The purpose of this blog is to educate the public about salmon culture in Alaska by:
- explaining what salmon ranching is.
- exposing marketing campaigns that make false claims like “salmon from Alaska is 100% wild“.
- making fair benefit/impact comparisons to other fish culture techniques around the world.
- breaking through the anti-fish culture smoke screen adopted by many Alaskan fisherman, marketers and journalists.
Vaccination station for juvenile salmon. Tutka Lagoon, Cook Inlet, Alaska.
To be clear, we support fish culture – it’s an efficient way to provide protein to over 6.5 billion people with the potential to take pressure off our wild fish resources that have been severely depleted by over-fishing.
What we take issue with is dishonest promoters of Alaska seafood who insist on covering up the fact that 1 in 3 Alaskan salmon sold to consumers today is cultured.
We welcome you to our blog and we certainly welcome your comments, thoughts and perspective on this subject.
For our latest posting please visit http://alaskasalmonranching.wordpress.com/
11 responses so far ↓
B Stevenson // November 19, 2008 at 8:50 pm |
I had no idea that this is going on in Alaska. Thanks for being the only website to expose this!! (I can’t believe how litle information there is out there on salmon ranching and the impacts of doing such a thing)
Bill Vernon // December 8, 2008 at 2:50 pm |
The use of the carotenoid asthaxantin has never been clearly explained. It provides necessary health benefits to the salmon. In an attempt many years ago to find a natural sorce carotenoid we used a very early product that was not yet well developed. Our entire crop was affected with poor colour and poor health. The good colour of the fish is consistent with good health. I have also done a lot of work on the whole issue of prices and I am quite sure that the drop in salmon prices corresponded more with the increase in Alaskan Ranching efforts than the rise in salmon farming. It was very close in timing. As far as the rest of your efforts, good work.
Ben Contag // April 3, 2009 at 2:06 am |
Hatcheries in Alaska are the only good thing going, just plain good
Laura McNaughton // April 6, 2009 at 4:49 pm |
This is the first time i have seen this blog. i work for a trade association in Miami representing Chilean salmon producers. keep up the good work of keeping consumers and the public informed by providing fair and balanced reporting. our mission is to promote the consumption of farmed salmon. the MBA’s focus on attacking such a sustainable source of protein should be questioned and i am glad to see your blog focusing on it. keep up the good work.
Greg Vogeazopoulos // May 7, 2009 at 4:10 pm |
Alaska’s Hatchery Program is a model the entire west coast should adopt. When fish are released into the saltwater as fingerlings, how would you identify them. Fact is, very limited hatchery influence with large positive effects toward the commercial industry. Wild stocks maintain opportunities to thrive and a livelyhood is energized.
They are NOT farmed fish, so if not wild then what? Go visit one in SE Alaska and broaden your perspective.
The Truth About Alaska Salmon // May 9, 2009 at 3:41 pm |
Hello Greg;
Thanks for your comment. How about we call them “half-farmed” or “half-wild”, or better yet, “ranched”, because that is exactly what they are. You say “very limited hatchery influence” in Alaska…we would respectfully disagree. In 2008, over 40% of the salmon caught in the commercial fishery were of hatchery (ranched) origin. There have been very few studies that have looked the affect that ranched salmon may have on wild salmon (if you don’t study it then there’s no problem huh?). Wild stocks may be overpowered by ranched salmon and there may not be enough fish meal in the ocean to support such high numbers of additional system. It’s this perspective that this blog is bringing to the table – and the fact that this is creating discussion is a good thing…for wild salmon.
Bill Keelty // May 12, 2009 at 8:12 pm |
I appreciate the alternatives you offer to the commercially sponsored & therefore more widely disseminated views.
sustainableseafood // May 28, 2009 at 7:59 pm |
Excellent job bringing this topic to light! The following quote is an email from Bill Heard, who is NOAA’s program manager in Alaska:
“You have identified a key point of distinction between different kinds of aquaculture, namely stock enhancement aquaculture where some hatchery activity is involved in producing juveniles for release into the wild environment versus farmed aquatic animals where they are retained in captivity until harvesting for market, such as farmed Atlantic salmon. Depending on location and species, Alaska’s capture fisheries for salmon do include various components in the catch that originated as juveniles in hatcheries. Again depending on species the duration of these juveniles at liberty in the ocean before returning as adults to be captured in fisheries varies from 1.5 to 5 years. Alaska has 5 active Regional Aquaculture Associations that release upwards of 1.8 billion juvenile salmon per year. Most of these are juvenile pink and chum salmon released at fry stages after some short term rearing in marine net pens. The proportion of hatchery- origin salmon in Alaska capture fisheries varies from year to year ranging from around 15 to 30 percent.”
In the aquaculture industry as a whole, there is not so much a dichotomy as a spectrum of control over inputs like confinement, reproduction, and feed. “Ranching” is normally a term that refers to capture of wild fish for control over grow-out conditions and harvest; stock enhancement is the control over early inputs and subsequent release. Only stock enhancement supplements natural fish stocks because so-called ranching does not produce more fish than the natural fishery. Alaskan salmon fishing has appropriated the term “ranching” in order to further up the cache of their products.
We, too, support fish farming, but operations that have control over the entire life cycle of salmonid species are not equivalent to stock enhancement. There are indeed issues of disease transmission and treatment that are legitimate concerns when salmon farming includes grow-out captivity. However, it is also true, as you have indicated, that ENGOs continue to parrot anti-aquaculture sentiments that make no sense. We hope that by highlighting the farming operations that take measures to address the real issues, consumers will begin to recognize the advantages of farming. We welcome your continued input on these topics.
The Truth About Alaska Salmon // June 1, 2009 at 2:38 am |
Hello – thanks for the NOAA information, it’s very interesting. Is it possible for us to see your initial question/contact with Bill Heard, so we can put some context around his response. By the way, this year the “hatchery-origin” share was 42% this year, so his range of 15-30% is a little shy of the mark. And we disagree with the statement “Ranching is normally a term that refers to capture of wild fish for control over grow-out”. Salmon ranching in Alaska is the part where salmon are released into the ocean basin to “graze” for food. That’s ranching. Regardless, Mr. Heard seems to have “concerns” over captivity (farming) but doesn’t seem to have any concerns over releasing 1.5 extra salmon (given his nice cozy term, “stock enhancement”) into an ocean that was never intended to carry that biomass. We’re not against ranching, but the continuous message “farming=bad” and “ranching=what ranching?” gets tiring.
Thanks for passing along – if you can provide useful information to us we would certainly appreciate it.
jim // October 2, 2009 at 11:08 am |
I think this whole blog is just run by jealous salmon farmers that can’t compete with a wild product.
The Truth About Alaska Salmon // October 4, 2009 at 9:06 am |
Hi Jim;
If that’s the way you feel then you are certainly missing the point of this blog. We support all types of responsible salmon culture including enhancement, ranching and farming. You are correct though; this blog clearly exposes the fact that most “wild” salmon are not “wild” at all (Alaska salmon ranching) and suggest that producers of salmon should be upfront with their methods of production. By simply calling their product “wild caught” is not a clear admission of how the salmon is produced. All production methods have benefits/impacts and only by openly discussing these benefits/impacts can we begin to do what is best for wild salmon.