Green Around the Gills

Welfare Abuse at Scottish Salmon Farms - Why No Legal Enforcement Or Prosecutions?

 

The weight of evidence recording widespread welfare abuse on Scottish salmon farms is surely now so overwhelming to bring legal action for systematic breaches of the Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006?

 

 

 

The latest damning photographic evidence was slipped out earlier this week (10 September 2019) via the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate - surely these salmon (only five fish are sampled and photographed per inspection) have been subjected to cruelty, torture and welfare abuse?

 

 

 

Read more via Mowi's Welfare Nightmare on Rum - "blind", "physical damage", "anorexic" & over 40,000 dead fish!

 

 

Photographs taken by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate - slipped out unnoticed in April 2019 - reveal severely damaged farmed salmon at The Scottish Salmon Company's Strondoir Bay salmon farm in Loch Fyne in February 2019. 

 

 

 

 

 

And here's photos from a Fish Health Inspectorate visit to The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Portree in February 2019 - including "visible damage to the heads of fish", skeletal muscle necrosis, dermatitis, lesions "likely associated with mechanical damage", anorexia, bilateral exopthalmia, petechial haemorrhaging, salmon gill poxvirus, Neoparamoeba perurans (the causative agent of Amoebic Gill Disease), Paranculeospora theridon, Vibrio spp, Photobacterium sp and Infectious Pancreatic Necrosis virus:

 

 

 

 

Read more via The Severely Damaged Scottish Salmon Company - For Sale Now!

 

 

Here's photos of an inspection at the North Papa salmon farm operated by Norwegian-owned Grieg Seafood in March 2019.  These fish have faces only a father would love - the physical damage is "attributed to a recent Optilicer treatment" and the farmed salmon have been dosed on antibiotics to treat Winter sores. 

 

 

 

 

Read more via Meet Pop-Eye the Scottish Salmon - Tortured by an Optilicer!

 

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch believes that salmon farms across Scotland are in breach of Section 19 ("Unnecessary Suffering"); Section 21 ("Cruel Operations") and Section 24 ("Ensuring Welfare of Animals") of the  Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006.  

 

 

 

Here's damning photographic evidence obtained by Scottish Salmon Watch via Freedom of Information in 2018 (and published via The Ferret):

 

 

Given the gruesome nature of the evidence it is not surprising that lawyers acting for two salmon farming companies (Norwegian-owned Scottish Sea Farms & Swiss-owned The Scottish Salmon Company) threatened legal action if the Scottish Government disclosed the photos.

 

 

 

 

Video footage shot by Scottish Salmon Watch inside salmon farms in 2018 and 2019 also shows deformities, lice infestation and welfare abuse.

 

 

 

 

 

Photos leaked by a worker at Mowi's salmon farm at Carradale in Kilbrannan Sound expose the horror story of 300,000 farmed salmon flayed alive - battered to death in storms in March 2018.

 

 

Yet the 'competent' authorities with responsibility for animal welfare - in the shape of Scottish Ministers, the Animal & Plant Health Agency, the SSPCA and Police Scotland's Wildlife Crime Unit - are turning a blind eye to systematic and shocking welfare abuse on salmon farms.  Raising complaints feels like banging your head against a brick wall.

 

 

 

Scottish Ministers claimed in a letter dated 20 August 2019 that:

 

 

Over 43,000 people have signed a petition co-ordinated by SumOfUs calling for immediate unannounced inspections of salmon farms.

 

 

Read more via:

Mission Possible - SumOfUs petition delivered to Marine Scotland

STV News: "Inspection call to stop 'surge of deaths' at salmon farms"

BBC News: "Salmon petition calls for 'emergency' fish farm inspections"

 

 

 

 

The compelling evidence presented above coupled with 'Case Information' published by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate contradicts the Scottish Government's view that there is not widespread welfare abuse on salmon farms.  Scottish Salmon Watch believes that Scottish Ministers - together with the SSPCA (who is chaired by a salmon farmer - working for Scottish Sea Farms who in 2018 threatened legal action against the disclosure of photos of welfare abuse of farmed salmon) and the RSPCA who earn close to £1 million from certifying 70% of Scottish salmon farming production as welfare-friendly - are irresponsible in not policing the Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006. 

 

 

 

How can Corin Smith's nauseating video footage shot inside The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Vacasay in Loch Roag in August 2018 be ignored by the authorities?

 

 

 

A FOI reply by the Scottish Government in May 2019 revealed that there had been only one unannounced inspection visit to a marine salmon farm (at Mowi's Port Na Cro site) in the whole of 2018.

 

 

Following a formal complaint by Scottish Salmon Watch in June 2019 we know that there has been at least one more unannounced inspection of a marine salmon farm in 2019.

 

 

 

 

A follow up unannounced inspection by the Fish Health Inspectorate on 13 June 2019 (published online on 8 August 2019) referred to "blind, rubbed and moribund" farmed salmon infested with lice.

 

 

 

 

 

Marine Scotland's letter to The Scottish Salmon Company dated 17 July 2019 included reference to "a number of blind fish with damaged eyes and flank abrasions". 

 

 

"All five fish sampled were moribund,lethargic and blind," reported Marine Scotland's Fish Health Inspector.  "Externally four had haemorrhaged eyes and three had flank lesions including a 'boil' like lesion on fish three.  Internally fish three and four had enlarged livers and fish four had an enlarged gall bladder":

 

 

 

And:

 

 

 

In July 2019, a complaint by Scottish Salmon Watch cited video evidence of welfare abuse of cleaner fish at Mowi's salmon farms at 'Bay of the Dead Heads' and SW Shuna.

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch's letter of 20 July 2019 (filed with Police Scotland's Wildlife Crime Unit, the Animal & Plant Health Agency and the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate) included the following photos (sourced from Go Pro video footage shot inside the salmon farm):

 

 

 

Here's shocking video footage of dead and dying cleaner fish at a Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' salmon farm in July 2019:

 

 

Here's some of the gruesome images from our visit on 2 July 2019:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Data on cleaner fish mortalities between 2013 and 2019 is hidden away in various Fish Health Inspectorate 'Case Information' files.  For example, by searching the June 2019 data we now know that 10,000 lumpfish died at Mowi's salmon farm at Port Na Cro.

 

 

 

 

 

Mowi's salmon farm at Bagh Dail Nan Ceann (Bay of the Dead Heads) also detailed mortality and disease problems in cleaner fish in the FHI June 2019 report (with "craters disease" cited).

 

Here's a Tweet:

 

 

Read more about the welfare nightmare for cleaner fish via Fish that eat lice off farmed salmon suffer, says report

 

 

 

With rising Summer temperatures and warmer weather, the alarm bells are ringing that 2019 could be the worst year on record for mortalities and diseases on Scottish salmon farms.  Salmon Business reported in May:

 

 

 

And expect mortalities and disease to be much worse in the second half of 2019.  As Scottish Salmon Watch warned last October:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Corin Smith knows only too well the bad smell coming from Scottish salmon farming - in 2018 he tracked mort trucks delivering tonnes of diseased salmon to a mort pit in North Uist.    Watch the stomach-churning footage on the BBC One Show in September 2018 online here

 

 

How many more dead and diseased farmed salmon will it take before Scottish Ministers take action against salmon farms for welfare abuse?  How high does Scottish salmon's mort mountain need to rise to before it triggers a prosecution for breach of Section 19 ("Unnecessary Suffering"); Section 21 ("Cruel Operations") and Section 24 ("Ensuring Welfare of Animals") of the  Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006? 

 

 

 

 

 

Mass mortalities and welfare abuse of farmed salmon is also a lethal side-effect of mechanical treatments including the 'Thermolicer' (a torture chamber for farmed salmon designed to heat treat lice-infestation).

 

 

Authorities in Norway are considering a ban on the Thermolicer.   Salmon Business reported in August 2019:

 

 

Farmed salmon across Scotland continue to suffer pain, welfare abuse and mass mortalities due to continued use of the Thermolicer. 

 

 

 

Back in 2016, Compassion In World Farming (CIWF) called for a ban on the Thermolicer in Scotland describing it as a "brutal treatment", "inherently stressful" and with "poor welfare".   CIWF's call for a ban followed a report in The Sunday Herald detailing over 175,000 dead farmed salmon including 95,000 dead fish at a Mowi (Marine Harvest) salmon farm due to the operation of a Thermolicer.

 

 

Read more via Oops: fish farm firm kills 175,000 of its salmon by accident

 

 

In January 2018 a Norwegian veterinarian "highlighted major head injuries she has seen to fish treated with warm water delousing machinery". 

 

 

In July 2018, Scottish Salmon Watch called for a ban on the Thermolicer citing a further 100,000 deaths in 14 separate incidents between August 2017 and January 2018. 

 

 

The press release continued:

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch believes that the continued operation of the Thermolicer on salmon farms represents a breach of Section 19 ("Unnecessary Suffering"); Section 21 ("Cruel Operations") and Section 24 ("Ensuring Welfare of Animals") of the  Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006.  

 

 

 

More details on welfare problems on Scottish salmon farms can be found via a report - "Fish Welfare on Scotland's Salmon Farms" - published by OneKind in August 2018. 

 

 

Salmon farms operated by Marine Harvest (since re-branded as Mowi due to negative consumer perceptions over the name Marine Harvest) ranked the worst for welfare:

 

 

Philip Lymbery, Chief Executive of Compassion in World Farming, Tweeted earlier this month:

 

 

Here's the article by Phil Lymbery - author of 'Farmageddon' - calling on consumers to pledge not to eat toxic Scottish farmed salmon:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Take the Salmon Pledge today!

 

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

Mowi's Welfare Nightmare on Rum - "blind", "physical damage", "anorexic" & over 40,000 dead fish!

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Stop salmon from suffering. Investigate Scottish fish farms right now!

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

'Salmonwatch' Exposes Scottish Salmon's Dirty Secrets

Unnecessary Suffering & Cruel Operations at Mowi's at Bagh Dail nan Ceann salmon farm (Sound of Jura)

Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann)

'Abuse' video sparks major investigation at fish farm

STV News on Scottish Salmon's Welfare Nightmare - watch online now!

‘Sick’ salmon film prompts government probe into Scottish fish farm

Frankenfish Video - The Ugly Face of Lousy Scottish Salmon

Mass deaths: nine million fish killed by diseases at Scottish salmon farms

Disease-ridden Scottish Salmon

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

New Report - "The State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018"

Fish that eat lice off farmed salmon suffer, says report

Sunday Mail: "Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips"

Blowing the Whistle on Scottish Salmon - whistleblowers leak gruesome photos of farmed salmon

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain -Leaping to Record Levels in 2018?

Stop suffering & cruelty on Scottish salmon farms

Justice for Fish - Welfare of Scottish Salmon in Legal Spotlight

Parliamentary Motion on the Welfare of Farmed Fish (Mark Ruskell MSP explains)

The Skinny on Scottish Salmon

Fish farm censured after film exposed lice-ridden salmon

Daily Mail: "Suffering Salmon: Watchdog investigates farm over claims that more than 300,000 fish are infested with lice"

Sick salmon at Scottish fish farm revealed on film

Salmon firms bid to block diseased photos

Hard Evidence: Photos of Diseased & Deformed Scottish Salmon

Named: supermarkets selling salmon from ‘poor’ welfare firms

Revealed: the fish farms worst on animal welfare

Fish Welfare On Scotland's Salmon Farms

Legal Complaint Vs Breaches of Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act

Horror photos of farmed salmon spark legal threat

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

Sunday Mail: "Gutted - 300,000 salmon are killed as storm batters fish farm"

EXPOSED: Early Harvesting at Scottish Salmon Farms Due to Disease & Mortalities

Fish farm firm kills 175,000 salmon by accident

 

 

 

 

How many more dead and diseased farmed salmon will it take before Scottish Ministers take action against salmon farms for welfare abuse?  How high does Scottish salmon's mort mountain need to rise to before it triggers a prosecution for breach of Section 19 ("Unnecessary Suffering"); Section 21 ("Cruel Operations") and Section 24 ("Ensuring Welfare of Animals") of the  Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006? 

 

The Severely Damaged Scottish Salmon Company - For Sale Now!

 

Photographs taken by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate - slipped out unnoticed in April 2019 - reveal severely damaged farmed salmon at The Scottish Salmon Company's Strondoir Bay salmon farm in Loch Fyne in February 2019. 

 

 

 

And here's photos from a Fish Health Inspectorate visit to The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Portree in February 2019 - including "visible damage to the heads of fish", skeletal muscle necrosis, dermatitis, lesions "likely associated with mechanical damage", anorexia, bilateral exopthalmia, petechial haemorrhaging, salmon gill poxvirus, Neoparamoeba perurans (the causative agent of Amoebic Gill Disease), Paranculeospora theridon, Vibrio spp, Photobacterium sp and Infectious Pancreatic Necrosis virus:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Strangely, the Mad Men at The Scottish Salmon Company (which is scheduled to be sold off by the end of this month) didn't choose any of the photos above to market their 'Lochlander' salmon.

 

 

Nor does The Scottish Salmon Company's marketing video include the gruesome photos or shocking video footage from Strondoir Bay.

 

 

 

Here's horrific video footage shot by Scottish Salmon Watch at The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Strondoir Bay in May 2019:

 

 

 

 

More video footage shot at The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Strondoir Bay in November 2018:

 

 

 

And more nauseating video footage from Strondoir Bay in September 2018:

 

 

 

Here's the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate 'Case Information' report dated February 2019 for The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Strondoir Bay - including details of "very damaged" fins, "damage to the head and snout", "dorsal fin reduced to cartilage", "caudal fins severely damaged", "high numbers of mixed bacteria", lice infestation and positive tests for Vibrio spp and Moritella viscosa.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's video footage filmed at The Scottish Salmon Company's Russel Burn hatchery in June 2019:

 

 

 

More gruesome video footage from a visit to The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm in Loch Shieldaig in June 2019:

 

 

 

Deformed fish from The Scottish Salmon Company sold in Billingsgate Market in London in December 2018:

 

 

 

And deformed salmon swimming inside The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Quarry Point in Loch Fyne in July & August 2018:

 

 

 

Read more about who owns The Scottish Salmon Company via 'Scottish Scamon':

 

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

'Abuse' video sparks major investigation at fish farm

STV News on Scottish Salmon's Welfare Nightmare - watch online now!

‘Sick’ salmon film prompts government probe into Scottish fish farm

Frankenfish Video - The Ugly Face of Lousy Scottish Salmon

Mass deaths: nine million fish killed by diseases at Scottish salmon farms

Disease-ridden Scottish Salmon

New Report - "The State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018"

Sunday Mail: "Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips"

Blowing the Whistle on Scottish Salmon - whistleblowers leak gruesome photos of farmed salmon

Fish farm censured after film exposed lice-ridden salmon

Daily Mail: "Suffering Salmon: Watchdog investigates farm over claims that more than 300,000 fish are infested with lice"

Sick salmon at Scottish fish farm revealed on film

Salmon firms bid to block diseased photos

Hard Evidence: Photos of Diseased & Deformed Scottish Salmon

Named: supermarkets selling salmon from ‘poor’ welfare firms

Revealed: the fish farms worst on animal welfare

Fish Welfare On Scotland's Salmon Farms

Legal Complaint Vs Breaches of Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act

Horror photos of farmed salmon spark legal threat

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

EXPOSED: Early Harvesting at Scottish Salmon Farms Due to Disease & Mortalities

 

 

 

Meet Pop-Eye the Scottish Salmon - Tortured by an Optilicer!

