Dramatic decline not caused by lice
ANewsVanIsland | 13 December 2010 |
CAMPBELL RIVER - After two and a half years of studying the effects of sea lice from BC fish farms, a trio of researchers has concluded the parasite has not caused a dramatic decline in the number of wild fish stocks. The conclusions were released today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science Journal. The paper "Relation of Farm Salmon, Sea Lice and Wild Salmon Populations" was co-authored by Gary Marty of UC Davis, Terrence Quinn from the University of Alaska and Sonja Saksida, now of the BC Centre for Aquatic Health Sciences in Campbell River.
Saksida says part of their research included data stretching back to the year 2000, supplied by salmon farmers, information which has not been previously made available to other researchers. She says looking at the data from a longer period of time is one of the reasons their conclusions differed from others who's studies were done over only a few years. Saksida says the data is available in it's raw form through the Science Journal and said anyone is welcome to re-evaluate the information.
Salmon Farm opponent Alexandra Morton of the Raincoast Research Society disputes the findings. She says the main problem with the study is researches clumped the separate rivers of the Broughton Archipelago as if they were a single river, something that ended in the results being blurred.
