Wdfw has deemed escaped Atlantic Salmon safe, with no consumption advisories.
All other Salmon in area 7 have advisories for Mercury and PCB's (even pink). Resident blackmouth, which live in the area year-round, are limited to two 8 ounce servings per month. This includes all seafood even from the store. So if you eat two servings of blackmouth, you are supposed to stop eating seafood for a month!
I understand these fish are fed pellets and not wild forage. However since they live in the water where everything else is toxic, I don't understand how it's safe to eat unlimited amounts.

People eat those things?

The free-ranging fish are accumulating the toxics from what they are eating. Hence, they have toxins while the AS don't. It is also why PS resident salmon are a lot worse for toxins than ocean-migrants; more [Bleeeeep!] in the food chain in the Sound.

Possibly less for mercury because of age, but I'm not sure even about that. Many of the Atlantic salmon that are sold cheap in the large Asian stores are frozen whole or fillet, smaller fish not like those on display at the counter. Not like the fish that escaped that are larger.
I can find info about virus testing, but nothing about testing Puget Sound Atlantics for toxics.
Here is info PCB's:


"Farmed salmon has much higher concentrations of persistent, bioaccumulative contaminants (polychlorinated biphenyls, dioxins, and several chlorinated pesticides) than wild salmon.11 Scientists have concluded that:

"Consumption of farmed salmon at relatively low frequencies results in elevated exposure to dioxins and dioxin-like compounds with commensurate elevation in estimates of health risk."

In a global assessment of farmed salmon published in the January 2004 issue of Science, 13 persistent organic pollutants were found. Some of the most dangerous are PCBs, strongly associated with cancer, reproductive and other health problems. PCB concentrations in farmed salmon were found to be eight times higher than in wild salmon. Those contamination levels are deemed safe by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) but not by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Researchers postulated that if EPA guidelines were applied to the farmed salmon they tested, recommendations would be to restrict salmon to no more than once per month."

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2015/01/03/omega-3-levels-farmed-salmon.aspx

In assessments of PS resident salmon, they accumulated more PCBs and such that ocean migrants.

Toxics in the food is an issue and there have been at least a few times when WDFW tested the food and the trout to see if that was a source of PCBs in lakes. It wasn't a problem in those cases.

But, since fish food is made up of fish meal it is quite possible that, especially imported meal, could have accumulated toxins and this will accumulate even more in cultured fish.

Have PS Atlantics been compared, side by side, with PS fish? I don't know, but I'll check.

[ Causego sells Atlantic salmon by the ton ! MY wild guess is, one hella lotta folks eat 'em.]

Having worked with a fish farmer years back I do find it a interesting thing full of contradictions. First in the world market other than a seasonal high value seasonal fish such as Cooper River Chinook and Springers sorta, the world markets prefer farmed fish due the the consistent quality of the product. Amazing as we deal with over harvest on almost all salmonid stocks people still advocate expanded consumption of naturally produced fish with the greatest push of natural vs farmed are the commercials teaming up with enviros which is a strange marriage to say the least. Frankly aquaculture is about the only way to feed the demand for seafood like it or not. It is the production of food for them that is the biggest enviro draw back. Solve that and the conversation changes really quick.

Jake: Interesting topic but there has to be better data sources than a health food website. Salmon and trout are raised world wide to include (but not limited to) the U.S., Canada, Norway and Chile so way, way too many variables to make generalities.

Edit: Add the U.K. and particularly Scotland.

If one were to read the actual paper in science it states that the organic pollutant levels in North American west coast farmed fish were equivalent to or lower than wild chinook and coho. They were much lower than Puget Sound resident chinook. Sockeye, chum and pinks had lower levels than farmed fish. I heard a talk by one of the leading researchers of toxins in west coast fish. Her recommendation was if you are worried about toxins in the fish you eat "think pink".

But saying that WN1A doesn't rile up The Base and get them to donate.

I would also add that it seem a little cynical or disingenuous to create a fishery (stocked resident coho and black mouth) that are known to concentrate toxins at rates higher than normal wild fish.

Too expand a bit on WN1A's post-

I remember reading a few years back that the much touted Copper river Chinook had toxin levels much higher than most farmed salmon. The Copper levels were not much different than Puget Sound blackmouth. The reason of course is that the Copper have high fat levels and tend to be older (6 year old fish thus more time to accumulate those toxins).