 

Reading through the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate's 'Case Information' is a real eye-opener.  Photos of an inspection at the North Papa salmon farm operated by Norwegian-owned Grieg Seafood in March 2019 are scarier than bug-eyed Momo. 

 

 

The physical damage is "attributed to a recent Optilicer treatment" and the farmed salmon have been dosed on antibiotics to treat Winter sores. 

 

 

 

 

Exophthalmia is referred to as pop-eye and is a condition linked to Cardiomyopathy Syndrome.

 

 

 

If beauty is measured by what's inside then these fish from Grieg Seafood's North Papa salmon farm are ugly as sin.

 

 

 

Here's the FHI 'Case Information' report for Grieg Seafood's North Papa inspection dated 28 March 2019 (p96 to 124) which detailed positive tests for Infectious Pancreatic Necrosis virus, Aeromonas salmonicida and Paranucleospora theridon:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another Grieg Seafood salmon farm in Shetland at Gob na Hoe reported over 3,000 mortalities due to an Optilicer treatment in March 2019. 

 

 

 

Here's the FHI 'Case Information' detailing "physical damage to heads and tails" and "severe lesions":

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In March 2019, another FHI 'Case Information' report for March 2019 details welfare problems and over 10,000 mortalities due to the operation of a Thermolicer at the Norwegian-owned Scottish Sea Farms site at Teisti Geo in Shetland. 

 

 

 

 

In January 2017, nearly 6,000 farmed salmon died at a Grieg Seafood salmon farm due to the heated 'torture chamber' called the Thermolicer:

 

 

More details on mass mortalities due to the operation of the Optilicer, Hydrolicer and Thermolicer are available online here

 

Read more via "Ban Water Torture on Scottish Salmon Farms - Over 100,000 farmed fish Thermoliced & Hydroliced to death since August 2017"

 

 

 

More background is available via Welfare Abuse at Scottish Salmon Farms - Why No Legal Enforcement Or Prosecutions?

 

Including:

 

Mass mortalities and welfare abuse of farmed salmon is also a lethal side-effect of mechanical treatments including the 'Thermolicer' (a torture chamber for farmed salmon designed to heat treat lice-infestation).

 

 

Authorities in Norway are considering a ban on the Thermolicer.   Salmon Business reported in August 2019:

 

 

Farmed salmon across Scotland continue to suffer pain, welfare abuse and mass mortalities due to continued use of the Thermolicer. 

 

 

 

Back in 2016, Compassion In World Farming (CIWF) called for a ban on the Thermolicer in Scotland describing it as a "brutal treatment", "inherently stressful" and with "poor welfare".   CIWF's call for a ban followed a report in The Sunday Herald detailing over 175,000 dead farmed salmon including 95,000 dead fish at a Mowi (Marine Harvest) salmon farm due to the operation of a Thermolicer.

 

 

Read more via Oops: fish farm firm kills 175,000 of its salmon by accident

 

 

In January 2018 a Norwegian veterinarian "highlighted major head injuries she has seen to fish treated with warm water delousing machinery". 

 

 

In July 2018, Scottish Salmon Watch called for a ban on the Thermolicer citing a further 100,000 deaths in 14 separate incidents between August 2017 and January 2018. 

 

 

The press release continued:

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch believes that the continued operation of the Thermolicer on salmon farms represents a breach of Section 19 ("Unnecessary Suffering"); Section 21 ("Cruel Operations") and Section 24 ("Ensuring Welfare of Animals") of the  Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006.  

 

 

 

Cardiac Disease Arrests Mowi in Kingairloch

 

 

Ever wondered what Scottish salmon looks like fresh from the loch?  Well look no further than these tasty specimens from Mowi's salmon farm at Kingairloch in Loch a Choire (Loch Linnhe) tested by the Scottish Government for various infectious diseases, pathogens, bacteria and viruses (only five fish are sampled by the Fish Health Inspectorate - the rest end up marketed as 'healthy' and 'delicious' Scottish salmon by Mowi and sold predominantly through Sainsbury's, Aldi & Lidl).

 

 

Beauty really is in the eye of the beholder.

 

 

 

 

Here's a map showing Mowi's salmon farm at Kingairloch:

 

 

 

Given the disease problems at their salmon farms it is not surprising that Mowi is not welcoming to visitors. 

 

 

 

The Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate slipped out a report in August 2019 detailing an inspection of Mowi's salmon farm at Kingairloch in April 2019 - including Cardiomyopathy Syndrome (CMS), Pasteurella skyensis, multifocal hepatic necrosis, Salmonid Alphavirus, anorexia, lesions, haemorrhaging and deformed hearts:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

More gruesome photos of welfare abuse and disease problems at Mowi's farm off the Isle of Rum were published online by the Scottish Government on 10 September 2019:

 

 

 

 

Do these lice-infested, "blind", "physically damaged" and "anorexic" salmon look the picture of health as claimed by Mowi's slick marketing?

 

 

Surely Scottish Ministers should think twice before gorging themselves on Mowi's disease-ridden salmon?

 

 

 

Here's more photos of Mowi's disease-ridden salmon obtained via Freedom Information in 2018:

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

Horror photos of farmed salmon spark legal threat

Hard Evidence: Photos of Diseased & Deformed Scottish Salmon

Legal Complaint Vs Breaches of Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act

Salmon firms bid to block diseased photos

 

 

Mowi is all too aware of the risks of diseases writing in their Integrated Annual Report 2018 (published on 27 March 2019) that "continued disease problems may also attract negative media attention and public concerns" .

 

 

For more data on diseases and mortalities please read a report published by Scottish Salmon Watch in March 2019 including Fish Health Inspectorate 'Case Information' on Marine Harvest salmon farms during 2018:

 

 

Little wonder that Marine Harvest changed their name to Mowi on 1 January 2019 (despite objections from the Mowinckel family in Norway and indigenous artist Ernie Smith - whose tradition name is Mowisaht - in Canada).  As Intrafish reported in March 2019:

 

 

 

Read more via:

Welfare Abuse at Scottish Salmon Farms - Why No Legal Enforcement Or Prosecutions?

Mowi's Welfare Nightmare on Rum - "blind", "physical damage", "anorexic" & over 40,000 dead fish!

The Fish Pharm Menace - Mowi is Like a Bad Movie (& Dick Dastardly)!

"Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times

Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans

Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe

Proposed salmon farm raises environmental concerns in Hebrides

Memo to MOWI - You Got to Move it, You Got to Move it Mowi!

 

 

Mowi “holding communities to ransom” over relocation of fish farm sites says campaigner

Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann)

Mowi's Fungus Pollution of the River Polly

Fish farms urged to stop use of toxic chemical in Scottish waters

EXPOSED: Mowi's Cache of Carcinogenic Chemicals On Conservative MSP's Estate

Salmon farming giant Mowi probed over chemical use

Salmon Farming Exposed

Mowi's Greed of Feed

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

The Sorry State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018

Negative perception of Marine Harvest behind switch to Mowi

"We think it's completely wrong that the Mowi name will be associated with the kind of farming that Marine Harvest operates"

X-Rated Mowi: Preview of Marine Harvest's Horror Show

 

 

Media Backgrounder: MOWI - Unfit for Purpose

Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips

Whistleblower photos of Marine Harvest

Sunday Mail: "Gutted - 300,000 salmon are killed as storm batters fish farm"

The welfare status of salmon farms in Scotland

Named: Supermarkets selling salmon from 'poor' welfare firms

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

Horror photos of farmed salmon spark legal threat

 

Media Backgrounder: "Marine Harmfest Scotland"

24,500 fish escape from Marine Harvest farm after storm damage

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Leaps Over 10 Million - FOI reveals 2.3 million dead salmon at Marine Harvest farms in 2017

Mapped: the 45 lochs polluted by fish farm pesticides

RSPCA in firing line over Marine Harvest's seal-killing spree in Scotland

16,000 salmon escape Argyll fish farm after storms

Fish company investigated after salmon farm pollutes Scottish loch - Marine Harvest, one of the largest fish-farming companies, is under investigation after polluting loch with pesticide

Revealed: the dirty dozen salmon farms that contaminate lochs with pesticides

Marine Harvest fined £23,500 for pollution

Campaigners want polluted salmon farm endorsed by Oliver to be shut

 

 

Road Spill for Diseased Scottish Salmon (Not Even Fit For Roadkill)!

 

If further evidence of Scottish salmon's burgeoning 'mort mountain' was needed, video footage of diseased salmon spilled all over the A86 main road between Fort William and Dalwhinnie was posted on Facebook yesterday - featuring cars and camper vans driving through a slick of virus-laden Scottish salmon and what appears to be the Gogar lorry driver making a phone call (you can also see lesions and flayed skin which look similar to some of the shocking images of welfare abuse published by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate).  

 

 

 

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch has passed on this quaint video to the Scottish Tourism Alliance for use in their 'Tourism Scotland 2020' next marketing campaign.  I can see the slogans now - "Come to Scotland for free Scottish Salmon Road-Kill" or "Visit Scotland - a land where diseased Scottish salmon are so plentiful they leap onto the road".  

 

 

Or maybe the Scottish skiing season at nearby Aviemore could be extended by using slimy Scottish salmon as artificial snow?  Next time you're driving in the Highlands of Scotland please remember to bring your Scottish salmon tyres (and plenty of disinfectant as well as nose-plugs). 

 

 

 

 

 

Traffic Scotland Tweeted yesterday (13 September):

 

 

Corin Smith posted on Facebook (14 September):

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's more video footage posted by Corin Smith:

 

 

 

It's not clear yet what infectious diseases, pathogens, viruses and bacteria were infecting the dead farmed salmon or whether any fluids leached into any watercourses potentially infecting wild fish - the River Spey and Loch Laggan are in the vicinity of the salmon spill.

 

 

John Robins of Animal Concern wrote to the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (15 September) and brought the matter to the attention of Scottish Ministers and Highland Council:

 

E-MAIL FROM: John F. Robins, Secretary and Campaigns Consultant, Animal Concern, Post Office Box 5178, Dumbarton G82 5YJ. Tel. 01389-841-639, Mobile: 07721-605521.

E-MAIL: info@animalconcern.org    website: http://www.animalconcern.org/

Animal Concern is a pressure group registered as a non-profit making Limited Company (Co. No. SC109126) established in 1988 as Animal Concern (Scotland) Ltd. It incorporates the Scottish Anti-Vivisection Society which was founded in 1876.

 

Roseanna Cunninghame MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform,

Mairi Gougeon MSP, Minister for Rural Affairs and the Natural Environment,

The Scottish Government,

Edinburgh

 

 

Dear Ms Cunninghame and Ms Gougeon,

 

You will find below a copy of my e-mail to SEPA regarding a potentially very serious pollution and animal health risk incident which took place near Dalwhinnie last Friday.  

 

If the statement attributed to the driver of the lorry involved in the incident is accurate it could mean that large numbers of consignments of possibly highly toxic waste from salmon farms are being carried across Scotland in unsealed vehicles totally unsuitable for the safe transfer of such waste. Spillages such as that which occurred last Friday could result in diseases, which have killed vast numbers of fish on salmon farms, being released into the home river systems of our declining populations of wild Atlantic Salmon and seatrout.

 

I ask that you immediately ban the transfer of salmon morts by road, carry out a full assessment of the current situation regarding the often long distance transportation of salmon morts from farms to disposal facilities and introduce compulsory high minimum standards of biosecurity before allowing such waste onto our roads again.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

John F. Robins,

Animal Concern

 

From: john@jfrobins.force9.co.uk <john@jfrobins.force9.co.uk>
Sent: 15 September 2019 08:31
To: 'community@sepa.org.uk' <community@sepa.org.uk>
Subject: Possible pollution incident involving salmon morts

 

Please note: I tried to deliver this message via your on-line contact form but that is limited to 2,000 characters. I’d appreciate it if you would acknowledge receipt of this e-mail.

 

E-MAIL FROM: John F. Robins, Secretary and Campaigns Consultant, Animal Concern, Post Office Box 5178, Dumbarton G82 5YJ. Tel. 01389-841-639, Mobile: 07721-605521.

E-MAIL: info@animalconcern.org   website: http://www.animalconcern.org/

Animal Concern is a pressure group registered as a non-profit making Limited Company (Co. No. SC109126) established in 1988 as Animal Concern (Scotland) Ltd. It incorporates the Scottish Anti-Vivisection Society which was founded in 1876.

 

Scottish Environment Protection Agency

Strathallan House

Castle Business Park

Stirling

FK9 4TZ

 

Dear Sir or Madam,

 

I write concerning an incident on Friday 13th September involving a Gogar Services vehicle (registration number DS15 CKF) carrying a load of salmon farm morts.

 

This vehicle shed its load on the road near Dalwhinnie. I’m not sure if this was on the A9 or the A889. It was reported on the Facebook page of a Mr. William Haughton who posted a video which you should be able to view on this link: https://www.facebook.com/1winks1/videos/2501635109894586

 

This link also takes you to the video and to comments added since the video was posted:

https://www.facebook.com/1winks1?eid=ARDMwNwB_DjatS146_qxkTKCNzwQt6f7XyU0TmPgRS5P75VkP5wl2oqQzdzj7fq9Lyofhb6zSUxmeDvJ  

 

The comments posted include a claim that the incident occurred near the River Truim (a tributary of the Spey) and a driver saying there was still fish debris on the road on Saturday 14th September. The video shows vehicles driving through the morts and other comments are from drivers claiming their cars and motorbikes had fish debris sticking to them after driving through the morts.

 

One comment claims the lorry driver said he had required to brake suddenly and the dead salmon were thrown forward out of the rear of the lorry and over his cab. From the number of salmon covering both lanes of the road and the verges I would estimate that 1 tonne or more of fish were ejected from the lorry.

 

As you are no doubt aware morts from salmon farms are often classified as toxic waste as the fish may have been killed by a number of diseases including some which are highly infectious. They may also have been treated with toxic chemicals or dangerous pharmaceuticals before they died.

 

If you have not already done so I ask you to investigate this incident to determine whether the load did include diseased or otherwise contaminated fish and, if so, did the loss of those fish into the environment pose any risk to the public, especially those people who came into contact with the morts?

 

I am also concerned that wild fish stocks could have been put at risk if contaminated residues from the incident scene were washed into the River Truim or if debris carried away by vehicles which drove through the morts, entered any other waterways.

