Raising salmon on a vegetarian diet Average reader rating: 0
Source: The Berkshire Eagle	World News    16/02/2004 08:52:39
Raising salmon on a vegetarian diet By Stefanie Cohen Berkshire Eagle Staff NEW MARLBORO -- Since a study was released last month announcing that farm-raised salmon contain higher concentrations of dioxins and PCBs than salmon caught in the wild, Keith Wilda, executive director of the Western Massachusetts Center for Sustainable Aquaculture, has wanted to use the Berkshire National Fish Hatchery to test vegetarian fish food on salmon. For the last eight months, the hatchery has been feeding breeds of trout and tilapia vegetarian feed instead of the more commonly used feed made from ground fish. Wilda is testing fish growth and health, and the amount of pollutants, such as nitrogen and phosphorus, produced by plant meal vs. fish meal. Kevin Ferry, who works at the Berkshire National Fish Hatchery in New Marlboro, cleans a tank of 1-year-old salmon. Photo: Joel Librizzi / Berkshire Eagle Staff 220 salmon donated Last week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department donated 220 salmon to the hatchery, with the hope that Wilda's team can determine whether the plant meal eliminates or lessens the amount of dioxins and PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, found in the fish. Although the federal agency donated the fish and the use of the hatchery to Wilda's team, Wilda will have to raise the $10,000 needed to conduct the study on his own. The journal Science reported last month that farm-raised salmon contain higher concentrations of cancer-causing agents than salmon caught in the wild, and that eating farm-raised salmon from certain regions more than once a month poses "unacceptable cancer risk" under federal Environmental Protection Agency guidelines. The study linked the PCB and dioxin levels to the fish meal, which is made from ground fish that have been contaminated with the toxins. Wild salmon, on the other hand, eat smaller fish and other aquatic organisms. Wilda began working with Freedom Feeds Inc., an Ohio-based company, last June. He wanted to test Freedom Feed, a grain-based meal that contains no fish meal or fish oils. It is intended to provide fish farmers with a more sustainable way to raise fish. "Aquaculture is supposed to be environmentally friendly," said Wilda. "Part of our work is building wild fish stock back up. If we are harvesting fish from the wild to feed farmed fish, some would say we are fighting against ourselves." So far, Freedom Feed has produced comparable results to fish meal in terms of growth rate and health for tilapia, rainbow trout and brown trout. "We got good results with tilapia, and great results with the trout," he said. Wilda said the fish are not large enough to conduct taste tests yet, but he has been told that the vegetarian feed does not markedly change the fish's taste. In addition, said Wilda, the fish produce fewer pollutants on the grain than they do on the fish meal, lessening the potential for water pollution. Inconclusive results When the journal Science study came out last month, the Food and Drug Administration immediately took issue with the findings, claiming that the levels of toxins found in the sampling of salmon were not high enough to cause alarm. Wilda agreed that the results of the Science study were inconclusive. "It was done on only 700 fish from different parts of the world," he said. "There need to be more samples taken." Freedom Feeds nutritionist Steve Massie pointed to a recent study conducted by the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission that found the plant feed lowered levels of PCBs in previously contaminated fish, but he also found the Science study to be inconclusive. He said the levels of toxins found in the fish were well below what the FDA considers safe and that while his company has received a spike in interest since the study was released, farm-raised salmon sales don't seem to have fallen nationwide. Wilda said while he wasn't overly worried about dioxin and PCB levels, he wanted to see fish farmers use vegetarian feed in order to keep water pollution down and to decrease the overall cost of doing business. He also wanted to keep consumers eating farm-raised fish in order to protect wild salmon and other fish. "If the wild salmon population is low, which it is, and people consume more and more of it because they are staying away from farm-raised fish, there is more chance of wild salmon becoming extinct," said Wilda. "This feed will help sustain the wild fish by keeping people eating farm-raised."
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