Farm-raised salmon article

[Greg]

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water... http://www.ontherail.com/issues/issu...on/salmon.html

[SeattleDeb]

Oh Greg.... <SIGH>...but thanks for the post...just when you also think you're being healthy...I've bought a lot of farm-raised for us to eat.

Appreciate the info.

At least they had the honesty to admit their bias. The farm-raised salmon thing has become something of a politically correct issue for the beautiful people and assorted wannabes. Sure salmon farming causes some environmental problems - so does cattle ranching, pig farming, wheat farming, etc. - the objective should be to mitigate those problems, not simply condemn an alternative to the current state of affairs, which is the near total destruction of wild populations, as has happened to cod and haddock here on the East Coast.

Just a couple corrections to errors of fact in the original article (I was a marine biologist for 20 years). I doubt that farmed salmon are much fattier, if at all, due to "lack of exercise". Salmon are around the fattiest of fish to start with. And most of the flesh that we eat in fish is not exercised in routine swimming anyway - only that little dark bit along the midline. The normal "salmon" colored flesh is only used rarely for a quick burst of speed. If farmed salmon is less firm than the wild fish (and I can't say I've ever noticed any difference in wild vs. farmed Atlantic salmon) then there must be some other cause.

[Greg]

Thanks for the corrections and extra info, Dick. I can't believe a member of the press would publish something without checking their facts! OK, maybe I can.

A little caveat for everyone: never believe what you read, unless it's from a reputable and trusted source; especially on the internet.

Excuse me but the author of that article was rased next door to, and worked most of high school in a fish farm. I know a lot about the subject, and the article was heavily researched as well.


Typical of someone who sells farm raised fish to say that it's a PC issue. It isn't. It's a quality issue. Yes it's true that there are farms raising fish in such a way that isn't so environmentally catastrophic (and I said so in the article), but the fact remains that the texture of a farm raised fish can't compete, the color is usually artificial, and the tase is not even close.

Please read the article, follow some of the links there for more info, and if you still want more, drop me an e-mail and I'll share some of my research links.nullSalmon Article

[Greg]

Here's the thing, in my opinion. Even with the "biased" warning, people could read your article and decide only to eat wild fish. This could create a drain on an already sorely depleted resource. That the farming of salmon is an environmental problem seems to be a given. So is the extinction of any wildlife species; a subject that I thought the article did not stress nearly enough. Especially when you consider that the two issues mingle. You'll have to excuse me if a took that as being journalistically irresponsible. Especially considering there is a link to a provider of wild salmon, but no mention of which farms in particular are doing a better job, environmentally speaking, in raising fish.

Perhaps, as a chef, this is a quality issue. For some of the general public, it's going to be a "save the environment" pc thing. Which isn't an entirely bad thing; I just wish people would care about it because it's the right thing to do, not just because it's cool.

Personally, I'll take the sacrifice in quality to ensure that future generations will have the opportunity to discuss which is better and hope that your article at least raises awareness of the problems that some of the fish farms are causing. Dick is definitely right in saying:

the objective should be to mitigate those problems, not simply condemn an alternative to the current state of affairs.

Greg, I see your point that if the public gets the idea to only buy wild Salmon, and lots of it, it would be bad. Very bad. However, if they are not informed of what their options are, things just keep going forward as they are and that's not good either. As I said in the article, the Marine Stewardship Council was created for this very reason. They are working to find a way to encourage sustainable rasiing and harvesting of a variety of fish.

It's not a matter of PC, cool or beautiful people. it's a matter of common sense. These ocean based farms are killing off other species, coating the floor of the oceans where crabs, clams, etc used to live with debris, and when they get sick, so does the wild population. and don't even get me started on the genetically manipulated ones in New Zealand!

yes, it's true that pig farms etc, give off a lot of manure, but it stays in one place, it's not dumped directly into lakes, rivers, or the ocean!

All I'm saying is: Farming Salmon in huge quantities in off shore pens is not the best solution to the problem. let's figure out what is.

[Greg]

Perhaps (if it's not too much trouble) you could, underneath the links for finding wild salmon put a link to msc.org's page showing which fisheries are using their guidelines for sustainable management. Equal air-time, so to speak. In other words it's not what you wrote, so much as how the page is laid out.
I agree that it's important to find a solution that will not "save" (quotations because a lot of what they're doing is bad for the wild salmon, especially the genetic manipulation! grrrr) one species at the expense of others.
BTW, regarding hog farming: the manure does not always stay in one place. It's usually not intentionally dumped into lakes and rivers, but, like the farmed salmon that escape, accidents do happen. Maybe your next article?
I think one good place to start, if someone is going to buy farmed salmon, is to point them in the right direction. Go to the Marine Stewardship Council web site, choose either the "flash site" or the "html site" (html will be the quicker one) and click on "consumers". There you will find a list of seafood companies that follow their guidelines for sustainable practices.

[ May 17, 2001: Message edited by: Greg ]

There are links there for several places to get info on farmed and wild salmon, including the MSC. I wouldn't want to swipe their list of links, but I did add another link to them on the salmon page.

BTW, did you see the BBS article on Genetically manipulated Salomon too? http://WWW.ONTHERAIL.COM/site/weeds/weeds.asp?Topic=3
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I really didn't want to jump back into this, but . . . I recognize that my 30 years of professional experience as an environmental scientist, 20 of it conducting marine research as a consultant to EPA, other government agencies, and industry; my list of publications and invited presentations at national symposia; and my experience as a Vice President in three of the world's largest environmental consulting firms pales in comparison to having worked in a fish farm in high school, but I'll stand behind my remarks anyway. I did read your article and found it to be fundamentally correct in some areas, but also to contain a clear bias, some errors of fact, and to be unnecessarily alarmist. Salmon farming is simply not one of the major environmental issues of the early 21st century, which should not be interpreted to mean that I think any associated problems should be ignored either.

The point I was trying to make is that we simply can't go on indefinitely harvesting seafood like a bunch of stone-age hunter-gatherers. Just as, about 7000 years ago, gathering of wild grains eventually developed into agriculture, and hunting wild animals eventually gave way to cattle ranching, fishing as we know it now will eventually become aquaculture. As in the case of the other examples, this is a change that does not happen in one or several lifetimes, but over periods of many centuries.

As Greg correctly took from my comments, our objective should be not to resist or avoid that natural process of change, but rather to manage the process to ensure that the fish farming and other forms of aquaculture that are developing will be conducted with proper concern for environmental issues and for their own sustainability. If nothing else, I hope we could at least agree on that.

[Chef David Simpson]

Have you guys tried the Copper River Salmon? Very good stuff!!

[Kimmie]

Hi David,

We missed you!

Have you been there by any chance
www.copperriverfestival.com/

[SeattleDeb]

Yes..CR Salmon is pretty huge here in Seattle...highly advertised "that it's coming" ...anticipated...enjoyed..then gone, only a short season.

[Live_to_cook]

The next time wild salmon was available here would be the first time. But I promise that if I see it, I'll buy it instead.