 

I also request that you determine whether or not this load was being carried legally and, if it was not, I ask you to prosecute those responsible.

 

I do not know what farm or farms these morts came from but I’m sure Gogar Services (contact details below) will be able to provide you with that information.

 

I look forward to hearing from you regarding this incident.

 

Yours faithfully,

 

 

John F. Robins,

Animal Concern 

 

Gogar Services, East Gogar, Blairlogie, Stirlingshire FK9 5QB. 01259 728203. https://www.gogarservices.co.uk/

 

 

The Daily Record reported (17 September):

 

 

 

 

Here's a Tweet in reply:

 

 

 

If you're unlucky enough ever to get close to disease-ridden Scottish salmon it is advisable to have a jolly good scrub down - the stench of Scottish salmon is enough to make you vomit all over the road. 

 

 

If you've been taken in hook line and stinker with the glossy marketing of 'healthy', 'RSPCA Assured', 'organic' and 'sustainable' Scottish salmon then perhaps it's time to take a closer look at all the reasons not to eat farmed salmon. 

 

 

 

Here's video footage inside skips full of diseased Scottish salmon:

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday's spill involving Stirlingshire-based Gogar is not the first time trucks carrying diseased Scottish salmon have made the news.   The Daily Mail featured a Gogar truck laden with diseased Scottish salmon in an article published in January 2018:

 

 

 

If the Daily Mail doesn't do it for you, please watch the BBC One Show's 'Dead Salmon Run' broadcast in December 2017 - featuring footage of diseased salmon effluent leaking from Billy Bowie trucks:

 

 

 

The Sunday Times reported (28 January 2018):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture reported in a press release issued in January 2018:

 

Press Release: "Diseased Salmon Slip Net & Spill on Road - Failure to police the transport of dead fish prompts EC complaint"

Download press release in full with Notes to Editors and FOI documents online here 

 

 

Following a BBC exposé on 'The One Show' broadcast last month, campaigners are calling on local authorities and the Scottish Government to properly police the transport of mortalities from Scotland's disease-ridden salmon farms. 

 

Photo: Fluids leaking from a Billy Bowie haulage truck transporting diseased farmed salmon from Loch Kishorn - broadcast by the BBC's 'The One Show' on 11 December 2017

 

The Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture (GAAIA) has filed a complaint to the European Commission  regarding a breach of the Animal By-Products Regulations by the United Kingdom.   GAAIA has also written to the Scottish Government requesting an urgent investigation into disease-ridden mortalities from Scottish salmon farms (Download Letter to Fergus Ewing 28 Jan 2018). 

 

 

One local authority (East Ayrshire) is now investigating the standards of the vehicles used to transport farmed salmon morts and compliance with the Animal By-Products Regulations 2013 (ABPR). 

 

 

Footage from the BBC screened on 11 December 2017 showed a haulage truck operated by Billy Bowie flouting the law by leaking fluids from diseased salmon farmed by Scottish Sea Farms in Loch Kishorn (read more via Scottish Sea Farms mort events in 2017).  There have been other reported cases of farmed salmon spilling onto roads across Scotland including the A9. 

 

 

 

Documents obtained via Freedom of Information (FOI) reveal that local authorities are failing to enforce the regulations with some citing a lack of resources and others completely ignorant [1]:   

 

"We don’t have the resources to carry out any monitoring or surveillance of these activities, we didn’t carry out any investigations into these activities in 2017," replied Argyll & Bute Council on 11 January 2018. 

 

"Stirling Council would not be involved in this.  This would be for Aquaculture Industry to respond to," replied Stirling Council on 26 January 2018 (GAAIA has since asked for a review pointing out that "salmon farms are clearly not located within Stirlingshire - however, the transport of dead farmed salmon does occur within your local authority"). 

 

"As you may be aware, East Ayrshire’s Trading Standards team are taking forward the investigation of vehicles leaking ABP with the transporter Billy Bowie.  As they are leading on this matter, my team will not be taking forward any specific action on this particular case," replied Highland Council on 24 January 2018. 

 

"I am providing notice that under Section 17 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 that the Council does not hold the information requested and so, is unable to comply with your request.  I can advise that there are no salmon farms in Renfrewshire," replied Renfrewshire Council on 23 January 2018 (GAAIA replied: "It is patently obvious that there are no salmon farms in Renfrewshire!  The FOI request relates to transport of dead fish from salmon farms to disposal sites across Scotland and in Northern England.  Renfrewshire is cited in this case in October 2015 on the A737 (as reported by The Courier)."

 

 

"Shetland Islands Council has not had to issue any warning letters, complete any investigations, surveillance or monitoring in regard to the transport and disposal of salmon farm mortalities," replied Shetland Isles Council on 20 December 2017. 

 

 

Other local authorities have either not replied or did not possess any information even though local authorities are charged by law with enforcing the legislation. 

 

"APHA do not inspect or monitor the transport of salmon farm mortalities," said a FOI reply from the Animal & Plant Health Agency dated 9 January 2018.  "The enforcement of the regulations is the responsibility of Local Authorities under the Animal By-Products (Enforcement) (England) Regulations 2013 and of the Scottish Government under The Animal By-Products (Enforcement) (Scotland) Regulations 2013".

 

"Police Scotland has no protocols with any local authority or operating company regarding the disposal of wastes from fish farms," said a FOI reply from Police Scotland dated 10 January 2018.

 

 

"Not only are haulage companies flouting the regulations but local authorities are failing to enforce the law," said Don Staniford, Director of the Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture (GAAIA) and author of 'Scottish Salmon Farming 101'.  "Scottish salmon farming has a huge mort mountain with over one in four farmed salmon dying and an estimated 20 million morts piling up across Scotland.  It beggars belief that haulage trucks making 'The Dead Salmon Run' are not being properly policed.   Scottish salmon farming stinks and leaves a bad taste in the mouth."

 

Download a copy of Complaint to the European Commission by GAAIA (28 January 2018)

 

 

The Daily Mail reported in January 2018: "Thousands of fish thrown in a truck - and troubling new questions for salmon farms"

Download PDFs of the newspaper version online here: page 1; page 2 and page 3

 

 

 

The Daily Mail reported (27 January 2018):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Online via Daily Mail: "Thousands of fish thrown in a truck - and troubling new questions for salmon farms"

 

 

 

Read more on mass mortalities and disease on Scottish salmon farms via:

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

Mass deaths: nine million fish killed by diseases at Scottish salmon farms

Disease-ridden Scottish Salmon

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

New Report - "The State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018"

Sunday Mail: "Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips"

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain -Leaping to Record Levels in 2018?

EXPOSED: Early Harvesting at Scottish Salmon Farms Due to Disease & Mortalities

 

 

 

Download press release in full with Notes to Editors and FOI documents online here 

 

 

Following a BBC exposé on 'The One Show' broadcast last month, campaigners are calling on local authorities and the Scottish Government to properly police the transport of mortalities from Scotland's disease-ridden salmon farms. 

 

Photo: Fluids leaking from a Billy Bowie haulage truck transporting diseased farmed salmon from Loch Kishorn - broadcast by the BBC's 'The One Show' on 11 December 2017

 

The Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture (GAAIA) has filed a complaint to the European Commission  regarding a breach of the Animal By-Products Regulations by the United Kingdom.   GAAIA has also written to the Scottish Government requesting an urgent investigation into disease-ridden mortalities from Scottish salmon farms (Download Letter to Fergus Ewing 28 Jan 2018). 

 

 

One local authority (East Ayrshire) is now investigating the standards of the vehicles used to transport farmed salmon morts and compliance with the Animal By-Products Regulations 2013 (ABPR). 

 

 

Footage from the BBC screened on 11 December 2017 showed a haulage truck operated by Billy Bowie flouting the law by leaking fluids from diseased salmon farmed by Scottish Sea Farms in Loch Kishorn (read more via Scottish Sea Farms mort events in 2017).  There have been other reported cases of farmed salmon spilling onto roads across Scotland including the A9. 

 

 

 

Documents obtained via Freedom of Information (FOI) reveal that local authorities are failing to enforce the regulations with some citing a lack of resources and others completely ignorant [1]:   

 

"We don’t have the resources to carry out any monitoring or surveillance of these activities, we didn’t carry out any investigations into these activities in 2017," replied Argyll & Bute Council on 11 January 2018. 

 

"Stirling Council would not be involved in this.  This would be for Aquaculture Industry to respond to," replied Stirling Council on 26 January 2018 (GAAIA has since asked for a review pointing out that "salmon farms are clearly not located within Stirlingshire - however, the transport of dead farmed salmon does occur within your local authority"). 

 

"As you may be aware, East Ayrshire’s Trading Standards team are taking forward the investigation of vehicles leaking ABP with the transporter Billy Bowie.  As they are leading on this matter, my team will not be taking forward any specific action on this particular case," replied Highland Council on 24 January 2018. 

 

"I am providing notice that under Section 17 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 that the Council does not hold the information requested and so, is unable to comply with your request.  I can advise that there are no salmon farms in Renfrewshire," replied Renfrewshire Council on 23 January 2018 (GAAIA replied: "It is patently obvious that there are no salmon farms in Renfrewshire!  The FOI request relates to transport of dead fish from salmon farms to disposal sites across Scotland and in Northern England.  Renfrewshire is cited in this case in October 2015 on the A737 (as reported by The Courier)."

 

 

"Shetland Islands Council has not had to issue any warning letters, complete any investigations, surveillance or monitoring in regard to the transport and disposal of salmon farm mortalities," replied Shetland Isles Council on 20 December 2017. 

 

 

Other local authorities have either not replied or did not possess any information even though local authorities are charged by law with enforcing the legislation. 

 

"APHA do not inspect or monitor the transport of salmon farm mortalities," said a FOI reply from the Animal & Plant Health Agency dated 9 January 2018.  "The enforcement of the regulations is the responsibility of Local Authorities under the Animal By-Products (Enforcement) (England) Regulations 2013 and of the Scottish Government under The Animal By-Products (Enforcement) (Scotland) Regulations 2013".

 

"Police Scotland has no protocols with any local authority or operating company regarding the disposal of wastes from fish farms," said a FOI reply from Police Scotland dated 10 January 2018.

 

 

"Not only are haulage companies flouting the regulations but local authorities are failing to enforce the law," said Don Staniford, Director of the Global Alliance Against Industrial Aquaculture (GAAIA) and author of 'Scottish Salmon Farming 101'.  "Scottish salmon farming has a huge mort mountain with over one in four farmed salmon dying and an estimated 20 million morts piling up across Scotland.  It beggars belief that haulage trucks making 'The Dead Salmon Run' are not being properly policed.   Scottish salmon farming stinks and leaves a bad taste in the mouth."

 

Download a copy of Complaint to the European Commission by GAAIA (28 January 2018)

 

 

The Daily Mail reported in January 2018: "Thousands of fish thrown in a truck - and troubling new questions for salmon farms"

Download PDFs of the newspaper version online here: page 1; page 2 and page 3

 

 

 

The Daily Mail reported (27 January 2018):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Online via Daily Mail: "Thousands of fish thrown in a truck - and troubling new questions for salmon farms"

 

 

 

Read more on mass mortalities and disease on Scottish salmon farms via:

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

Mass deaths: nine million fish killed by diseases at Scottish salmon farms

Disease-ridden Scottish Salmon

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

New Report - "The State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018"

Sunday Mail: "Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips"

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain -Leaping to Record Levels in 2018?

EXPOSED: Early Harvesting at Scottish Salmon Farms Due to Disease & Mortalities

 

 

 

Download PDFs of the newspaper version online here: page 1; page 2 and page 3

 

 

 

The Daily Mail reported (27 January 2018):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Online via Daily Mail: "Thousands of fish thrown in a truck - and troubling new questions for salmon farms"

 

 

 

Read more on mass mortalities and disease on Scottish salmon farms via:

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

Mass deaths: nine million fish killed by diseases at Scottish salmon farms

Disease-ridden Scottish Salmon

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

New Report - "The State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018"

Sunday Mail: "Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips"

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain -Leaping to Record Levels in 2018?

EXPOSED: Early Harvesting at Scottish Salmon Farms Due to Disease & Mortalities

 

 

 

Mowi's Welfare Nightmare on Rum - "blind", "physical damage", "anorexic" & over 40,000 dead fish!

 

Gruesome photos of welfare abuse and disease problems at Mowi's farm off the Isle of Rum (published online by the Scottish Government on 10 September 2019) blow out the water the company's claims that their salmon are "healthy"!

 

 

 

 

Do these lice-infested, "blind", "physically damaged" and "anorexic" salmon look the picture of health as claimed by Mowi's slick marketing?

 

 

Surely Scottish Ministers should think twice before gorging themselves on Mowi's disease-ridden salmon?

 

 

 

And perhaps residents on the Isle of Canna where Mowi want to site a new salmon farm should look closely at Mowi's problems on nearby Rum (where 135 tonnes of dead farmed salmon were reported in June 2019), Mowi's controversial salmon farm on the Isle of Colonsay (scene of 150,000 dead salmon in 2017) and Mowi's 300,000 salmon battered to death at their Carradale farm in Kilbrannan Sound?

 

 

 

Given the horror story of Scottish salmon it's not difficult to understand why Mowi does not want the public from coming closer than 15 metres from their salmon farms.

 

 

 

Read more via The Fish Pharm Menace - Mowi is Like a Bad Movie!

 

 

Here's more photos of Mowi's disease-ridden salmon obtained via Freedom Information in 2018:

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

Horror photos of farmed salmon spark legal threat

Hard Evidence: Photos of Diseased & Deformed Scottish Salmon

Legal Complaint Vs Breaches of Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act

Salmon firms bid to block diseased photos

 

 

The latest damning information on Mowi's Rum salmon farm was slipped out on 10 September 2019 via the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate:

 

 

The Fish Health Inspectorate's 'Case Information' for Mowi's salmon farm off the Isle of Rum on 9 July 2019 (starts at p10 of the PDF) includes:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mowi's disease and mortality problems during 2019 are not limited to their Rum operation or farmed salmon.  Data on cleaner fish mortalities between 2013 and 2019 is hidden away in various Fish Health Inspectorate 'Case Information' files.  For example, by searching the June 2019 data we now know that 10,000 lumpfish died at Mowi's salmon farm at Port Na Cro.

 

 

 

 

 

Mowi's salmon farm at Bagh Dail Nan Ceann (Bay of the Dead Heads) also detailed mortality and disease problems in cleaner fish in the FHI June 2019 report (with "craters disease" cited).

 

 

 

When Scottish Salmon Watch visited Mowi's Bagh Dail Nan Ceann salmon farm in early July 2019 there were certainly visible health challenges with dead and dying lumpfish littering the surface of the one cage visited.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a Tweet:

 

 

Read more about the welfare nightmare for cleaner fish via Fish that eat lice off farmed salmon suffer, says report

 

 

With rising Summer temperatures and warmer weather, the alarm bells are ringing that 2019 could be the worst year on record for mortalities and diseases on Scottish salmon farms.  Salmon Business reported in May:

 

 

 

Mowi is all too aware of the risks of diseases writing in their Integrated Annual Report 2018 (published on 27 March 2019) that "continued disease problems may also attract negative media attention and public concerns" .

