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October 16, 2002
Atlantic Salmon: Wolf In Sheep's Clothing
Most of the salmon on the market today is farm-raised Atlantic salmon. It's tasty, not terribly expensive, and it's supposed to be fairly healthy. Unfortunately, farm-raised salmon lacks a lot of the nutritional value found in wild salmon. Farmed salmon have more saturated fat than wild, and less of the super-nutrious omega-3 fatty acids. They are loaded with checmicals, including anti-biotics and dye (for that special Salmon (TM) color). The farms are bad for the environment. And the farmed Atlantics are escaping their pens and threatening dwindling populations of Pacific salmon (coho, chinook, pink, sockeye and chum).
This summer, I visited a salmon farm off the coast of Maine with some friends. We took home about 25 pounds of fantastic salmon and had beautiful filets for dinner the next two nights. After that trip, I started coming across information about how the farms operate and it's given me a lot to think about.
+ Salmon Nation
+ Aquaculture's Troubled Harvest
+ When it Comes to Salmon, Buy Wild
Posted by buddha at October 16, 2002 06:48 PM
Comments
Wow, is the Sierra Club off their nut? Those may be valid reasons why you shouldn't eat farmed salmon; but it seems to me there are good reasons not to eat wild salmon either. How about: it takes 9 years to grow one? Or, the chances of any egg making it back to spawn are like a million to one? Or, every salmon you eat is one that won't be breeding? Or, don't you think consumer demand has something to do with wild salmon going extinct? Or even, I've had troll-caught Copper River salmon exactly once in my life -- at a restaurant where I paid over $150 per head? They don't exactly have it on special at Safeway, you know.
Posted by: Troutgirl at October 19, 2002 04:53 PM
Valid points, all of them. I'm no fishery expert, but it seems kind of like the wild salmon are screwed either way. What's a salmon-lover to do? Give up salmon entirely?
Oddly, I don't really buy into most of the eco-ethic stuff out there. I eat commercial beef and chicken without much thought. For some reason, maybe because I had just been on a salmon farm, these articles struck a nerve when I read them.
Posted by: dan at October 20, 2002 12:48 AM