Watch Live: CityNews Tonight Vancouver

Deadly virus detected; BC fish farm quarantined

By

CLAYOQUOT SOUND (NEWS1130) – The Canadian Food Inspection Agency has quarantined a fish farm in Clayoquot Sound, after some of its salmon were found to carry a dangerous virus.

Although the virus is not harmful to humans and occurs naturally in our waters, it is fatal to Atlantic salmon, and it could be dangerous to wild salmon in the high concentrations generated in the farm.

“The issue with salmon farms is that they are very similar to a cattle feed lot or an intensive chicken farm where many animals are crowded together and there is a high rate of disease. Viruses that are within that farm mutate,” explains Bonny Glambeck with Friends of Clayoquot Sound.

She points out the company that runs the facility, Mainstream Canada, is applying for another salmon farm in the sound, near to Tofino.

She says with two other European viruses identified in Clayoquot in the last year, it’s no time to be expanding the industry.

She also wonders how the virus can be kept from wild salmon. “My question is how can you quarantine an open net-pen fish farm? These are open pens that hang in the waters of Clayoquot Sound with tidal slush and current going through them on a six-hour cycle.”

The National Aquatic Animal Health Laboratory is doing tests to confirm the presence of the virus.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency will also be investigating, to get a picture of the health status of BC’s salmon.

There hasn’t been a confirmed case in farmed salmon since 2003.

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today