 

 

For more data on diseases and mortalities please read a report published by Scottish Salmon Watch in March 2019 including Fish Health Inspectorate 'Case Information' on Marine Harvest salmon farms during 2018:

 

 

Little wonder that Marine Harvest changed their name to Mowi on 1 January 2019 (despite objections from the Mowinckel family in Norway and indigenous artist Ernie Smith - whose tradition name is Mowisaht - in Canada).  As Intrafish reported in March 2019:

 

 

Mowi (before they changed their name from Marine Harvest) officially reported over 1.6 million mortalities in Scotland between March 2017 and November 2018 in 101 separate incidents - including 520,171 dead salmon at Marine Harvest's Inchmore Hatchery in August 2018 and 140,488 dead salmon at Marine Harvest's salmon farm at Eilean Grianain (Carradale) in Kilbrannan Sound in March 2018. 

 

 

The mortality data published by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate is available online here - and details 101 mortality events for Mowi (Marine Harvest) sites including reports of Cardiomyopathy Syndrome (CMS), Anaemia, Piscine Reovirus (PRV), Pasteurella skyensis, Proliferative Gill Disease (PGD), Amoebic Gill Disease (AGD), Pancreas Disease (PD), complex gill issues and deaths due to lice infestation, physical damage, handling, oxygen supply failure, chemical treatments (Hydrogen Peroxide/H202, Azamethiphos/Salmosan and Deltamethrin/Alphamax) and Thermolicer mechanical treatments:

 

 

In view of such horrific disease problems it's not surprising that Mowi's salmon farming production fell 36% in 2018 (from 60,186 tonnes in 2017 to 38,444 tonnes in 2018). 

 

 

Mowi's mortality and disease problems account in large part for the dramatic 21% fall in Scottish salmon farming production - with 2018 data forecast to be 39,000 tonnes lower than that reported in 2017!

 

 

Data junkies should keep an eye out for the Scottish Fish Farm Production Survey 2018 (scheduled for publication at 9.30am on Monday 30 September - read online here).   There will be new data on mortality rates - reported by the Scottish Government as more palatable 'survival rates' - with the 2017 survey (published in October 2018) reporting an annual mortality rate in Shetland of 23.5% and a staggering 30.3% annual mortality in the Western Isles.  Total annual mortality for Scottish salmon farming is reported at 20.9% - that equates to perhaps 15 to 20 million dead farmed salmon although the industry are not obliged to report actual numbers after successfully lobbying that public disclosure would be commercially damaging!

 

 

From: <Lorna.Munro@gov.scot>
Date: Fri, Sep 13, 2019 at 10:00 AM
Subject: RE: Date of 2018 fish farm survey?
To: <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>

Hi Don

Yes, the Scottish fish farm production survey 2018 will be published on the 30^th September 2019 at 9.30am.

https://www2.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/ForthcomingPubs

Kind regards

Lorna

 

 

 

More details on Mowi via:

Welfare Abuse at Scottish Salmon Farms - Why No Legal Enforcement Or Prosecutions?

The Fish Pharm Menace - Mowi is Like a Bad Movie (& Dick Dastardly)!

"Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans

Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe

Proposed salmon farm raises environmental concerns in Hebrides

Memo to MOWI - You Got to Move it, You Got to Move it Mowi!

 

 

 

Mowi “holding communities to ransom” over relocation of fish farm sites says campaigner

Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann)

Mowi's Fungus Pollution of the River Polly

Fish farms urged to stop use of toxic chemical in Scottish waters

EXPOSED: Mowi's Cache of Carcinogenic Chemicals On Conservative MSP's Estate

Salmon farming giant Mowi probed over chemical use

Salmon Farming Exposed

Mowi's Greed of Feed

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

The Sorry State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018

Negative perception of Marine Harvest behind switch to Mowi

"We think it's completely wrong that the Mowi name will be associated with the kind of farming that Marine Harvest operates"

X-Rated Mowi: Preview of Marine Harvest's Horror Show

 

 

Media Backgrounder: MOWI - Unfit for Purpose

Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips

Whistleblower photos of Marine Harvest

Sunday Mail: "Gutted - 300,000 salmon are killed as storm batters fish farm"

The welfare status of salmon farms in Scotland

Named: Supermarkets selling salmon from 'poor' welfare firms

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

Horror photos of farmed salmon spark legal threat

 

Media Backgrounder: "Marine Harmfest Scotland"

24,500 fish escape from Marine Harvest farm after storm damage

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Leaps Over 10 Million - FOI reveals 2.3 million dead salmon at Marine Harvest farms in 2017

Mapped: the 45 lochs polluted by fish farm pesticides

RSPCA in firing line over Marine Harvest's seal-killing spree in Scotland

16,000 salmon escape Argyll fish farm after storms

Fish company investigated after salmon farm pollutes Scottish loch - Marine Harvest, one of the largest fish-farming companies, is under investigation after polluting loch with pesticide

Revealed: the dirty dozen salmon farms that contaminate lochs with pesticides

Marine Harvest fined £23,500 for pollution

Campaigners want polluted salmon farm endorsed by Oliver to be shut

 

The Fish Pharm Menace - Mowi is Like a Bad Movie (& Dick Dastardly)!

 

When Scottish Salmon Watch visited salmon farms operated by Mowi (formerly called Marine Harvest) around the Island of Shuna earlier this month (1 September) we were shadowed so closely that we've written a letter to the Chief Executive of the Maritime & Coastguard Agency regarding Mowi's intimidation, harassment and reckless navigation in ignoring the 'rules of the road'. 

 

 

 

 

Being harassed by Mowi boats brought back memories of the poor pigeon chased down by Dastardly & Muttley.

 

 

 

Our small kayak was dwarfed by Mowi power boats deliberately and dangerously blocking our safe navigation through public waters (the Round Shuna pursuit yacht race was taking place during our visit to Mowi's Port Na Cro salmon farm).  Despite Scottish Salmon Watch's repeated requests to "avoid unnecessary confrontation", Police Scotland failed to monitor the protests allowing Mowi to act unchecked.

 

 

Mowi's menacing tactics in Scotland are similar to the surveillance, intimidation and harassment employed by Mowi in Canada.

 

 

Read more via: Fish farm activists complain of intimidation and ‘Black Cube’ mix-up muddies waters over Martin Sheen surveillance

 

 

Or the threatening behaviour of Police Scotland who in July 2019 were caught acting as private security for Norwegian-owned salmon farms.

 

 

 

Despite Mowi's repeated attempts at blocking our approach, we successfully sampled untreated sewage waste effluent (which we suspect may contain infectious diseases, pathogens, bacteria and viruses such a Piscine Reovirus) in the public waters close to Mowi's salmon farms.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's video footage from our visit to Mowi's Port Na Cro salmon farm (Mowi staff also have much more video footage!):

 

 

 

Here's video footage from Mowi's SW Shuna salmon farm (the site is actually registered to and owned by Kames Fish Farming with the name Rubh an Trilleachain):

 

 

 

 

 

Here's video footage of our visit to Mowi's Poll Na Gille salmon farm (ranked the worst for welfare) on 1 September 2019.

 

 

 

 

Here's a summary video report of our protests over the weekend of 31 August & 1 September 2019:

 

 

 

Prior to visiting salmon farms, Scottish Salmon Watch take appropriate biosecurity precautions (as recommended by the Scottish Government and the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation):

 

 

 

However, seagulls (and other wildlife including wild fish such as herring which have been filmed in the vicinity and inside salmon farms) do not take biosecurity safeguards as the salmon farm operates in an open water environment. 

 

 

 

Operating in an open water environment can have significant impacts way beyond the salmon farm lease area.  Peer-reviewed science has shown the lethal impact of toxic chemicals used by salmon farms on shellfish, seaweed and the marine environment.

 

 

 

Noise pollution from the Acoustic Deterrent Devices (ADDs) used by salmon farms has been shown by peer-reviewed scientific research to impact on cetaceans up to 50km away:

 

 

 

The take-home message - to be heard loud and clear around the world - is don't buy Scottish salmon.  Please take the pledge not to buy farmed salmon. 

 

 

And don't buy Mowi's disease-ridden salmon - I'd rather eat my own vomit!

 

 

 

Please educate your children on the risks posed by farmed salmon and salmon farming!

 

 

And take a look at what Mowi's salmon really look like when the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate do find time to inspect their filthy farms:

 

 

 

 

With rising Summer temperatures and warmer weather, the alarm bells are ringing that 2019 could be the worst year on record for mortalities and diseases on Scottish salmon farms.  Salmon Business reported in May:

 

 

 

No wonder SumOfUs is calling for the Scottish Government to conduct immediate unannounced on-the-spot inspections of ALL salmon farms.

 

 

 

 

 

More details via:

Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)

"Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans

Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe

Proposed salmon farm raises environmental concerns in Hebrides

Memo to MOWI - You Got to Move it, You Got to Move it Mowi!

Mowi “holding communities to ransom” over relocation of fish farm sites says campaigner

Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann)

 

 

Mowi's Fungus Pollution of the River Polly

Fish farms urged to stop use of toxic chemical in Scottish waters

EXPOSED: Mowi's Cache of Carcinogenic Chemicals On Conservative MSP's Estate

Salmon farming giant Mowi probed over chemical use

Salmon Farming Exposed

Mowi's Greed of Feed

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

The Sorry State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018

Negative perception of Marine Harvest behind switch to Mowi

"We think it's completely wrong that the Mowi name will be associated with the kind of farming that Marine Harvest operates"

X-Rated Mowi: Preview of Marine Harvest's Horror Show

 

 

Media Backgrounder: MOWI - Unfit for Purpose

Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips

Whistleblower photos of Marine Harvest

Sunday Mail: "Gutted - 300,000 salmon are killed as storm batters fish farm"

 

The welfare status of salmon farms in Scotland

Named: Supermarkets selling salmon from 'poor' welfare firms

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

Horror photos of farmed salmon spark legal threat

 

Media Backgrounder: "Marine Harmfest Scotland"

24,500 fish escape from Marine Harvest farm after storm damage

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Leaps Over 10 Million - FOI reveals 2.3 million dead salmon at Marine Harvest farms in 2017

Mapped: the 45 lochs polluted by fish farm pesticides

RSPCA in firing line over Marine Harvest's seal-killing spree in Scotland

16,000 salmon escape Argyll fish farm after storms

Fish company investigated after salmon farm pollutes Scottish loch - Marine Harvest, one of the largest fish-farming companies, is under investigation after polluting loch with pesticide

Revealed: the dirty dozen salmon farms that contaminate lochs with pesticides

Marine Harvest fined £23,500 for pollution

Campaigners want polluted salmon farm endorsed by Oliver to be shut

 

 

Letter to Maritime & Coastguard Agency re. Safety

Here's a letter sent to the Chief Executive of the Maritime Coastguard Agency (12 September 2019):

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read letter in full online here

 

 

More details via:

• The Fish Pharm Menace - Mowi is Like a Bad Movie (& Dick Dastardly)!
• Photos of Salmon Farm Protests
• Citizen Science - if the Scottish Government won't sample salmon farm effluents then we will!
• Sewage Samples from Mowi Salmon Farms a "Biosecurity Risk" say Scottish Parliament!
• The Oban Times: "Salmon farm water samples delivered to Scottish Parliament"
• Press Release: "Testing Times for Scottish Salmon"
• Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"
• Undercurrent News: "Scottish farming protestors kick off 'citizen science' campaign"

 

 

 

 

Photos of Salmon Farm Protests

 

Here's a selection of photos from our recent protests - starting on 31 August 2019 with photos taken by photographer Lauren Fair:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Watch a video report from SumOfUs:

 

 

 

And a video report from Andrew Holder:

 

 

 

Here's more photos from 31 August 2019:

 

 

 

Here's photos from 1 September 2019:

 

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

 

• Citizen Science - if the Scottish Government won't sample salmon farm effluents then we will!
• Sewage Samples from Mowi Salmon Farms a "Biosecurity Risk" say Scottish Parliament!
• The Oban Times: "Salmon farm water samples delivered to Scottish Parliament"
• Press Release: "Testing Times for Scottish Salmon"
• Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"

 

Citizen Science - if the Scottish Government won't sample salmon farm effluents then we will!

 

Citizen Science from Andrew Holder on Vimeo.

 

 

Read more via:

 

• Sewage Samples from Mowi Salmon Farms a "Biosecurity Risk" say Scottish Parliament!
• The Oban Times: "Salmon farm water samples delivered to Scottish Parliament"
• Press Release: "Testing Times for Scottish Salmon"
• Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"
• Undercurrent News: "Scottish farming protestors kick off 'citizen science' campaign"
• Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"
• The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"
• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"
• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"

 

 

 

 

 

Sewage Samples from Mowi Salmon Farms a "Biosecurity Risk" say Scottish Parliament!

 

Samples of untreated sewage effluent taken by Scottish Salmon Watch at Mowi salmon farms at Port Na Cro and Poll Na Gille around the Island of Shuna near Craobh Haven were denied entry to the Scottish Parliament who deemed it a "biosecurity risk".

 

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch sent the samples to Marine Scotland Science in Aberdeen.

 

Watch more via:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

 

• Press Release: "Testing Times for Scottish Salmon"
• Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"
• Undercurrent News: "Scottish farming protestors kick off 'citizen science' campaign"
• Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"
• The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"
• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"

 

 

Shamefully, Marine Scotland Science (who Scottish Salmon Watch mailed samples of waste effluent to) do not even test for pathogens (even though Marine Scotland Science have detected the highly contagious Piscine Reovirus in over 50% of farmed salmon samples tested):

 

From: <MS.FishHealth@gov.scot>
Date: Mon, Sep 9, 2019 at 4:45 PM
Subject: RE: Samples of waste effluent from Mowi salmon farms (Port Na Cro & Poll Na Gille)
To: <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>

 

Dear Mr Staniford,

 

The testing of water and effluent for the presence of pathogens is not a service which Marine Scotland Science currently offer.

 

Upon receipt of the water samples, Marine Scotland Science can either dispose of them in a biosecure manner, or return them to you.

 

I would be obliged if you could advise me accordingly.

 

Your sincerely,

 

Charles Allan.

 

Fish Health Inspectorate

Group Leader

 

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Sent: 09 September 2019 15:08
To: Marine Scotland Mailbox <Marine_Scotland_Mailbox@gov.scot>; MS FishHealth <MS.FishHealth@gov.scot>
Subject: Samples of waste effluent from Mowi salmon farms (Port Na Cro & Poll Na Gille)

 

Please note that two samples of waste effluent collected from near Mowi salmon farms have been mailed to Marine Scotland Science in Aberdeen.

 

They were collected from close to the salmon farm at Port Na Cro and Poll Na Gille on 1 September.

