Mmmmm!!!! Enjoy Your "Responsibly Farmed" Salmon, Now With 1,550% More Sea Lice!!

[hatrack]

In early September the independent non-profit Aquaculture Stewardship Council increased the amount of sea lice allowable on farmed salmon that is certified as “responsibly farmed.” B.C. farmed fish are now allowed to have three motile (or 0.6 to 1.7 adult female) sea lice on them, when they used to only be allowed 0.1 mature females to qualify for the label. Motile sea lice is an umbrella term for pre-adult and both male and female lice. This is a 540 to 1,550 per cent increase in the total allowable parasite limit. Advocates say this won’t change anything in practice on B.C. fish farms because most farms were given exemptions from ASC sea lice limits and were operating under Fisheries and Oceans Canada limits, which are three motile lice per fish.

Sea lice are parasites native to B.C. that attach themselves to salmon and eat the fish’s mucous and skin layer, says Sean Godwin, a post-doctoral researcher at Simon Fraser University who specializes in sea lice. These parasites add stress to a wild fish, make them more susceptible to be eaten by predators and slow down their growth rate, he says. Sea lice impact farmed salmon less because the fish are protected from predators and are regularly fed, he adds.

In their juvenile stages sea lice drift through the ocean in hopes of finding salmon to attach themselves to. Wild salmon shed the lice when they return to fresh water to spawn because sea lice cannot survive in fresh water, Godwin says. Because adult wild salmon tend to swim up rivers in the fall and juvenile salmon swim down rivers in the spring, sea lice transmission between the young and older fish are naturally prevented.

Salmon farms house a lot of fish — sometimes over one million salmon — in very close spaces “which provides the ideal conditions for pathogens and parasites to proliferate,” Godwin says. Farms act as “year-round reservoirs” for sea lice which then expose juvenile salmon to “high numbers of sea lice” as they swim close to farms during their migration. “It’s the juvenile salmon we worry about because they’re smaller and lack fully developed scales and immune systems to help protect them,” he adds.

EDIT

https://thetyee.ca/News/2022/10/14/Eco-Label-Sea-Lice-Certified-Farmed-Responsibly-Salmon/

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Frankenstein Fish

Nature had it all figured out, yet it didn't know how to control mankind.

[jimfields33]

2. I'm so glad I hate salmon. Worst tasting fish.

[TreasonousBastard]

3. That's all very interesting, but how does this louse affect us when...

eaten?


Or is it primarily cosmetic?

[Jirel]

5. Not one bit.

The only problem with them is that salmon farms are a perfect breeding ground for them. They can weaken and kill fish if too many of them start attaching and sucking. If a fish escapes, it can aid proliferation in the wild population, where they always have been. Wild salmon head into fresh water to spawn, and these crustaceans die, so young salmon aren’t at risk. But if you basically create an epidemic in the areas that wild salmon swim in the ocean, you’ll kill off wild salmon in droves.

It’s not icky or damaging to us in any way. But it’s potentially an environmental problem for wild salmon.

[Jirel]

4. Do I care?

It sounds gross, but it really isn’t. The ocean is full of parasites. The sea lice are the largest source of protein in the ocean as larvae. Yes, they can kill fish in a later life stage when overpopulated, ergo the rules about farmed salmon. If you let them overproliferate, they’ll be a major problem to farmed and wild salmon nearby, and salmon farms can be a source for basically an epidemic, if farmed fish escape.

But gross? No. They don’t go inside the fish. They’re just another crustacean on the outside. Extra protein is fine - it’s only the risk they pose to wild fish near the farms that’s a problem.

[msongs]

6. fish are full of parasites and worms. get yer raw fish sushi right away nt