With all respect BB a closed loop system is like placing 20 gallons of gas in your living room and waiting for a spark. The cost of purifying water down to the micro level is huge which is why hatcheries use them on a limited bases. Yes they work but the cost is massive so not much of a chance of being used yet. Get the price of the technology down and good to go.

That is the greatest mistake we make in my mind. Rather than scream the sky is falling a concerted effort to develop the technology to rear seafood with aquaculture is needed. It is the one thing that would reduce pressure on natural salmonids. Get the price down and the commercials will disappear slowly but steadily.

Then remember the enviros made a deal with the devil and joined with the commercials. Sometimes Winston can be wrong as this time " the enemy of my enemy is my freind " is not working this time around.

Agree with Rivrguy. Folks have told me that we can non-filter or reverse osmosis but the cost of a couple hundred cfs would not be low.

That said, all fish rearing facilities can do much better than they are doing. This applies to private, state, Federal, tribal. There are ways to do better but they cost.

why not build a giant charcoal filter like used in fish tanks? run the water through 1 or 2 of those and alot of the problems would be trapped inside it and it can be disposed of...

freshwater rights are liquid gold and will be contested, especially for any "junior" right applications. Maybe the best option might be for saltwater facilities and some kind of a flow through process. Reducing or eliminating disease, food, and fecal waste will be issues but is should be doable. I just have a personal opposition to net pens in open water. The proposed move of the Port Angeles net pens, due to the US Navy pier construction inside Port Angeles harbor, to an area 1.5 miles off Green Point (East of Port Angeles) is going to place a 20% larger facility in an area of strong currents and, in my opinion, too close to marine vessel traffic picking up Puget Sound pilots that are taking vessels into or returning from inner Puget Sound. Any mechanical issue with a 900' freighter/tanker could create a huge problem.

When I raised Koi as a hobby I used UV ( OK but lots of maintenance ) then went to ozone but that one bit more than a little in the wallet. You have two issues micro and organic requiring different solutions. Organics require a back flushing system which captures waste from the water then what to do with it is a real problem I ran it into a huge bio filter but I was small potato to commercial.

Then the regs! Hatcheries for years used a green die that killed off micro things but fed by the tablespoon rats could develop cancer but if you ever had green carpet you had it in your home. So EPA said change which sounds good but......the replacement? Formalin which is liquid but formaldehyde is the main active ingredient.

To be honest folks if the same standards that DOE in this state were applied to a city such as Seattle you would damn near have to abandon the city! You see fish do not vote, only a few in aquaculture, lots of votes in city, big big cost to urban folks and they vote. You figure out what happens next with this story.

It's certainly doable. Raise the cost of commercial fish sky high. Good to some, bad to the majority who buy fish to eat. Same with hatcheries for fisheries. Significant increase in cost, which is license fees.

It is a problem of volume. Like as has been said, metro sewage discharges (like hatcheries) have low levels of nutrients but they make it up in volume. Getting the last couple ppm or ppb out of a waste stream is very speedy.

Plus, I don't think any of the ozone or UV treatments are 100% effective. 99.9999 still lets some out and that one survivor may successfully find a host and spread.

This whole argument revolves around risk versus cost.

everyone knows fish farms produce waste and disease, but why arent they rasing Kings there, or Coho? why are they using a fish from the other side?

wouldnt it be easier to raise something they have experience with on this side as far as infections and whatnot?

To the best of my knowledge, Pacific salmon don't do as well in a net pen facility. Atlantics have been cultured for generations for the desired characteristics that seem to do okay in a captive facility. The issues, as outlined above, are how to get adequate water, handle pollutant discharges, and protect against mechanical or other catastrophic failures and find the food base necessary to get desired growth in a timely manner. The GMO "Frankenfish" is a result of the desire for faster growth.


http://www.nbcnews.com/id/39265727/ns/he...e/#.WaMc59GQwdU

It's a slippery slope and lots of money involved. Here are some other links on fish farming.

http://www.vancouversun.com/life/Salmon+grown+land+based+tanks+come+market/9839481/story.html

http://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/...as-buyer-sought

http://www.fishfarmingexpert.com/news/a-land-based-success-story/

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2017/01/barramundi-aquaculture-fish-farm-iowa-veroblue/

I will speculate that there are production advantages to AS. Are there diseases of Pacific salmon that would pose a greater risk to local stocks?

i can see how that would be an issue Larry, but what would the advantages be? faster time to adulthood?

BB, people freak out about that "Frankenfish" thing then go out and catch and eat Triploid Rainbows... pretty much the exact same thing....

AS have a longer history of culture and more selective breeding. Imagine the outrage if you cultured Pacifics. First, they would genetically swamp the wild fish when they escaped. And, being the same species, would be way more likely to at least successfully mate. Say 2 AS's spawn and produce zip. Nothing lost. A cultured Chinook spawns with a wild Chinook. Still produces zip but one wild spawner is wasted. If they don't produce zip you get maladapted genes out there until natural selection removes them. Which again wastes wild fish. Who is going to surrender Pacific's for a private broodstock?

There have been postings elsewhere which have interjected the GMO/Frankenfish aspect but nothing I have read indicates that the AS being raised in WA waters (or B.C. for that matter) are genetically modified. GMO or not??

They have certainly been selectively bred for ability to live uncultured conditions, thrive in pens, probably spawn on a more year-around basis. They are as domesticated as most cows.

I acknowledged they are fed different food in my original post.
This magic food made up mostly of meat by-products, must have toxics in it or there would be no health advisory from Department of health. Or there absorbing toxics from the environment.

Can't argue with that!



I don't see how you can predict the carrying capacity of our ecosystem when salmonids have been overfished since the 1870's!
We are producing 17 million pounds annually of Atlantic salmon. How much of that is eaten locally?
Basic laws of supply and demand say there is no shortage of farmed salmon or the price would be sky high. There is no reason they cannot be produced on land as they are in other places.
The simple reason they are not is because we are allowing this. On land farms don't have the added benefits of year round chemical weapons labs to experiment on what hurts our pacific salmon runs and what doesn't work. This is a long term investment to eliminate the competition and have entire market for themselves.

For a second there i thought you were talking about chamber creek steelhead...

My Dad worked at was called "dom sea" fish farm back in the 70s and 80s. (Near Rochester)
They tried a variety of pacific salmon, Atlantic salmon and rainbow trout. At that time they felt rainbow got the most bang for the buck. Later they changed to Atlantic Salmon, I don't know what they are raising there now, if anything.
He also developed a self feeding system, which they did not use because it developed some aggressive fish getting large while others suffered.
They want all the fish to survive to market.
I did fish the main pond once. Good times!

Been a while since I've watched this, but some very interesting information to glean from it (and of course other sources);
Farmed Norwegian Salmon - World’s Most Toxic Food
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jH6wH1dqbwc

Updated version;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYYf8cLUV5E

Salmon Confidential, Documentary About Salmon Farms in Canada & Diseased Salmon

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTCQ2IA_Zss