 

Please confirm receipt.

 

Could you please test the samples for infectious diseases, pathogens and viruses?

 

Videos via

https://vimeo.com/358772135

https://vimeo.com/357656385

 

Thanks,

 

Don

The Oban Times: "Salmon farm water samples delivered to Scottish Parliament"

 

 

Read The Oban Times article in full online here

 

 

View this photo

 

 

Read more via:

 

• Sewage Samples from Mowi Salmon Farms a "Biosecurity Risk" say Scottish Parliament!
• Press Release: "Testing Times for Scottish Salmon"
• Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"
• Undercurrent News: "Scottish farming protestors kick off 'citizen science' campaign"
• Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"
• The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"
• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"

Press Release: "Testing Times for Scottish Salmon"

Download press release as a PDF online here

 

Read more via:

Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"

Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"

The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"

The Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"

"Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"

Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?

Letter to Police Scotland re. protocol for filming salmon farms

The Ferret: "Police Scotland acted as ‘private security’ for fish farm, claims campaigner"

Make a Splash for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

Swimming (& Paddling) Against the Rising Tide of Salmon Farming

Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe

STV News: "Inspection call to stop 'surge of deaths' at salmon farms"

BBC News: "Salmon petition calls for 'emergency' fish farm inspections"

'Salmonwatch' Exposes Scottish Salmon's Dirty Secrets

Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann)

Photos of Secret Filming at Scottish & Irish Salmon Farms

"Campaigners call for urgent investigation of all Scottish salmon farms"

'Salmonwatch' Launched in Scotland

Biosecurity Precautions for Filming Salmon Farms

 

 

Photo: Andrew Holder of Extinction Rebellion Oban

 

Download high res image online here

Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)

Download in full as a PDF online here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Download in full as a PDF online here

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"
• Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"
• The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"
• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"
• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"

 

 

 

Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

Download event poster as a Jpeg online here and as a PDF online here

 

Read more via: Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"

 

 

Please join us swimming and paddling around salmon farms near Oban on the West coast of Scotland on 31 August and 1 September (please help us spread the word - there's two versions of the posters).   

Download event poster as a Jpeg online here and as a PDF online here

 

For more specific details please email Don Staniford via salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com (Tel: 07771 541826)

 

 

Salmon farming has a raft of environmental impacts - including negative effects on seals, salmonids, cetaceans and shellfish. 

 

 

 

Do you want to speak up for wild salmon and sea trout impacted by disease-ridden salmon farms?

Read more via:

Impacts of salmon lice emanating from salmon farms on wild Atlantic salmon and sea trout

Extinction Vortex (chapter in Michael Wigan's book 'The Salmon')

Scottish Salmon's Great Escape

A Global Assessment of Salmon Aquaculture Impacts on Wild Salmonids

Declining wild salmon populations in relation to parasites from farm salmon

Wild salmon put at risk as a million farmed fish escape

Fitness reduction and potential extinction of wild populations of Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar, as a result of interactions with escaped farm salmon

Scottish salmon in "extinction vortex"

 

 

Do you want to speak for shellfish killed by the lethal chemicals used by salmon farms?

Read more via:

New salmon sea lice treatment threshold serves industry not oceans

Effects of pharmaceuticals used to treat salmon lice on non-target species: Evidence from a systematic review

Wildlife widely damaged by fish farm pesticides, says Sepa

Near fish farms. lobster catches plummet

Salmon farming in crisis: 'We are seeing a chemical arms race in the seas'

Fish Farmageddon: Scottish Salmon's Lethal Legacy

Damning Report on Toxic Salmon Farms Buried

SARF098: Towards Understanding of the Environmental Impact of a Sea Lice Medicine–the PAMP Suite

Silent Spring of the Sea

Report: Canadian salmon firm admits using lobster-killing pesticide near Maine border

Dispersion and toxicity to non-target crustaceans of azamethiphos and deltamethrin after sea lice treatments on farmed salmon, Salmo salar

New Scientific Paper: Salmon Farming Chemical Kills Lobsters!

 

 

 

 

 

Do you want to stand up for ca. 1,000 seals killed by salmon farms since 2010?

 

Read more via:

Seals Shot and Killed in Scotland by Cruel Salmon-Farming Industry

The RSPCA rescues one seal – and condones the killing of many others

Sunday Herald: "Revealed: Scottish Government bid to exempt salmon farming from US seal-killing ban"

Scottish Government bid to exempt fish farming from US ban on seal killing

Fish farms under fire for seal death toll

UK seal population under threat for salmon farming industry

RSPCA in firing line over Marine Harvest's seal-killing spree in Scotland

Not just salmon: 5 other animals impacted by salmon farming in Scotland

Time to stop the seal slaughter

Scotland's 'trigger-happy' salmon farmers risk losing £200m US export market

 

 

 

Or maybe you want to make a splash for cetaceans such as harbour porpoises and dolphins impacted by the noise pollution from the Acoustic Deterrent Devices (ADDs) used by salmon farms?

 

 

Read more via:

Sounding Off On Salmon Farms - Acoustic Deterrent Devices evade Marine Noise Registry

SARF report 112: "Influences of lower-frequency Acoustic Deterrent Devices (ADDs) on cetaceans in Scottish coastal waters"

The Times: "Noisy fish farms ‘harm other marine life’"

Mapping widespread and increasing underwater noise pollution from acoustic deterrent devices

Noise pollution from a salmon farm

Sounding Off About Scotland's Noisy Salmon Farms - Turn Off Acoustic Deterrent Devices to Protect Cetaceans

Deafening Impact of Salmon Farms on Cetaceans

The National: "Warning salmon farm devices could hit wildlife tourism"

Cetaceans Sound Alarm On Salmon Farms - new research sparks EC complaint & call to ban Acoustic Deterrent Devices

Sunday Herald: "Health of whales, dolphins and porpoises put at risk by underwater alarms"

Noisy Salmon Farms - Switch Off Acoustic Deterrent Devices Now!

Salmon Farming Kills Whales

Whale drowned after being trapped under salmon pen

 

 

 

Sign a petition against the use of ADDs on salmon farms online here

 

 

Read more via:

 

• Letter to Police Scotland re. protocol for filming salmon farms
• The Ferret: "Police Scotland acted as ‘private security’ for fish farm, claims campaigner"
• Make a Splash for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Swimming (& Paddling) Against the Rising Tide of Salmon Farming

 

 

 

Read more background on the salmon farms to be visited online here (and updated online here)

 

 

 

Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"

The Oban Times reported (30 August 2019):

 

 

 

Read more news via:

 

 

• Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"
• The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"
• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"
• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times

 

 

Here's our advert in last week's Oban Times:

 

 

 

More details via Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

 

Undercurrent News: "Scottish farming protestors kick off 'citizen science' campaign"

 

 

Read more via:

 

• Media Backgrounder & Schedule for Swim for Salmon (31 Aug & 1 Sept)
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Oban Times: "Protestors make waves for salmon farms"
• Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"
• The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"
• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"
• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"

Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"

The trade newspaper and online media service Intrafish reported (28 August 2019):

 

 

 

Read more via:

• Intrafish: "Protestors to test water around salmon farms"
• The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"
• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"
• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

 

The National: "Salmon chiefs issue warning to swimmers ahead of protest"

 

The National reported (28 August 2019):

 

 

 

Read more via:

• The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"
• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"
• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?

The Herald: "Citizen science activists target salmon farms"

The Herald reported (28 August 2019):

 

 

 

Here's the newspaper version (download Jpeg online here):

 

 

Read more via:

• The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"
• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?
• Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019
• Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

 

The Times: "Campaigners test health at salmon farms"

The Times reported (28 August 2019):

 

 

 

Hamish Macdonell knows The Times newspaper all too well - he was Scottish political editor at The Times before leaving to join the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation in September 2018. 

 

 

In March 2018, Hamish reported for The Times on the "huge risk to the environment" from salmon farming:

 

 

Now his job is to bury the truth about disease-ridden Scottish salmon farming.

 

Photo: Truly stressed and skinless Scottish salmon - battered and flayed alive at a Mowi salmon farm in Kilbrannan Sound in March 2018 (Mowi admitted to The Sunday Mail that 300,000 farmed salmon died)

 

 

Hamish Macdonell and The Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO) has refused to coordinate site visits:

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Aug 23, 2019 at 3:31 PM
Subject: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: Hamish Macdonell <hmacdonell@scottishsalmon.co.uk>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>, <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, <ian.roberts@mowi.com>

Hamish,

Further to our conversation at the Scottish Parliament earlier this year, would it be possible to organize site visits to salmon farms over the weekend of 31 August & 1 September?

We have a police liaison officer (former policeman Mark Carter of Marine Concern - copied in here) who knows the area well and is willing to board any police boat or Scottish Sea Farms/Mowi boat to monitor the events. 

Prior to the visits we could meet to discuss specific plans and doubly ensure that safety and biosecurity measures are addressed. 

You can read letters to Police Scotland via:

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/08/letter-to-police-scotland-re-protocol-for-filming-salmon-farms-.html

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/files/letter-re-protocol-guidelines-for-filming-at-salmon-farms-21-july-2019.pdf

 

And you can read about our biosecurity & safety protocols via https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/07/biosecurity-precautions-for-filming-salmon-farms-.html

I know Scottish Sea Farms (copied in here) have concerns about biosecurity, safety and animal welfare. 

I have also copied in Mowi's head of communications Ian Roberts along with Police Scotland's Sophie Marshall who I spoke with earlier this week and briefed her on our plans. 

Here's the latest schedule:

 

We'll be taking water samples near the salmon farms and would also like to board the farms to take photos, video and samples of farmed salmon and cleaner fish for disease testing (we will be accompanied by a trained veterinarian). 

From the recently published Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate data on mortalities and disease it seems that Mowi has welfare problems at Bagh Dail Nan Ceann and Poll Na Gille in particular: 

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann)

 

And filming in July at the Mowi/Kames salmon farm at South West Shuna (Rubh an Trilleachain) has uncovered footage of disease-looking cleaner fish:

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/files/letter-re.-bdnc-breach-of-animal-health-welfare-act-2006-20-july-2019.pdf

https://vimeo.com/355524215

Drone footage of the Shuna salmon farm operated by Scottish Sea Farms also raises serious welfare concerns: https://vimeo.com/348596635

It is also alarming that Police Scotland acted as a security guard for Scottish Sea Farms when the area in question is public waters with historic and intrinsic rights of navigation:

https://theferret.scot/staniford-police-scotland-scottish-sea-farms/

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/07/police-scotland-acting-as-private-security-enforcement-for-norwegian-owned-scottish-sea-farms.html

 

Scottish Salmon Watch believes that salmon farms on the West coast of Scotland may be breaching the Animal Health & Welfare Act (Scotland) 2006 in relation to "Unnecessary Suffering" (Section 19); "Cruel Operations" (Section 21) and "Ensuring Welfare of Animals" (Section 24).

Hence the calls by over 43,000 SumOfUs petitioners for immediate unannounced on-the-spot inspections: https://actions.sumofus.org/pages/stop-salmon-from-suffering-investigate-scottish-fish-farms-right-now-1

Do you think it would be possible to arrange formal site visits on 31 August and 1 September?

I am on 07771 541826 if you have any queries. 

Thanks,

 

Don

Director of Scottish Salmon Watch

 

 

From: Hamish Macdonell <hmacdonell@scottishsalmon.co.uk>
Date: Mon, Aug 26, 2019 at 9:11 PM
Subject: Re: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>, lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, ian.roberts@mowi.com <Ian.Roberts@mowi.com>, Julie Hesketh-Laird <jhesketh-laird@scottishsalmon.co.uk>, Nathan Tyler <ntyler@scottishsalmon.co.uk>

Dear Don,

The SSPO cannot facilitate such visits to farms.

Anyone wanting to do so should approach the companies concerned.

Please see the guidance on the SSPO website relating to health and safety and visits to salmon farms.

http://scottishsalmon.co.uk/safety-near-salmon-farms/

Regards,

Hamish Macdonell

 

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Aug 27, 2019 at 7:49 AM
Subject: Re: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: Hamish Macdonell <hmacdonell@scottishsalmon.co.uk>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>, lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, ian.roberts@mowi.com <Ian.Roberts@mowi.com>, Julie Hesketh-Laird <jhesketh-laird@scottishsalmon.co.uk>, Nathan Tyler <ntyler@scottishsalmon.co.uk>

Hamish,

It is disappointing that the SSPO cannot coordinate site visits this weekend.  If you change your mind I am on 07771 541826.

Re: the SSPO's advice on 'Safety Near Salmon Farms'

And specifically the statement:

"It is advised that a distance of 15 metres is maintained from the perimeter of a site to ensure safe passage and minimise any risk of harm or damage. You should avoid swimming, diving or kayaking closer than 15 metres to a fish farm"

Do you have any regulation, law or any guidance justifying such a distance?  Is this backed up by Police Scotland, Marine Scotland, APHA or any other Government agency?

If the weather and water conditions are suitably safe then I certainly plan to swim and/or kayak much closer than 15 metres from the salmon farms.  In order to collect samples of waste effluent to test for infectious diseases, pathogens, parasites, bacteria, contaminants, chemicals etc it is necessary to get as close as possible.  I will have my family - including our 4 & 5 year old children on board the main boat - so the notion that I would be compromising safety is ludicrous. 

Your "don't stress our fish" argument (as published in yesterday's Fish Farmer) simply does not hold water either.  Read more via Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?

If salmon farmers held animal welfare in high regard then they would not be cramming a migratory species like the Atlantic salmon - the King of Fish - in lice-infested, disease-ridden cages.  And salmon farmers would not be using a torture chamber for fish - the Thermolicer (watch video of the Voe Earl Thermolicer - used by Mowi - in Craobh Haven) - if they had any serious concerns about welfare.  Norway is considering a ban and Scottish Salmon Watch believes Scotland should follow suit.  Read more via Authorities mull over ban on thermal delousing.

It's an undeniable reality that salmon farming is a welfare nightmare with Mowi's site at Poll na Gille (where we will visit on Sunday 1 September) ranked by OneKind as the worst in Scotland.  Mowi's Bagh Dail Nan Ceann salmon farm is ranked third worst by OneKind. 

When we filmed inside a salmon cage at Bagh Dail Nan Cean (meaning 'Bay of the Dead Heads' in Gaelic)  in July 2019 we were horrified by the dead and dying cleaner fish on the surface of the farm.  Read our report via Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann). 

As you are fully aware, when the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectors visited Mowi sites around Shuna in June 2019 they reported welfare, mortality and disease problems (including 'crater disease' in cleaner fish).  Read more via Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019 

Suffice to say here that getting closer than 15 metres (taking all biosecurity and safety protocols into account - read more via Biosecurity Precautions for Filming Salmon Farms) is required in order to see if Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms are breaching welfare laws (and health & safety for that matter) not to mention environmental pollution regulations. 

In particular, Scottish Salmon Watch believes salmon farms are routinely breaching the  Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 - specifically in relation to "Unnecessary Suffering", "Cruel Operations" and "Ensuring Welfare of Animals". 

