Many of you may have already heard about the problems associated with salmon farms located in the ocean itself.

First of all, a really disgusting fact is that salmon raised in these conditions are not pink or red – their flesh is grey. But who would eat grey salmon right? So they feed them food pellets containing artificial orange dye, which makes their flesh a pale orangey-pink color. However, these synthetic colored pellets are then pooped out on the ocean floor in mass numbers, polluting the ocean.

Next, there is the problem of sea lice infestation in these salmon farms due to them being held in such unhealthy and unnatural conditions. But the real tragedy is that these sea lice are infecting the wild salmon population – which has disastrous consequences not only to the wild salmon, but to the entire ecosystem and food web connected to these wild salmon.

To understand exactly what happens and the detrimental cascade effect on the ecosystem, watch this excellent little film (very educational for kids too!):

http://www.watershed-watch.org/sealice.html

Jini