Saving Seafood

Cooke Aquaculture gets permit to allow stocking of Hope Island farm in Washington

August 6, 2021 — Cooke Aquaculture has received a key permit from the U.S. state of Washington that will allow it to stock its Hope Island farm with rainbow trout.

The permit, issued by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife on 5 August, will allow Cooke to stock its Hope Island farm, in Puget Sound’s Skagit Bay, with 365,000 steelhead, also known as rainbow trout. But the facility’s lease expires in March 2022, before the fish will be ready for harvest, meaning the company must either obtain an extension on its lease or move the fish to another site by that time.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

Cooke Aquaculture gets key permits for steelhead transition in Washington

January 7, 2021 — Washington’s Department of Ecology has revised four water quality permits to Cooke Aquaculture to farm steelhead in net-pens it formerly used to raise Atlantic salmon.

Cooke had already received approval from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, though conservation groups have sued to block their issuance. The facilities are located near Bainbridge Island and La Conner, and are now permitted for steelhead, also known as rainbow trout.

Read the full story at Seafood Source

In China, Salmon is Salmon, Even if It’s Trout

August 17, 2018 — For years, fish sellers in China have labeled something other than salmon as salmon, according to a local media report that outraged sushi lovers across the country.

Now, Chinese fish authorities have responded: That’s perfectly O.K. with them.

Chinese regulators said this week that rainbow trout can be sold as salmon, according to new standards set by a government-affiliated fish association and 13 commercial fisheries. To justify the change in definition, officials cited biology: Salmon and rainbow trout belong to the same fishy family. They also required sellers to note the exact type of fish elsewhere on the label.

Still, the fuzzy definition touched a nerve in a country with a long history of food labeling issues and a vast population of increasingly sophisticated consumers. Thousands took to the internet to blast regulators for lowering food standards instead of fixing the issue. Some declared they would never eat salmon again.

Even patrons at a sushi restaurant said that they could no longer trust salmon enough to eat it raw.

Read the full story at The New York Times

Rainbow trout can now officially be labeled as salmon in China

August 14, 2018 — Rainbow trout can be labeled and sold as salmon, according to new rules issued by a government-run fishery organization and 13 Chinese fishery companies.

The ruling is intended to resolve complaints that China-produced rainbow trout is being mislabled as salmon, amid concerns that eating rainbow trout raw would lead to parasite infection.

The ruling says salmon is the umbrella name of salmonidae fish, and rainbow trout also belongs to this category, the China Aquatic Products Processing and Marketing Alliance (CAPPMA) said on their website.

The CAPPMA, a social organization under the Ministry of Agriculture, along with 13 fishery companies, issued the controversial standard.

The sale of salmon has been increasing in China in recent years, but a lack of standards has raised the concern of many Chinese consumers.

In May, some media reports claimed that a lot of what is sold as salmon in China is in fact rainbow trout, produced in Northwest China’s Qinghai Province.

Later many netizens began to claim rainbow trout from the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau is being mislabeled as salmon, and is infested with worms and painted to resemble salmon.

Read the full story at the Global Times

A Fish’s-Eye View Of The New England Drought

October 11, 2016 — Just as they do every fall, Massachusetts Fisheries and Wildlife workers are stocking dozens of rivers and ponds with rainbow trout, raised in hatcheries, for anglers to catch.

But this year, because of the drought, a few places won’t get fish. And  some anglers are choosing not to go after wild fish—to give them a break.

According to the U.S. Drought Monitor, most of western Massachusetts is in a severe or even extreme drought.  Stream flows are “much below normal” in most of the state, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. That’s tough on fish.

Brian Keleher, a fisheries manager with the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, took me to the eastern bank of Dufresne Pond in Granby, where lily pads are splayed out over mud flats.

“I really don’t think there would be anything of any size at least over here,” Keleher said.

There are small pools, but they’re not a great place for fish trying to hide from predators, like birds.

“Fish can be trapped and exposed,” explained Keleher. “They have no where to go, no where to escape. They can’t escape to the depths.”

Read and listen to the full story at New England Public Radio

Drought Forces Trout to Be Trucked From California Hatchery

August 13, 2015 — FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — Tons of rainbow trout had to be rescued from a Central California fish hatchery and moved by truck to cooler lake water, sparing them from the state’s relentless drought, wildlife officials said Wednesday.

About 80,000 pounds of trout were scooped up from the San Joaquin Hatchery near Fresno and hauled 30 miles uphill to Shaver Lake in the Sierra Nevada foothills. Temperatures in Millerton Lake, which flow through into the hatchery on the San Joaquin River, had reached nearly 70 degrees, threatening the trout’s survival, The Fresno Bee reported (http://bit.ly/1Ns8OG3 ).

“The drought is having a devastating effect,” California Department of Fish and Wildlife spokesman Andrew Hughan said. “We’re really making an effort to save as many fish as we can and get them into cold water before it gets any warmer.”

Read the full story from the Associated Press at The New York Times 

Whirling disease found in North Carolina tributary of Watauga Lake

August 7, 2015 — FOSCOE, N.C. — In the event Northeast Tennessee anglers haven’t had enough troublesome news to tide them over, we’ve got more.

The presence of whirling disease — a dreaded neurological parasite that cripples rainbow trout — has been discovered in the Watauga River near Foscoe, N.C.

The infestation was confirmed by the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission late last month

The infected area is part of the upstream tributary that feeds Watauga Lake. That alone is disconcerting. The way whirling disease works, however, it can take all kinds of shortcuts into Northeast Tennessee trout streams.

“All it takes is for one fisherman to bring it over clinging on their boots,” said Huck Huckaba at Eastern Fly Outfitters in Piney Flats.

“So far, nothing has been reported in Tennessee, but everyone needs to be aware. In the very least, make sure you clean and dry your boots before changing watersheds,” he said.

Read the full story at Times News