We have strong reasons - probable cause if you want to use a criminal law term - to believe that Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms are guilty of welfare abuse similar to the gruesome photographic evidence obtained from the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate in 2018.

BBC Panorama broadcast video footage from diver David Ainsley showing waste pollution under a Mowi salmon farm around Shuna (Poll na Gille).  Watch via 'Salmon Farming Exposed'.

If David Ainsley had stayed 15 metres away he would not have captured nauseating video footage of dead and diseased salmon at the bottom of a salmon farm operated by Mowi around Shuna either.  Watch online here and online here.

We are hoping to have a diver on board and if they dived under Scottish Sea Farms and/or Mowi farms then staying 15 metres away would not show the state of waste pollution, welfare problems or mass mortalities.  Or that is the SSPO's intention in warning us off?

From 15 metres away we should still be able to hear the Acoustic Deterrent Devices used by Mowi - indeed peer-reviewed scientific research has shown that cetaceans such as harbour porpoises can hear the noise pollution from salmon farms as far as 25 km away.  Read more via BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans

As Scottish Salmon Watch has offered previously, we have Mark Carter of Marine Concern on hand willing to act as a police liaison.  Mark is an ex-policeman and also knows the waters around Oban well as a kayaker and marine expert. 

We would be happy to meet with the SSPO, Scottish Sea Farms, Mowi and Police Scotland prior to the events over the weekend to further discuss safety and biosecurity.

As previously requested, we would kindly ask Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms to establish a cease-fire over the weekend and take fire-arms off the site.  I will be dressed as a seal and the bullet proof vest is fake (just like M&S's Lochmuir salmon).  Read more via Letter to Police Scotland re. protocol for filming salmon farms

Given our plans to be in the water - designated public waters afforded protection to navigation and recreation under Scottish law - around salmon farms could I please ask that Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms stop chemical delousing over the coming week?  Boats carrying toxic chemicals have been seen recently in the area where we will be swimming and we do not want our health to be impacted by pesticides known to be lethal to lobsters and other marine life. 

 

 

We will be wearing gas masks but again these are not real and we would ask that Mowi & Scottish Sea Farms respect public safety and public health. 

If you have any concerns or queries please do not hesitate to contact me.  Further information including specific details on the protests is available via: Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

Thanks,

Don

Director of Scottish Salmon Watch

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch has asked Mowi & Scottish Sea Farms to set up official site visits:

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Aug 27, 2019 at 8:07 AM
Subject: Fwd: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, <ian.roberts@mowi.com>, <Jayne.MacKay@mowi.com>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>

Would it be possible to have a official site visits to your salmon farms on 31 August and 1 September?

We will be in the public waters close to your salmon farms - adhering to all biosecurity and safety protocols - and would like to take samples of diseased salmon for testing as well as waste effluents. 

If you would like to meet prior to the protests then we would be happy discuss any concerns you may have.  Mark Carter (copied in here) is willing to board any Police Scotland (Sophie Marshall of Police Scotland is copied in here too - we have been speaking to her about our protests) or salmon farm boat to be on the water around the salmon farms.

Scottish Salmon Watch takes the issue of biosecurity and safety extremely seriously (see my email to the SSPO below for more details).

I am on 07771 541826 if you have any questions.

Best fishes,

Don

 

 

Here's a Tweet to Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms (27 August 2019):

 

 

Read more via:

• Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"
• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?
• Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019
• Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

Photo: Truly stressed and skinless Scottish salmon - battered and flayed alive at a Mowi salmon farm in Kilbrannan Sound in March 2018 (Mowi admitted to The Sunday Mail that 300,000 farmed salmon died)

Press & Journal: "Claims fish farm protest must be halted on health and safety grounds"

 

The Press & Journal reported (27 August 2019):

 

 

Read more via:

• The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"
• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?
• Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019
• Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?
• Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe

The Scotsman: "Protestors set to target west coast fish farms"

 

The Scotsman reported (27 August 2019):

 

Read more via:

 

• "Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"
• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?
• Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019
• Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?
• Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe

 

"Don’t stress our fish, campaigners told"

Photo: Truly stressed and skinless Scottish salmon - battered and flayed alive at a Mowi salmon farm in Kilbrannan Sound in March 2018 (Mowi admitted to The Sunday Mail that 300,000 farmed salmon died)

 

 

Pity those poor (sorry, I mean obscenely rich billionaire) salmon farmers at Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms who between them control over 50% of 'Scottish' salmon farming.  

 

 

These Norwegian-owned giants are worried that swimmers dressed as salmon, seals, lobsters and harbour porpoises will "stress" their factory farmed fish (20-25% of which die a horrible death each year due to diseases and welfare problems) during protests planned for this weekend.  

 

 

 

Scottish Sea Farms claimed in a letter (22 August 2019) that the protest "poses a risk to salmon stocks, potentially breaching biosecurity protocol and causing stress to the fish, both of which can have devastating consequences on animal welfare".

 

 

 

One of the salmon farms visited on Sunday (1 September) is the worst salmon farm according to a welfare report published last year by OneKind - another Mowi farm at Bagh Dail Nan Ceann (Bay of the Dead Heads in Gaelic) was ranked by OneKind as joint second worst.  

 

 

Watch shocking video footage of welfare abuse of dead and dying cleaner fish at Mowi's salmon farm at 'Bay of the Dead Heads' in July 2019 online here

 

 

Video footage of lice-infested cleaner fish swimming inside a salmon farm operated by Scottish Sea Farms in Loch Spelve on the Isle of Mull is enough to put you off your Scottish salmon supper for life.

 

 

Read a report by OneKind on the welfare of cleaner fish on salmon farms online here

 

 

The welfare conditions of farmed salmon and cleaner fish at Scottish Sea Farms do not look much better than at Mowi (formerly known as Marine Harvest but the name was changed in January 2019 due to negative consumer perceptions despite objections from the Mowinckel family who name was appropriated). 

 

 

 

Here's photos taken by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate of diseased salmon farmed by Scottish Sea Farms (lawyers acting for Scottish Sea Farms failed in threatened legal action to prevent disclosure).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fish Farmer magazine reported (26 August 2019):

 

 

 

The Scottish Salmon Producer Organisation issued a media statement (26 August 2019) - posted online a few hours after my blog Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?:

 

 

 

Here's the letter dated 22 August 2019:

 

 

Here's our reply:

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Aug 22, 2019 at 2:57 PM
Subject: Re: Planned protest
To: Lesley Rice <lesley.rice@scottishseafarms.com>

Thanks - I'd be happy to meet Scottish Sea Farms on the morning of 31 August prior to the event.  Ideally, Police Scotland would also be present.

We have a police liaison officer (former policeman Mark Carter of Marine Concern) who knows the area well and is willing to board any police boat or Scottish Sea Farms boat. 

We could discuss specific plans and doubly ensure that safety and biosecurity measures are addressed.

You can read letters to Police Scotland via:

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/08/letter-to-police-scotland-re-protocol-for-filming-salmon-farms-.html

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/files/letter-re-protocol-guidelines-for-filming-at-salmon-farms-21-july-2019.pdf

And you can read about our biosecurity & safety protocols via https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/07/biosecurity-precautions-for-filming-salmon-farms-.html

What do Scottish Sea Farms consider a safe distance away from the cages?

We'd certainly like to take water samples of the untreated sewage effluent from your feedlots. 

Thanks,

 

Don

 

 

Read more via Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?

 

 

 

The Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO) has refused to coordinate site visits:

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, Aug 23, 2019 at 3:31 PM
Subject: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: Hamish Macdonell <hmacdonell@scottishsalmon.co.uk>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>, <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, <ian.roberts@mowi.com>

Hamish,

Further to our conversation at the Scottish Parliament earlier this year, would it be possible to organize site visits to salmon farms over the weekend of 31 August & 1 September?

We have a police liaison officer (former policeman Mark Carter of Marine Concern - copied in here) who knows the area well and is willing to board any police boat or Scottish Sea Farms/Mowi boat to monitor the events. 

Prior to the visits we could meet to discuss specific plans and doubly ensure that safety and biosecurity measures are addressed. 

You can read letters to Police Scotland via:

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/08/letter-to-police-scotland-re-protocol-for-filming-salmon-farms-.html

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/files/letter-re-protocol-guidelines-for-filming-at-salmon-farms-21-july-2019.pdf

 

And you can read about our biosecurity & safety protocols via https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/07/biosecurity-precautions-for-filming-salmon-farms-.html

I know Scottish Sea Farms (copied in here) have concerns about biosecurity, safety and animal welfare. 

I have also copied in Mowi's head of communications Ian Roberts along with Police Scotland's Sophie Marshall who I spoke with earlier this week and briefed her on our plans. 

Here's the latest schedule:

 

We'll be taking water samples near the salmon farms and would also like to board the farms to take photos, video and samples of farmed salmon and cleaner fish for disease testing (we will be accompanied by a trained veterinarian). 

From the recently published Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate data on mortalities and disease it seems that Mowi has welfare problems at Bagh Dail Nan Ceann and Poll Na Gille in particular: 

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann)

 

And filming in July at the Mowi/Kames salmon farm at South West Shuna (Rubh an Trilleachain) has uncovered footage of disease-looking cleaner fish:

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/files/letter-re.-bdnc-breach-of-animal-health-welfare-act-2006-20-july-2019.pdf

https://vimeo.com/355524215

Drone footage of the Shuna salmon farm operated by Scottish Sea Farms also raises serious welfare concerns: https://vimeo.com/348596635

It is also alarming that Police Scotland acted as a security guard for Scottish Sea Farms when the area in question is public waters with historic and intrinsic rights of navigation:

https://theferret.scot/staniford-police-scotland-scottish-sea-farms/

https://donstaniford.typepad.com/my-blog/2019/07/police-scotland-acting-as-private-security-enforcement-for-norwegian-owned-scottish-sea-farms.html

 

Scottish Salmon Watch believes that salmon farms on the West coast of Scotland may be breaching the Animal Health & Welfare Act (Scotland) 2006 in relation to "Unnecessary Suffering" (Section 19); "Cruel Operations" (Section 21) and "Ensuring Welfare of Animals" (Section 24).

Hence the calls by over 43,000 SumOfUs petitioners for immediate unannounced on-the-spot inspections: https://actions.sumofus.org/pages/stop-salmon-from-suffering-investigate-scottish-fish-farms-right-now-1

Do you think it would be possible to arrange formal site visits on 31 August and 1 September?

I am on 07771 541826 if you have any queries. 

Thanks,

 

Don

Director of Scottish Salmon Watch

 

 

From: Hamish Macdonell <hmacdonell@scottishsalmon.co.uk>
Date: Mon, Aug 26, 2019 at 9:11 PM
Subject: Re: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>, lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, ian.roberts@mowi.com <Ian.Roberts@mowi.com>, Julie Hesketh-Laird <jhesketh-laird@scottishsalmon.co.uk>, Nathan Tyler <ntyler@scottishsalmon.co.uk>

Dear Don,

The SSPO cannot facilitate such visits to farms.

Anyone wanting to do so should approach the companies concerned.

Please see the guidance on the SSPO website relating to health and safety and visits to salmon farms.

http://scottishsalmon.co.uk/safety-near-salmon-farms/

Regards,

Hamish Macdonell

 

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Aug 27, 2019 at 7:49 AM
Subject: Re: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: Hamish Macdonell <hmacdonell@scottishsalmon.co.uk>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>, lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, ian.roberts@mowi.com <Ian.Roberts@mowi.com>, Julie Hesketh-Laird <jhesketh-laird@scottishsalmon.co.uk>, Nathan Tyler <ntyler@scottishsalmon.co.uk>

Hamish,

It is disappointing that the SSPO cannot coordinate site visits this weekend.  If you change your mind I am on 07771 541826.

Re: the SSPO's advice on 'Safety Near Salmon Farms'

And specifically the statement:

"It is advised that a distance of 15 metres is maintained from the perimeter of a site to ensure safe passage and minimise any risk of harm or damage. You should avoid swimming, diving or kayaking closer than 15 metres to a fish farm"

Do you have any regulation, law or any guidance justifying such a distance?  Is this backed up by Police Scotland, Marine Scotland, APHA or any other Government agency?

If the weather and water conditions are suitably safe then I certainly plan to swim and/or kayak much closer than 15 metres from the salmon farms.  In order to collect samples of waste effluent to test for infectious diseases, pathogens, parasites, bacteria, contaminants, chemicals etc it is necessary to get as close as possible.  I will have my family - including our 4 & 5 year old children on board the main boat - so the notion that I would be compromising safety is ludicrous. 

Your "don't stress our fish" argument (as published in yesterday's Fish Farmer) simply does not hold water either.  Read more via Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?

If salmon farmers held animal welfare in high regard then they would not be cramming a migratory species like the Atlantic salmon - the King of Fish - in lice-infested, disease-ridden cages.  And salmon farmers would not be using a torture chamber for fish - the Thermolicer (watch video of the Voe Earl Thermolicer - used by Mowi - in Craobh Haven) - if they had any serious concerns about welfare.  Norway is considering a ban and Scottish Salmon Watch believes Scotland should follow suit.  Read more via Authorities mull over ban on thermal delousing.

It's an undeniable reality that salmon farming is a welfare nightmare with Mowi's site at Poll na Gille (where we will visit on Sunday 1 September) ranked by OneKind as the worst in Scotland.  Mowi's Bagh Dail Nan Ceann salmon farm is ranked third worst by OneKind. 

When we filmed inside a salmon cage at Bagh Dail Nan Cean (meaning 'Bay of the Dead Heads' in Gaelic)  in July 2019 we were horrified by the dead and dying cleaner fish on the surface of the farm.  Read our report via Shocking Video Footage from Mowi's 'Bay of the Dead Heads' (Bagh Dail nan Ceann). 

As you are fully aware, when the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectors visited Mowi sites around Shuna in June 2019 they reported welfare, mortality and disease problems (including 'crater disease' in cleaner fish).  Read more via Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019 

Suffice to say here that getting closer than 15 metres (taking all biosecurity and safety protocols into account - read more via Biosecurity Precautions for Filming Salmon Farms) is required in order to see if Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms are breaching welfare laws (and health & safety for that matter) not to mention environmental pollution regulations. 

In particular, Scottish Salmon Watch believes salmon farms are routinely breaching the  Animal Health & Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 - specifically in relation to "Unnecessary Suffering", "Cruel Operations" and "Ensuring Welfare of Animals". 

We have strong reasons - probable cause if you want to use a criminal law term - to believe that Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms are guilty of welfare abuse similar to the gruesome photographic evidence obtained from the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate in 2018.

BBC Panorama broadcast video footage from diver David Ainsley showing waste pollution under a Mowi salmon farm around Shuna (Poll na Gille).  Watch via 'Salmon Farming Exposed'.

If David Ainsley had stayed 15 metres away he would not have captured nauseating video footage of dead and diseased salmon at the bottom of a salmon farm operated by Mowi around Shuna either.  Watch online here and online here.

