November 23, 2005 Atlantic Salmon Federation

Interactions Between Fertile Farmed and Wild Salmon are Cause for Alarm

For immediate release

St. Andrews…Atlantic Salmon Federation (ASF) researchers have recovered 45 escaped farmed Atlantic salmon from four streams and rivers in Charlotte County, N.B. over the past week at the height of spawning season for wild salmon. Despite Cooke Aquaculture’s assurances in many news reports that the farmed salmon that escaped from their site were not mature, 43 (95%) of the salmon that ASF has recovered so far are definitely sexually mature.

“The record needs to be set straight,” said ASF’s President Bill Taylor. “These 100,000 plus farmed escapees recently released from Cooke aquaculture have the potential to greatly harm wild salmon, especially those that are already struggling for survival in the Bay of Fundy and Gulf of Maine rivers.”

Research arrives at the opposite conclusion to comments attributed to Nell Halse of Cooke Aquaculture in N.B.’s Telegraph Journal, which indicate that “even if they were (sexually mature), there is no conclusive evidence that the spawn of farmed and wild fish would be unfit to survive.” One such comprehensive research program was carried out by Dr. Philip McGinnity of the Marine Institute and Prof. Andy Ferguson of the School of Biology and Biochemistry, Queen’s University, Belfast, Ireland, and released on March 15, 2003.

Entitled, Accidental and Deliberate Introductions of Farm Salmon Result in Reduced Survival and Fitness and Could Lead to Extinction of Vulnerable Wild Populations of Atlantic Salmon, their research took 10 years to complete and they examined multiple families of both first and second generation wild and farmed salmon hybrids in freshwater and in the ocean.

Dr. McGinnity and Prof. Ferguson concluded that “as a result of domestication over several generations, genetic changes have reduced the capability of farm salmon to survive in the wild, especially during the marine phase. Overall, farm salmon showed an estimated lifetime success of 2% of that of native wild salmon. In the second generation of hybrids, some 70% of the embryos died in the first few weeks.”

They also concluded that “genetic changes leading to reduced survival in the wild is a feature of all domesticated salmon and trout and consequently hybrids between farm and wild fish also have reduced survival.”

ASF’s concerns about interactions between wild and farmed salmon are very valid. While Cooke Aquaculture has referred to farmed salmon as “cousins” of the wild salmon that relationship is very distant and far removed. Over the past 25 years, and many generations of salmon, fish farmers have genetically changed the make-up of the farmed salmon through selective breeding. The instincts needed for survival in the wild have been replaced with passivity and faster growth, characteristics needed to get them to market more quickly.

Cooke Aquaculture has indicated that it will “beef up security on the sites to prevent sabotage.” “This is welcome, but”, continued Mr. Taylor “it is like closing the barn door after the horse has escaped.”

“ASF’s research team will continue our work to prevent escaped farmed salmon from reaching the spawning beds, where wild salmon are now producing the next generation that will have the genetic make-up to survive the rigors of the wild and make the long migration to the ocean and back”, said Mr. Taylor. “But we do not have the resources to work on all the rivers and streams that flow into the Gulf of Maine and the Bay of Fundy, where dozens, maybe hundreds, more escapees will enter and swim upstream.”

“The obvious question is what are government and the industry doing to mitigate this environmental disaster…the public would like to know, but government continues to operate behind closed doors with no sense of obligation to report,” concluded Mr. Taylor. -30- The Atlantic Salmon Federation is an international, non-profit organization that promotes the conservation and wise management of the wild Atlantic salmon and its environment. ASF has a network of seven regional councils (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, Quebec, Maine and Western New England)and a membership of more than 150 river associations and 40,000 volunteers. The regional councils cover the freshwater range of the Atlantic salmon in Canada and the United States.

ASF Contacts: Sue Scott, VP – Communications or Muriel Ferguson 506 529-1027 506 529-4581 506 529-1033

Commission Information

Interactions Between Fertile Farmed and Wild Salmon are Cause for Alarm