Salmon
By: Alexa Grace
Endangered Salmon Facts
• Logging over the past century has had a devastating
impact on the habitat of endangered salmon and
steelhead.
• 80% of forested streams and rivers are in “early seral
stage,” which means that these streams and rivers have
been logged so heavily that they provide no useful
habitat for salmon or other fish.
• Salmon farms harm the environment by spreading
diseases and parasites to wild fish, releasing waste and
chemicals into the ocean, not being able to prevent
farmed fish escapes and causing marine mammal deaths.
BC Salmon Farms
• British Columbia has over 100 open net-cage fish farms.
• Salmon farms claim to reduce the pressure on wild
salmon by supplying farmed fish for the marketplace. In
reality the farms threaten the survival of wild salmon.
• The government and industry would like to see B.C.
farmed salmon production double within the next 10
years, which means twice the toll on our oceans and wild
fish.
Salmon Farm Facts
• Salmon farms can hold over a million fish in an area the
size of four football fields
• It takes two to five kilos of wild fish (used in feed) to
produce one kilo of farmed salmon
• Industry data shows billions of sea lice eggs are
produced on salmon farms in B.C.'s Broughton
Archipelago where tiny wild salmon enter the ocean
• Infection with just one sea lice can kill a wild juvenile
pink salmon
• The vast majority of B.C. farmed salmon are exported to
the U.S.
• B.C.'s 100 plus open-net-cage salmon farms produce
waste roughly the same as the raw sewage from a city of
half a million people.
If The Abuse Of Salmon Continues..
• Salmon and other wild fish will become extinct
• When a river loses its salmon stock, that
population is gone forever - the miracle of
returning to its spawning ground cannot be
repeated.
• Unless urgent action is taken to halt factors such
as over-fishing and the damage caused by
commercial fish farming, the remaining healthy
populations of wild salmon face ever increasing
pressure.
What You Can Do To Help..
• Tell your grocer that you will not buy farmed Salmon,
because it is killing wild Salmon.
• Write to British Columbia’s Provincial Premier
(Gordon Campbell) to let him know that you will not
buy farmed Salmon from BC.
• At the grocery store ask for paper bags instead of
plastic bags.
• Recycle as much as you possibly can.
More You Can Do To Help..
• Be an informed consumer. Don't use products that are
harmful to the environment when safer alternatives exist.
• Don't dump antifreeze, motor oil or other chemicals into
street drains. Many drains empty directly into rivers.
• Educate yourself. Learn more about salmon and
watersheds. Then educate others. Help them learn what
they can do to help salmon.
• When fishing, know the difference between trout and
salmon smolts (young fish) and release any smolts you
catch.
• Avoid boating, canoeing or kayaking through spawning
areas when adult salmon are in the river.
I Believe…
• There should be a law against fish farming,
therefore people would be forced to stop.
• Provide better regulations and enforcement
to prevent overfishing.
• Provide protection for the salmon spawning
grounds, for both predators and pollution.
Bibliography
• http://www.raincoastresearch.org/salm
on-farming.htm
• http://www.farmedanddangerous.org/pa
ge/salmon-farming-problems
• http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/st
ory/CTVNews/20061002/salmon_sealice
_061002/20061002/
The End
By: Alexa Grace