We are hoping to have a diver on board and if they dived under Scottish Sea Farms and/or Mowi farms then staying 15 metres away would not show the state of waste pollution, welfare problems or mass mortalities.  Or that is the SSPO's intention in warning us off?

From 15 metres away we should still be able to hear the Acoustic Deterrent Devices used by Mowi - indeed peer-reviewed scientific research has shown that cetaceans such as harbour porpoises can hear the noise pollution from salmon farms as far as 25 km away.  Read more via BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans

As Scottish Salmon Watch has offered previously, we have Mark Carter of Marine Concern on hand willing to act as a police liaison.  Mark is an ex-policeman and also knows the waters around Oban well as a kayaker and marine expert. 

We would be happy to meet with the SSPO, Scottish Sea Farms, Mowi and Police Scotland prior to the events over the weekend to further discuss safety and biosecurity.

As previously requested, we would kindly ask Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms to establish a cease-fire over the weekend and take fire-arms off the site.  I will be dressed as a seal and the bullet proof vest is fake (just like M&S's Lochmuir salmon).  Read more via Letter to Police Scotland re. protocol for filming salmon farms

Given our plans to be in the water - designated public waters afforded protection to navigation and recreation under Scottish law - around salmon farms could I please ask that Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms stop chemical delousing over the coming week?  Boats carrying toxic chemicals have been seen recently in the area where we will be swimming and we do not want our health to be impacted by pesticides known to be lethal to lobsters and other marine life. 

 

 

We will be wearing gas masks but again these are not real and we would ask that Mowi & Scottish Sea Farms respect public safety and public health. 

If you have any concerns or queries please do not hesitate to contact me.  Further information including specific details on the protests is available via: Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

Thanks,

Don

Director of Scottish Salmon Watch

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch has asked Mowi & Scottish Sea Farms to set up official site visits:

 

From: Don Staniford <salmonfarmingkills@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Aug 27, 2019 at 8:07 AM
Subject: Fwd: Site visits on 31 Aug & 1 September?
To: <lesley.dougall@scottishseafarms.com>, <ian.roberts@mowi.com>, <Jayne.MacKay@mowi.com>
Cc: Mark Carter <mc@marineconcern.com>, Marshall, Sophie <Sophie.Marshall@scotland.pnn.police.uk>

Would it be possible to have a official site visits to your salmon farms on 31 August and 1 September?

We will be in the public waters close to your salmon farms - adhering to all biosecurity and safety protocols - and would like to take samples of diseased salmon for testing as well as waste effluents. 

If you would like to meet prior to the protests then we would be happy discuss any concerns you may have.  Mark Carter (copied in here) is willing to board any Police Scotland (Sophie Marshall of Police Scotland is copied in here too - we have been speaking to her about our protests) or salmon farm boat to be on the water around the salmon farms.

Scottish Salmon Watch takes the issue of biosecurity and safety extremely seriously (see my email to the SSPO below for more details).

I am on 07771 541826 if you have any questions.

Best fishes,

Don

 

 

Here's a Tweet to Mowi and Scottish Sea Farms (27 August 2019):

 

 

Expect welfare and disease problems to escalate - that's the warning in May 2019 from Mowi Scotland's Health Manager:

 

 

And expect further mass mortalities due to the torture chamber called The Thermolicer - with repeated calls for the welfare nightmare to be banned in Scotland as it looks likely to be banned in Norway:

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

• Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"
• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?
• Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019
• Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?
• Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe
• BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans
• Memo to MOWI - You Got to Move it, You Got to Move it Mowi!

 

Press Release: "Swim protest against salmon farming pollution on Scotland’s west coast"

 

Download press release as a PDF online here

 

 

 

High res photo of Andrew Holder of Extinction Rebellion Oban online here

High res photos of the flags to be used on the protest:

 

Download this photo

 

 

Download this photo

 

 

Download this photo

 

 

Download this photo

 

 

More details via Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

 

 

 

 

Here's our advert in latest issue of The Oban Times:

 

 

Read more news via:

 

• "Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?
• Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019
• Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?
• Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe
• BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans
• Memo to MOWI - You Got to Move it, You Got to Move it Mowi!

 

 

"Mowi are talking rubbish" says National Trust in the Financial Times

 

The Financial Times reported (27 August 2019):

 

Read article in full online here

 

 

Mowi Scotland's MD Ben Hadfield may not remember but readers of The Guardian may remember a report of the chemical pollution left by Marine Harvest (re-named Mowi in January 2019 due to negative consumer perceptions over the name Marine Harvest) in Loch Shell:

 

 

Read more on Marine Harvest's appalling environmental record via "Marine Harmfest Scotland"

 

 

 

New name but same environmental pollution - here's the BBC News reporting in May 2019.

 

 

Read more on Mowi via:

• Memo to MOWI - You Got to Move it, You Got to Move it Mowi!
• Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer
• Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?
• Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019
• Video sparks HSE scrutiny of Mowi in Loch Linnhe
• Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!
• BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans
• Fungus From Fish Farm Pollutes River Polly (Again, Again & Again)

 

 

 

 

 

New name but same environmental pollution - here's the BBC News reporting in May 2019.

 

 

Ministers Gorge on Scottish Salmon à la John Gummer

 

Fergus Ewing (the Scottish Government's Cabinet Secretary for Rural Economy & Connectivity aka Minister for the Promotion of Norwegian-owned Salmon Farming) is never afraid to leap like a disease-ridden Scottish salmon onto the industry's bandwagon.  

 

 

The photo of him tucking into Mowi salmon at the Lochaber Show (pictured with Kate Forbes MSP, another Scottish Minister busy prom0ting Norwegian-owned 'Scottish' salmon) brings back memories of John Gummer (then the UK Minister of Agriculture) feeding his daughter a bite of British beef at the height of the BSE scandal. 

 

 

 

 

 

"The fish farm industry forms an integral part of Scotland's rural economy – creating jobs and providing capital in some of our most rural communities," crowed Fergus Ewing in The Herald (15 October 2018).  "So it’s very encouraging to see salmon production value on the increase yet again."  

 

 

 

"Demand for quality Scottish salmon continues to outstrip supply and the sector aspires to grow to meet demand, but we also recognise the importance of steady, sustainable development," he continued.  "These new figures, alongside the investment in tackling emerging challenges give us great confidence in the sector’s ability for sustainable growth over the coming years."

 

 

 

Fergus forgot to mention the fact that salmon farming production in Scotland is predicted to fall a whopping 21% during 2018 (most of that 39,000 tonne fall being accounted for by lice-infested Mowi who reported a fall in salmon farming production in Scotland from 60,000 tonnes in 2017 to 40,000 tonnes in 2018). 

 

 

 

 

Here's the 2017 Scottish Fish Farm Production Survey published in October 2018 which predicts a fall of 21% (39,000 tonnes less production) in 2018:

 

 

In January 2018, Fergus admitted via a Scottish Parliamentary reply that over a quarter (26.7%) of all Scottish farmed salmon (nearly 13 million) were dying on salmon farms:

 

 

 

 

In April 2018, Fergus was at the Brussels Seafood Show flexing his muscles on behalf of the predominantly Norwegian-owned 'Scottish' salmon farming sector and pledging his support to a reckless expansion plan to double or even treble salmon farming production by 2030:

 

 

 

Fergus wears salmon-tinted spectacles to avoid looking at the escalating problems of salmon farming.

 

 

In June 2018, Fergus Ewing (pictured with Ben Hadfield, Mowi Scotland's Managing Director) hit out at metropolitan critics of the aquaculture sector as he opened a Mowi hatchery in the Highlands. 

 

 

In October 2018, The Sunday Mail reported that 500,000 farmed salmon had died at Mowi's flagship hatchery at Inchmore - opened only a few months earlier by Scotland's Cabinet Secretary for Rural Economy, Fergus Ewing.

 

 

 

Read more via Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

 

 

In September 2018, Fergus Ewing vowed to deal with "detractors":

 

 

BBC Panorama reported in May 2019:

 

 

Before Fergus gorges on more Scottish salmon he may want to do some more reading about the risks posed by consuming farmed salmon.  Science Daily reported in 2009:

 

 

The Guardian reported in 2002:

 

 

 

The Daily Telegraph reported in 2004:

 

PLOS One reported in 2011:

 

 

The Sunday Herald reported in 2016: 

 

 

The Mail On Sunday reported in 2016:

 

 

People around the world are taking the pledge not eat farmed salmon.

 

 

Watch video pledges online here and online here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read more reasons to boycott Scottish salmon via:

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

Disease-ridden Scottish Salmon

The Sorry State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018

The Skinny on Scottish Salmon

Scottish Salmon Farming 101

25 Reasons to Boycott Scottish Salmon

25 Years of Scottish Salmon Shame

Supermarket Scamon - Scottish Salmon Belongs in the Bin!

Reasons Not to Eat Farmed Salmon

 

 

 

Protest "Poses Serious Risk to Our Salmon" Claim Scottish Sea Farms - Who's Calling Who "Dangerous"?

 

The waters around Scotland's lice-infested and disease-ridden salmon farms are certainly heating up with protests planned for this weekend.  Scottish Sea Farms claimed in a letter dated 22 August 2019 that "a water-based protest poses a serious risk to our salmon stocks, potentially breaching biosecurity protocol and causing stress to the fish, both of which can have devastating consequences on animal welfare".  Scottish Sea Farms invited Scottish Salmon Watch to "find less dangerous means of expressing your opinion" and referred to "several instances of people getting into unexpected difficulty, sometimes with fatal results".

 

 

Andrew Holder of Extinction Rebellion Oban commented on Facebook (26 August 2019):

 

 

 

 

Some staff at Scottish Sea Farms have welcomed Scottish Salmon Watch to visit (even though they need to wash their mouth out with soap and water).

 

 

 

 

 

Read about our protests on 31 August & 1 September online via Swim for Salmon, Cetaceans, Lobsters & Seals!

 

 

 

Read more via "Biosecurity Precautions for Filming Salmon Farms"

 

 

 

Judging by Scottish Salmon Watch's visit to Shuna last month, it appears that Scottish Sea Farms can also rely on Police Scotland to act as a private security warning us off the water near the salmon farm. 

 

 

 

 

Read more via "Letter to Police Scotland re. protocol for filming salmon farms"

 

 

Scottish Sea Farms know all too well the "fatal results" of their salmon farming operations.   In 2011, BBC News reported:

 

 

In 2012, BBC News reported that the fine for Scottish Sea Farms had been reduced on appeal from £600,000 to £333,335.

 

 

When Scottish Salmon Watch visited a salmon farm operated by Mowi in nearby Loch Linnhe in July 2019 it triggered an investigation by the Health & Safety Executive following a tip-off from Animal Concern.

 

 

Even a fine of £333,335 is a drop in the ocean to such a huge company.  The latest accounts filed in October 2018 with Companies House by Scottish Sea Farms (formerly called Golden Sea Produce and Hydro Seafoods) reported a turnover of £200 million and a profit of £62 million in 2017. 

 

 

Scottish Sea Farms is wholly Norwegian-owned and Scotland's #2 salmon farming company (after Norwegian-owned Mowi).  As Scottish Salmon Watch's 'Scottish Scamon' report stated in February 2019:

 

 

 

Read more via 'Scottish Scamon: How Foreign Interests Control 99% of 'Scottish' Salmon Farming'

 

 

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch reported in May 2019:

 

 

Read more via "Salmon Eggsclusive: Scotland's 'King of Fish' is Now Viking Not Scottish!"

 

The Ferret reported in February 2019:

 

 

 

Read more via "Game Ova for Scottish Salmon - Deadly disease delays egg imports from AquaGen in Norway" and 'Secret' Scottish Salmon - Norwegian-owned Scottish Sea Farms refuse to disclose information for ova imports as it would "cause substantial harm to their commercial interests"

 

 

The "fatal results" of Scottish Sea Farms is only too clear when Scottish Government inspectors actually visit their disease-ridden salmon farms (one of the reasons why Scottish Sea Farms is reluctant for protestors to come close to their operations and why 43,000 SumOfUs petitioners are calling on Marine Scotland to conduct immediate unannounced inspections of all salmon farms). 

 

 

 

Here's some of the photos taken by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate of diseased salmon farmed by Scottish Sea Farms.

 

 

 

Given the gruesome nature of salmon farming it is not surprising that lawyers acting for Scottish Sea Farms threatened legal action against the disclosure of damning photos.  

 

 

 

Thankfully for the general public, the Scottish Government ignored the threats by Scottish Sea Farms and published the photos anyway.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Earlier this month, the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate published further damning data of disease on salmon farms during 2019.  Here's mortality events at Scottish Sea Farms reported in 2019 (in most cases the numbers of mortalities are not yet provided). 

 

 

AGD = Amoebic Gill Disease

CMS = Cardiomyopathy Syndrome

 

Here's the worst cases since 2017 (note this is not a comprehensive list of mortalities since mortality numbers are not reported after lobbying from the salmon farming industry who claimed disclosure would be commercially damaging):

 

 

PGD = Proliferative Gill Disease

 

 

 

Disease data accessed via Freedom of Information in 2017 and 2018 also revealed the following cases at Scottish Sea Farms:

 

 

 

The mortality events at Scottish Sea Farms in Loch Kishorn were featured by the BBC's One Show in December 2017 via 'The Dead Salmon Run' - watch online here

 

 

 

 

An analysis of 2018 disease and mortality data published by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate was published by Scottish Salmon Watch in March 2019.

 

 

 

Fatal incidents involving Scottish Sea Farms featured prominently:

 

 

 

Read more via 'The State of Salmon Farming in Scotland in 2018'

 

 

Watch a video shot by a drone in July 2019 at the Scottish Sea Farms salmon farm in Shuna - showing farmed salmon crashing into the sides of the cages - online here

 

Scottish Salmon Farms Cruelty from Andrew Holder on Vimeo.

 

 

Here's more video reports from Scottish Salmon Watch's visit to the Scottish Sea Farms salmon farm at Shuna in July 2019.

 

 

 

When Scottish Salmon Watch visited the salmon farm operated by Scottish Sea Farms in Loch Spelve in August 2018 we were shocked at the levels of lice infestation - of both farmed salmon and cleaner fish.  Watch video footage online here

 

 

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch also filmed dead cleaner fish at the Scottish Sea Farms processing plant in South Shian.

 

 

 

 

The Sunday Herald reported in 2012 on the dangerous nature of the Scottish Sea Farms processing plant at South Shian. 

 

 

 

The "fatal results" of Scottish Sea Farms can also be seen in published data on seals killed - with Scottish Sea Farms named and shamed as Scottish salmon's #1 seal killer.

 

 

 

 

 

In a letter to Police Scotland dated 21 July 2019, Scottish Salmon Watch wrote:

 

 

The lethal nature of salmon farming extends to cetaceans with the killing of a humpback whale at a salmon farm operated by Scottish Sea Farms in the Sound of Mull in 2014. 

