State bodies in dispute over proposed salmon farm

Serious differences over sea lice have surfaced in relation to Bord Iascaigh Mhara’s plans for a 15,000-tonne organic salmon farm in Galway Bay, according to the Irish Times.

A recently completed Marine Institute-led study of returns of Atlantic wild salmon to river basins says pollution and poor water quality, rather than fish farms, are the main cause of stock mortality.

The study, led by David Jackson, analysed the return rates of fish treated to protect against sea lice with untreated “control” fish – reviewing data on 352,142 migrating salmon from 28 releases at eight locations along Ireland’s south and west coasts from 2001 to 2009.

Data published by Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI), the State body responsible for wild salmon, was included in the review.

A similar study conducted in Norway, published this year in the Journal of Fish Diseases, came to a similar conclusion.

But according to the Irish Times, the Inland Fisheries Ireland  has a different opinion. It says the basis on which the status of salmon populations in each river has been assessed for the Marine Institute-led study is fundamentally flawed and that the categorisation techniques deployed “totally misrepresent salmon numbers in Irish rivers”.

It says the study has drawn “blanket conclusions regarding fish stock numbers in rivers currently designated as ‘Open’ which fail to recognise that fish populations would vary significantly within this category, depending on the specific river concerned”, the Irish Times wrote.