banner tune is in my head now. lol

BN, I don’t mind going there at all!

Since all of the BC salmon species actually migrate to different areas of the North Pacific, why don’t you pick the specific salmon you want to “try” to accuse the Alaskan salmon ranching of having an impact? Or, should we just start with Alaska does NOT “ranch” ANY Sockeye – it is all from natural runs! Or, how about all those Pink, Chum, and Chinook that actually migrate into the Bering Sea, where your BC salmon NEVER migrate to? I guess you are going to try and tell and convince everyone those few Coho Alaska releases (that actually do stay in the Gulf of Alaska) really has that much effect on the BC runs?

"Dang! that star spangled banner tune is in my head now." lol

 

[Charlie]

Finally the Skeena sockeye run collapsed this year. Salmon feed lots probably played a role in that one.

Really? Now who's jumping the gun ..

Maybe, maybe not! Let’s see how many Skeena Sockeye show up with those lovely diseases from all YOUR diseased Atlantic salmon that were processed up there – releasing and exposing all the Skeena salmon to YOUR lovely Norwegian diseases!

 

[agentaqua]

Maybe, maybe not! Let’s see how many Skeena Sockeye show up with those lovely diseases from all YOUR diseased Atlantic salmon that were processed up there – releasing and exposing all the Skeena salmon to YOUR lovely Norwegian diseases!

I think this noticeable silence from the FF boosters is called "oops!!".

 

[Birdsnest]

Far from opps. I feel that you fellas are so distracted by your farm hating that you cant even for a moment show a speck of concern about alaskan salmon ranching. To me its quite telling. A response in not always required.

 

[agentaqua]

Far from opps. I feel that you fellas are so distracted by your farm hating that you cant even for a moment show a speck of concern about alaskan salmon ranching. To me its quite telling. A response in not always required.

1st - if you look back a few posts - you will see that I responded to this issue - and talked about decreases in size as a surrogate for ocean capacity.

2nd - Alaskan ranching differs from open net-pen Atlantic salmon culture from smolts to grow-out size by several important factors - one of the more important factors being the length of time smolts are held in cages. For Alaskan ranching it is a matter of weeks during late spring/early summer. For Atlantic salmon culture - it is some 18 or so months through at least 1 full juvenile outmigration period, maybe 2.

3rd - Because we disagree that open net-pen technology provides inadequate risk-adverse strategies to mitigate wild-cultured stock interactions does not necessarily mean we "hate" you or your industry. Just because we strongly disagree over the BS and cover-ups, and fear for what legacy we are leaving behind - and demand accountability - means those concerns should be taken seriously by legislators and regulators who are supposed to be working for the public. Painting those who disagree with your perspective as "haters" is a unfortunately well-used tactic by your industry PR types in order to shift the discussion away from sticky topics and denigrate the legitimate concerns from the public. Thanks for demonstrating that tactic here.

 

[tincan]

Report released today says 9 in 10 scientists in Canada fear to speak freely to the media about the work they do and that, faced with a departmental decision that could harm public health, safety or the environment, nearly as many (86%) would face censure or retaliation for doing so. Any you wonder why there are so many of us 'radicals' on this forum who are upset with the current federal government policy. Good policy must be informed by science and that is simply not the case here in Canada at the moment. Whether we are talking about fish farms, food safety, medicine, resources, education, and on and on science and research should be at the forefront in terms of policy decision making ... and that is clearly not the case under the Harper gov't.

If anyone would like to make an attempt to justify this muzzling and suppression of public information I wish you luck.

http://www.pipsc.ca/portal/page/portal/website/issues/science/bigchill

Invitations to participate in the online survey, hosted by Environics Research, were sent to 15,398 PIPSC members – scientists, researchers and engineers – engaged in scientific work in over 40 federal departments and agencies. Of these, 4,069 (26%) responded between June 5 and 19, 2013. The survey is considered accurate + or – 1.6%, 19 times out of 20.

 

[Rum Buddies]

Far from opps. I feel that you fellas are so distracted by your farm hating that you cant even for a moment show a speck of concern about alaskan salmon ranching. To me its quite telling. A response in not always required.

To me it sounds like you want to point the finger another direction and deflect the criticism.

 

[trophywife]

Still waiting for an answer to my simple question.. Why not land base farming?

 

[cuttlefish]

Report released today says 9 in 10 scientists in Canada fear to speak freely to the media about the work they do and that, faced with a departmental decision that could harm public health, safety or the environment, nearly as many (86%) would face censure or retaliation for doing so. Any you wonder why there are so many of us 'radicals' on this forum who are upset with the current federal government policy. Good policy must be informed by science and that is simply not the case here in Canada at the moment. Whether we are talking about fish farms, food safety, medicine, resources, education, and on and on science and research should be at the forefront in terms of policy decision making ... and that is clearly not the case under the Harper gov't.

If anyone would like to make an attempt to justify this muzzling and suppression of public information I wish you luck.

http://www.pipsc.ca/portal/page/portal/website/issues/science/bigchill

Invitations to participate in the online survey, hosted by Environics Research, were sent to 15,398 PIPSC members – scientists, researchers and engineers – engaged in scientific work in over 40 federal departments and agencies. Of these, 4,069 (26%) responded between June 5 and 19, 2013. The survey is considered accurate + or – 1.6%, 19 times out of 20.

Wow. That pretty much says it all. Thanks, TC.
Just hoping Information Commissioner Suzanne Legault releases the report from her inquiry before the next election.