 

Read more via 'Salmon Farming Kills Whales'

 

 

The Acoustic Deterrent Devices used by Scottish Sea Farms have also been shown by peer-reviewed scientific research to have impacts on the hearing of cetaceans - especially the harbour porpoise - at distances of up to 25km.

 

 

Read more via BBC Countryfile on ADDs impacting on cetaceans

 

 

The impact of the salmon farming operations of Scottish Sea Farms on the sea-bed is environmentally destructive.  Here's video footage shot under a Leroy-owned salmon farm in Norway. 

 

 

 

Waste impacts under salmon farms operated by Scottish Sea Farms have been assessed by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency as "Unsatisfactory" a staggering 211 times.

 

 

Scottish Sea Farms has breached SEPA's Environmental Quality Standards for Emamectin benzoate in sediments under salmon farms.  For example, here's a breach in Loch Spelve:

 

 

And a breach by Scottish Sea Farms at Tanera in the Summer Isles:

 

 

Read more via "Mapped: the 45 lochs polluted by fish farm pesticides"

 

Here's video footage of maggot-infested salmon shot in September 2018 at the Tanera salmon farm operated by Scottish Sea Farms:

 

 

 

 

Scottish Sea Farms has reported the use of the toxic chemical Azamethiphos (a known lobster-killer) over 300 times.

 

 

Scottish Sea Farms has reported to SEPA the use of the lobster-killing chemical Emamectin benzoate over 1,000 times.

 

Read more via "Fish farming industry bids to relax limits on toxic pesticide"

 

 

 

Scottish Sea Farms has reported to SEPA the use of the toxic chemical Deltamethrin nearly 300 times.

 

Read more via "Effects of pharmaceuticals used to treat salmon lice on non-target species: Evidence from a systematic review"

 

 

Note that chemical use via so-called well boats is NOT included in this data set and is instead hidden away via SEPA's 'Scottish Pollutant Release Inventory' which does not even have data for 2018 yet let alone 2019.

 

 

Nor is data on the use of the toxic chemical Hydrogen Peroxide (or antibiotics) included in the data-base - the damning information only disclosed via Freedom of Information. 

 

 

Hydrogen peroxide has been shown by peer-reviewed scientific research to be toxic to seaweed and shellfish such as shrimp.   Here's a photo of tanks of Hydrogen peroxide at Dunstaffnage marina in August 2019 with toxic chemicals destined for  Scottish Sea Farms.

 

 

Data obtained from the Scottish Government via FOI by Scottish Salmon Watch reveals the use of staggering quantities of Hydrogen peroxide by Scottish Sea Farms.

 

 

 

 

Such is the volume of toxic chemicals that Scottish Sea Farms has over a dozen boats at their disposal licensed to use (and discharge) Hydrogen peroxide.

 

 

More information on the use of toxic chemicals by salmon farms can be found via "Silent Spring of the Sea"; "Scientific Backgrounder: Ecotoxicity & Chemical Resistance" and "Chemicals".

 

 

Given the hazardous nature of salmon farming, it is no wonder that Marks & Spencer (who source exclusively from Scottish Sea Farms) had to fake the name of a loch to market 'Lochmuir' salmon.

 

 

Watch more video reports from Scottish Sea Farms online here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain Piles Ever Higher in 2019

 

Mortality information for the first six months of 2019 (published this month by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate) makes for grim reading for Scotland's disease-ridden salmon farming industry.  

 

 

 

197 mortality event reports - which can be downloaded as an Excel spreadsheet online here - detail over 3.1 million dead farmed salmon (38 mortality event reports do not have the number of morts provided).  The data includes nearly 200,000 mass mortalities at The Scottish Salmon Company's new salmon farm at Maaey in Loch Uiskevagh (North Uist) which according to SEPA only stocked fish for the first time in March 2019.   Here's the top 20 mass mortality incidents officially reported by the Scottish Government at sea cage salmon farms in 2019 (all sites are operated by Mowi and The Scottish Salmon Company):

 

PD = Pancreas Disease; CMS = Cardiomyopathy Syndrome

 

The mass mortalities at the Maaey salmon farm were seemingly missed by the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectors who followed up on a tip off that there were problems at a salmon farm operated by The Scottish Salmon Company in Loch Uiskevagh - but visited a different salmon farm in Loch Uiskevagh. 

 

 

 

Cue Keystone Cops gag.

 

 

 

No wonder SumOfUs is calling for the Scottish Government to conduct immediate unannounced on-the-spot inspections of ALL salmon farms.

 

 

 

Here's further mortalities officially reported during 2019 - again dominated by The Scottish Salmon Company (which is up for sale if any investor is blind enough to take on such a disease-ridden nightmare) but also includes Cooke Aquaculture and Grieg Seafood (whose Skye salmon farms may be up for sale too):

 

 

SAV = Salmonid Alphavirus

 

 

The data includes nearly 2 million dead salmon in five mass mortalities at hatcheries during 2019 including over 1.5 million at Mowi's Lochailort Recirculation Hatchery in March 2019 and another 89,000 in February 2019:

 

 

 

 

 

Mowi's Lochailort Recirculation Hatchery was opened in 2013 by the then First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond.

 

 

 

In October 2018, The Sunday Mail reported that 500,000 farmed salmon had died at Mowi's flagship hatchery at Inchmore - opened only a few months earlier by Scotland's Cabinet Secretary for Rural Economy, Fergus Ewing.

 

 

 

In June 2018, The Sunday Mail reported that 300,000 farmed salmon had died - battered to death in storms - at Mowi's salmon farm at Carradale in Kilbrannan Sound.

 

 

The Scottish Government report in relation to the mortality information:

 

 

So to be clear - the 197 mortality event reports detailing 3.1 million on Scottish salmon farms for the first six months of 2019 are only the mass mortalities and there could be millions more morts.   As Scottish Salmon Watch reported in October 2018 the publication of data on the number of morts ended in 2013 following lobbying from the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation who argued that disclosure would be commercially damaging.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Also note that data on dead 'cleaner fish' such as wrasse and lumpfish is not collated by the Scottish Government although some historic data was provided via Freedom of Information in August 2018.

 

 

Data on cleaner fish mortalities between 2013 and 2019 is hidden away in various Fish Health Inspectorate 'Case Information' files.  For example, by searching the June 2019 data we now know that 10,000 lumpfish died at Mowi's salmon farm at Port Na Cro.

 

 

 

 

 

Mowi's salmon farm at Bagh Dail Nan Ceann (Bay of the Dead Heads) also detailed mortality and disease problems in cleaner fish in the FHI June 2019 report (with "craters disease" cited).

 

 

 

When Scottish Salmon Watch visited Mowi's Bagh Dail Nan Ceann salmon farm in early July 2019 there were certainly visible health challenges with dead and dying lumpfish littering the surface of the one cage visited.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a Tweet:

 

 

Read more about the welfare nightmare for cleaner fish via Fish that eat lice off farmed salmon suffer, says report

 

 

With rising Summer temperatures and warmer weather, the alarm bells are ringing that 2019 could be the worst year on record for mortalities and diseases on Scottish salmon farms.  Salmon Business reported in May:

 

 

 

And expect mortalities and disease to be much worse in the second half of 2019.  As Scottish Salmon Watch warned last October:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Corin Smith knows only too well the bad smell coming from Scottish salmon farming - in 2018 he tracked mort trucks delivering tonnes of diseased salmon to a mort pit in North Uist.    Watch the stomach-churning footage on the BBC One Show in September 2018 online here

 

 

 

 

 

And here's horrific video footage shot by Corin Smith inside The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Vacasay in Loch Roag on the Isle of Lewis in August 2018:

 

 

 

 

No wonder lawyers acting for The Scottish Salmon Company and Scottish Sea Farms threatened legal action if the Scottish Government published photos of disease-ridden Scottish salmon.  

 

 

 

 

In June 2018, The Ferret reported:

 

 

Here's photos of the gruesome welfare abuse and disease-ridden conditions to be found on Scottish salmon farms when the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate actually does pay a visit.

 

 

 

 

More gruesome photos can be accessed via:

EXPOSED: Gruesome Photos of Deformed & Diseased Scottish Salmon

Hard Evidence: Photos of Diseased & Deformed Scottish Salmon

 

 

 

Scottish Salmon Watch waits with baited bad breath for photos from Fish Health Inspectorate inspections of salmon farms during 2019 - and hopes that the Scottish Government can manage to actually visit salmon farms stocked with salmon. 

 

 

We know that the Scottish salmon farming industry practices early harvesting - so-called "fast tracking" - to avoid disease problems (and to avoid the inspectors and those pesky campaigners armed with Go Pros).  Scottish Salmon Watch reported in May 2018:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Earlier this week, Salmon & Trout Conservation Scotland reported that lice infestation levels had doubled in a single year:

 

 

 

Download the data, photos and videos online here

 

 

The publication of new data on Scottish salmon farms is expected next month or in October when Marine Scotland publish their annual fish farm production survey.  The latest survey for 2017 (published in October 2018) predicts a drastic 21% fall of 39,000 tonnes from 2017 to 2018. 

 

 

Scotland's largest salmon farming company, Norwegian-owned Mowi (formerly called Marine Harvest but changed in January 2019 due to negative consumer perceptions), is all too aware of the risks of diseases writing in their Integrated Annual Report 2018 (March 2019) that "continued disease problems may also attract negative media attention and public concerns".

 

 

In April 2019, The Ferret reported:

 

 

 

As I stated yesterday in a blog:

 

"Consumers and investors alike are advised to avoid disease-ridden Scottish salmon like the proverbial plague of boils," said Don Staniford, Director of Scottish Salmon Watch. "Scottish salmon farms are a welfare nightmare which must be closed down immediately.  Instead of blindly doubling or even trebling production by 2030 the Scottish Government should revoke salmon farm licences for the worst operators and conduct immediate unannounced site inspections.  Disease-ridden Scottish salmon is dead in the water with the situation predicted to get much worse as higher water temperatures exacerbate parasite and pathogen problems."

 

 

 

Watch video reports on morts via:

 

 

 

 

Read more via:

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

Mass deaths: nine million fish killed by diseases at Scottish salmon farms

Disease-ridden Scottish Salmon

Mowi's Disease-Ridden Mortalities - 1.6 million+ in 101 incidents (2017-2018)

New Report - "The State of Scottish Salmon Farming in 2018"

Sunday Mail: "Scottish salmon farms in disease hell row after tons of rotting fish dumped in skips"

Scottish Salmon's Mort Mountain -Leaping to Record Levels in 2018?

EXPOSED: Early Harvesting at Scottish Salmon Farms Due to Disease & Mortalities

 

 

 

Mmmm Blind Scottish Salmon with Boils, Anyone?

 

It's no surprise to read that The Scottish Salmon Company - registered in Jersey, floated on the Norwegian stock exchange and whose largest shareholder is listed as an anonymous account on the Swiss stock exchange believed to be controlled by Ukrainian businessman Yuriy Lopatinskyy who literally has a residence in Edinburgh next to the First Minister of Scotland - is "considering sale offers".  

 

 

Buyers beware, however.   Before you buy 'Scottish' salmon please take a hard look at the disease-ridden horror story. 

 

 

Do you really want to buy a company farming blind salmon plagued by boils (not to mention infested with lice and riddled with infectious diseases, pathogens and viruses)?

 

Investors and consumers alike are encouraged to read the Scottish Government's Fish Health Inspectorate recently published report on The Scottish Salmon Company's salmon farm at Aird in Loch Shieldaig.  The damning report - along with video footage shot by Scottish Salmon Watch in June and previous FHI reports - is enough to put you off Scottish salmon for life. 

 

 

 

 

 

Start at page 94 in the Fish Health Inspectorate report published on 8 August 2019 online here

 

 

The damning report refers to "blind, rubbed and moribund" farmed salmon infested with lice:

 

 

 

 

 

Marine Scotland's letter to The Scottish Salmon Company dated 17 July 2019 included reference to "a number of blind fish with damaged eyes and flank abrasions". 

 

 

"All five fish sampled were moribund,lethargic and blind," reported Marine Scotland's Fish Health Inspector.  "Externally four had haemorrhaged eyes and three had flank lesions including a 'boil' like lesion on fish three.  Internally fish three and four had enlarged livers and fish four had an enlarged gall bladder":

 

 

 

And:

 

 

 

Given the horrific nature of their salmon farming business, it is little wonder that lawyers acting for The Scottish Salmon Company threatened legal action in 2018 to prevent the disclosure of damning photos of disease-ridden Scottish salmon.

 

 

 

Here's some of the photos - obtained by Scottish Salmon Watch via Freedom of Information - The Scottish Salmon Company did not want the public the see (published in June 2018 by The Ferret). 

 

 

 

And more photos (sourced from Scottish Government Fish Health Inspections in 2017 and 2018) published by Scottish Salmon Watch in June 2018 and in August 2018)

 

 

 

And here's more stomach-churning photos of diseased salmon at The Scottish Salmon Company in 2016 (published by Scottish Salmon Watch in August 2018 - and sourced from the Scottish Government Fish Health Inspectorate surveillance):

 

 

 

The Ferret also reported in September 2018 on shocking images published by photographer Corin Smith from The Scottish Salmon Company's lice-infested salmon farm at Vacasay in Loch Roag on the Isle of Lewis:

 

 

Here's more shocking images of The Scottish Salmon Company's Vacasay salmon farm from photographer Corin Smith:

 

 

The Daily Mail reported in September 2018:

 

 

Gruesome footage of lice-ridden salmon captured by photographer Corin Smith at The Scottish Salmon Company was featured on the BBC's 'One Show' in September 2018 and also used in a recent video message by Sir David Attenborough. 

 

 

If The Scottish Salmon Company was being honest with their customers, investors and the public, the marketing for their 'Lochlander' salmon would look more like this.

 

 

Than this marketing image.

 

 

 

Are there any takers for The Scottish Salmon Company?  I would avoid disease-ridden Scottish salmon like the proverbial plague of boils. 

 

 

"Consumers and investors alike are advised to avoid disease-ridden Scottish salmon like the proverbial plague of boils," said Don Staniford, Director of Scottish Salmon Watch. "Scottish salmon farms are a welfare nightmare which must be closed down immediately.  Instead of blindly doubling or even trebling production by 2030 the Scottish Government should revoke salmon farm licences for the worst operators and conduct immediate unannounced site inspections.  Disease-ridden Scottish salmon is dead in the water with the situation predicted to get much worse as higher water temperatures exacerbate parasite and pathogen problems."

 

 

 

Read more via:

• STV News: "'Abuse' video sparks major investigation at fish farm"
• STV News on Scottish Salmon's Welfare Nightmare - watch online now!
• Scottish Salmon Exposed - Photos from Secret Filming on Arran & in Shieldaig
• The Ferret: "‘Sick’ salmon film prompts government probe into Scottish fish farm"
• Frankenfish Video - The Ugly Face of Lousy Scottish Salmon