Mass die off of farmed #Salmon, “all the #salmon are dying”, in #Newfoundland and #Labrador, #Canada

Canada’s Northern Harvest Sea Farms, which Norway’s Mowi purchased in 2018, has suffered from a mass die-off of salmon at its Newfoundland and Labrador farms.

The company, according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, has not disclosed how many fish have been lost in die-offs that began in early September but processing plant workers have been furloughed due to a lack of fish.

The farm’s spokesman, Jason Card, said that salmon normally thrive in water temperatures between 5 and 15 C, but water temperatures hovered between 18 and 21 C in August.

“Temperature spikes are not abnormal, but for that length of time they are,” Card said.

He ruled out other common problems for fish farmers — viruses and sea lice — as the cause of the die-offs.

Some workers at the Barry Group fish plant in Harbour Breton are worried about the future of their jobs.

“All our jobs are probably going to be in turmoil.… All the salmon are dying,” Gloria Pierce, a 40-year veteran of the plant said. “Bottom line is there’s no work for us, not for the remainder of this year until … maybe next year in August, which is a long time.”

Eric Day, another plant worker, blamed the die-offs on sea lice, which Northern Harvest has denied.

“Now it’s to the point that the sea lice [have] really grabbed hold of the fish big time, and of course it’s killing the fish,” Day said.

Courtesy of undercurrentnews.com

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