Something to keep in mind that much of the "research" on the threats from farmed salmon has been funded by the Alaskan commercial interests.

Ione study placed the consumption of farmed salmon in the USA at about twice the level of wild salmon consumption. If the farmed salmon are eliminated how much of the potential wild salmon production should be dedicated to the commercial industry to supply the public with salmon for their diet to replace that lost from the elimination of farmed salmon?

The 300,000 Atlantic salmon lost in the Cyprus net pen is 1.5 times larger than the entire Puget Sound forecast of hatchery Chinook. Maybe if we eliminate those farmed salmon we can meet much of the public demand for salmon filets by allocating the resource dedicate to the recreational fishery to the commercial fishery.

Curt

Hmmm, that might be an issue for some P.S. fishermen but for me there is, embarrassingly, very limited risk.

I thought those 300K were going to go to Orca life style improvements.

(Note: A bit tongue in cheek......but not totally)

The natural environment can't produce enough salmon for consumption. And, how times change. Back in the 80s, 100-125K hatchery Chinook returned to Bellingham Bay alone, products of the Nooksack and Samish hatcheries.

I found a department of health advisory for farmed salmon of 2-3 servings per week. It's not listed with the marine areas where the fish are being caught. My Asian wife eats around 5 pounds of seafood each week. How can they say these fish are "safe to eat" when you can only eat 1 to 1.5 pounds safely?

Still waiting if anyone has any information on Puget Sound Atlantics being tested for Mercury and PCB's?

They, the fish, don't accumulate the toxins from the water. They accumulate them from what they eat. And, the caged fish eat significantly different diets than the wilds or hatchery plants.

Since you didn't provide a link I did some looking and came up with this:http://www.doh.wa.gov/CommunityandEnvironment/Food/Fish/HealthyFishGuide.

Note that the recommendations are the same for non-farmed salmon as for farmed except P.S. Chinook have a lower recommended number of servings/wk. Elsewhere, there are some more detailed recommendations available by marine area for fish caught in Puget Sound.

Just for everyone's thoughts this. ( keeping in mind I have been out of the process a bit ). When my friend reared Atlantic for pens he was straight well water to limit any disease. Tanks were netted to prevent anything from getting in and all vents were screened. When up to size for transfer each smolt was treated with antibiotics by injections with a hand held gun type thing. Any diseases that the pens pick up are water borne which is why managing the pen load is important as stress needs to be minimized.

Pen Atlantic's do not reproduce in the wild anymore than a multi generational hatchery Summer Steelhead does which is about zero. So the only impact the release could have is on whatever they find to eat. That simple and complex at the same time. You know net pens came about due to the constant challenges to permitting a land facility. Some valid but many were simply sky is falling BS that sadly usually lies in the enviro community but wait remember the producers fall back position is oh hell nothing could go wrong. So your ass deep in pure 100% BS anywhere you go with this issue.

Oh somewhere back on the catching bit. Pen fish are usually fed with floating feed to reduce waste of feed and build up on the seabed and it does look like dog food ( depending on the size of the fish ) so get them in a bunch they will hit about anything if you can chum them up.

Lots of folks are pushing upland facilities for the commercial rearing. It takes a whole lot of clean water, which is actually in short supply having spent years trying to find sites for small grow and release hatcheries.

Cowlitz, for example, uses over 100 cfs and it has disease issues that would wipe out grow to market operation. Where are you gonna find 100 cfs of disease-free water that you are willing to keep anadromous fish out of to prevent disease transfer?

If we (humans, not just anglers) are going to eat fish or beef or fowl or just about any food you can think of it will require concentrated growing (agriculture/aquaculture). The "wild" can not support the world-wide demand. Siting is critical but for every bay we protect on the Pacific Coast is some bay somewhere else that gets used.

Too much demand...........

Water can be re-circulated within a facility. It can be freshwater or saltwater. It doesn't need a flow through system. They can have some discharge and draw water from whatever source is close by. Any discharge can be cleaned up with appropriate techniques to kill bacteria/viruses. Running a "feedlot" has issues, but using open water pens for exotic/non-native species causes problems as we've seen recently.