Transmission Dynamics of Parasitic Sea Lice from Farm to Wild Salmon

Published by: David Suzuki Foundation and partners
Authored by: Martin Krkosek
Partners: Raincoast Conservation Society

Biodiversity, Oceans and fresh water species at risk, fisheries and aquaculture, salmon, conservation, British Columbia, water systems

Salmon farming has been associated with sea lice infestations of wild juvenile salmon and wild salmon population declines in B.C.’s Broughton Archipelago. Despite a strong weight of evidence, the causal nature of these relationships has been highly contentious. A scientific consensus has been limited, in part, by an inability to adequately track the movement of these parasites between farmed and wild salmon.  This peer-reviewed report looks at lice infestations on wild juvenile pink and chum salmon as they migrated past an isolated salmon farm down a long and narrow migration corridor in the Broughton Archipelago, B.C.