Study Warning Of Salmon's Extinction Is Shoddy Science, Researchers Allege

January 23, 2008

Release from: Don Whiteley
The Globe and Mail (UK)

Fisheries scientists are challenging the conclusions of a scientific study that predicted fish farms would cause the extinction of pink salmon on B.C.'s central coast, and the peer-review process that led to its publication.

The provincially funded Pacific Salmon Forum is attempting to broker the dispute, inviting all parties to a Feb. 7 special meeting of the Science Advisory Committee to try to bridge the gap. The report's authors - University of Alberta graduate student Martin Krkosek, B.C. researcher and environmental activist Alexandra Morton and four others - will make a presentation on their study and answer questions.

John Fraser, chair of the forum, said the group's own research doesn't support the extinction theory, adding that the paper "was not done by us, not funded by us and we didn't even know about it."

Mr. Krkosek said he is looking forward to explaining his work.

Heralded in media reports in mid-December as a "groundbreaking" study that would settle the scientific debate over whether sea lice on fish in net-cage salmon farms are a threat to wild salmon, the study has done exactly the opposite.

The study, featured in Science magazine, predicted that pink salmon could be extinct within four years, blaming sea lice infestations from fish farms.

"Marty's [Mr. Krkosek's] work is all based on assumptions for which there are good reasons to invalidate, and which they have never documented," said Kenneth Brooks, a scientist who has spent most of his career as a marine researcher. "He has been asked repeatedly: Do you have any data substantiating cause and effect with salmon farms and sea lice? The answer is always no."

Dr. Brooks has co-authored a critique of Mr. Krkosek's study, with the signatures of 20 fisheries biologists, and submitted it as a letter to Science.

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans is preparing its own critique of the study. Brian Riddell, Pacific division manager for DFO, said the conclusions are not supported by the evidence in the study itself.

"That's what a peer review should have picked up," he said.

"But it did not, and so now we're the black horse. The bottom line to me is, if anyone actually understands the trends of the pink returns in the Broughton [Archipelago], they are inconsistent with a rapid decline to extinction."

Fisheries biologists are also concerned that the focus on sea lice and fish farms is deflecting interest away from more serious ecological issues affecting wild salmon.

There is growing concern that massive numbers of fish released from hatcheries to bolster the wild stock and other projects to help salmon are actually having a detrimental effect.

Studies done recently in Alaska have shown evidence of such an impact, and DFO researchers fear similar impacts of hatchery fish in the Strait of Georgia, including the Broughton Archipelago.

Dr. Riddell said this issue is a component of an ecosystem-based research initiative just starting in the Strait of Georgia, looking at ocean productivity and comparing both hatchery and wild fish returns. It will take three years to complete the work.