Sea of people marches to fight fish farms

From the Vancouver Sun:
Sea of people marches to fight fish farms
By Katie DeRosa and Judith Lavoie, Times Colonist
Nearly 1,000 people crowded Government Street yesterday in the culmination of a 500-kilometre walk to protest fish farms — which they say are killing B.C.’s wild salmon.

Surveying the sea of people, the largest local rally yet in support of protecting wild salmon runs, biologist and activist Alexandra Morton said it’s proof the cause has turned mainstream.

“I was hoping for this,” said Morton, who walked from Sointula on the northern tip of Vancouver Island to Victoria in what she called the Get Out Migration campaign. The final leg was from Centennial Square to the legislature yesterday. “The government is very deaf and they need [to hear from] a lot of people. We’re trying to save something people love and it’s amazing it’s been so difficult.”

Morton noted, however, that despite the growing opposition to fish farms — which she argues spread sea lice to wild salmon — “not a single farm has moved.”

Self-described life-long fisherman Bob Cameron, 86, said he had good reason for joining the march.

“We’ve fished all up and down the Island,” said Cameron, who was joined by his son Douglas, 58, “and we’d catch a nice big Chinook with three or four lice on it. Now, if you can catch one, it’s loaded with lice and the fish is almost dead.”

Douglas Cameron pointed to the massive salmon depletion seen on the Fraser River last year — when only 1.2 million salmon migrated instead of more than 10 million expected — as evidence that fish stocks are threatened.

At the rally, people signed petitions to federal Fisheries Minister Gail Shea calling for salmon pens to be moved away from wild salmon migration routes.

There is little agreement between those supporting Morton’s campaign, which is seen as one of the last chances to save wild salmon runs, and the salmon farming industry.

Even scientific research is confusing, as research papers come to different conclusions on the effect of sea lice on wild juvenile salmon. Morton’s research concludes sea lice are killing young salmon and a graphic video shows nets full of lice beside salmon farms. Morton also suspects some lice at farms off the Vancouver Island coast are becoming resistant to the pesticide SLICE.

But the Salmon Farmers Association says there is no evidence sea lice are becoming resistant to controls and insists lice from farms aren’t to blame for declining wild salmon runs.

“The rise and fall of pink salmon populations in the Broughton — where there are salmon farms — is mirrored in many other parts of the province where there are no salmon farms,” says the association’s website.

Mark Sheppard, provincial veterinarian for aquatic animal health, told the federal Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans last month that lice abundance on farmed salmon in B.C. is low compared to other countries and regions.

Also, some recent research “shows that the Pacific Ocean louse is genetically different from the Atlantic Ocean louse, which is the problem in Europe and in eastern Canada,” he said.

Morton told the committee her experiments show lice from farms are spreading to wild fish. “The pattern is really clear. If you take the farm fish out, the lice go away,” she said. “When you put the farm fish back, the lice come back.”

There is also disagreement over the economic importance of the industry.

Salmon farming employs more than 6,000 people directly and indirectly, most of them in small Vancouver Island communities, according to Mary Ellen Walling, Salmon Farmers Association executive director.

But Morton believes the numbers are lower and shrinking as the farms move to mechanization.

On the whole, the jobs pay little, but people working in the industry must be looked after as the industry moves to closed containment, she said. “You can still have those jobs — just on land,” she said.

Much of the support along the route from Sointula to Victoria has come from First Nations, who say declines of wild salmon are affecting entire ecosystems and their traditional way of life.

“I think there’s a real sense of urgency,” said Fred Speck of the GwaWaenuk Tribe, who has walked most of the route with Morton.

But other prominent members of First Nations communities appreciate the employment fish farming provides and don’t blame the industry for the decline of wild stocks.

There are many other reasons for problems with wild salmon, such as overfishing and climate change, said Tom Nelson of the Quatsino First Nation, who notes his people benefit from the partnership with fish-farm company Marine Harvest.

The question of sea lice will continue to be front and centre as the Eighth International Sea Lice Conference begins this weekend in Victoria.

More than 80 presentations will be made by 150 scientists from around the world.