The concern that Norwegian net pen salmon farms are attracting and killing Canadian wild fish is looming larger all the time as unconfirmed reports come in on black cod, adult wild salmon, pollock, rock cod and perhaps most disturbing - herring. The bright lights and the scent of food being thrown into the water attracts many wild fish. Sometimes these activities are called pit-lamping and chumming the waters. If the wild fish are small enough they pass through the nets. Once inside the pens, they can be eaten by the Atlantic salmon, which are fish-predators, they can become trapped if they grow too large and never return to the wild to spawn and they can be killed at harvest/sorting time and thrown in composting sites.
Over-fishing is a global scourge and we need Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) to assess how many wild fish are being destroy inside the salmon pens. In a meeting with the enforcement branch of Fisheries Oceans last week, I was told that they had never heard of this problem before I laid the charge against Marine Harvest for their possession of juvenile salmon.
I am incredulous. Either the public do not bother to contact DFO, or DFO is not hearing the people who report this. I have been getting these reports on this for over a decade and I have seen wild fish in the pens on my few visits to fish farms.
I am making the court proceedings on my charges available here so that people can follow this. I went to DFO with a report, samples of the fish and reports from the fish farm company that, yes, these young wild salmon were in their harvest boat. I also made my own observations. I asked DFO if they were going to lay a charge and DFO did not inform me of whether they were going to lay a charge or not so I did, with my lawyer Jeffery Jones. Now the Department of Justice as to decide if they are going to assume conduct of this trial or not. If they do they can stay it (shut it down) or run it. If they don't we can run the trial which will be a huge undertaking but we are willing. On Jan 5 the Department of Justice returned to court without making this decision, which effectively stalls all proceedings indefinitely. The Judge put an end to that giving them 30 days to decide.
Included in these transcripts:
Mr. Jones...."a very significant amount of work trying to fill the shoes of the state when it appears that, frankly, this industry -- fish farming industry, is not -- is immune from prosecution."
Download Court Transcript Jan-5-2010
