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Aquaculture

The price of lice

Nature volume 451, pages 23–24 (2008)Cite this article

Wild salmon stocks in Canadian coastal waters are being severely affected by parasites from fish farms. So intense are these infestations that some populations of salmon are at risk of extinction.

The global demand for fish is on the rise, and farmed sources are taking much of the strain — the catch of wild fish has levelled off, and may well be declining1, but aquaculture production is expanding rapidly2. The ecological costs of that expansion can be heavy, however, as Krkošek et al. show in Science3. The message of their paper is that there are some serious issues that cannot be ignored if the expansion of aquaculture is to be productive rather than destructive.

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Figure 1: Salmon louse.

BLICKWINKEL/HARTL

References

  1. Watson, R. & Pauly, D. Nature 414, 534–536 (2001).

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  2. Food & Agriculture Organization of the United Nations State of World Aquaculture 2006 Fisheries Tech. Pap. 500 (FAO, Rome, 2006).

  3. Krkošek, M. et al. Science 318, 1772–1775 (2007).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  4. Naylor, R. L. et al. Issues Ecol. No. 8 (2001).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Andrew A. Rosenberg is at the Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans and Space, University of New Hampshire, Durham, New Hampshire 03824-3525, USA. andy.rosenberg@unh.edu ,

    Andrew A. Rosenberg

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  1. Andrew A. Rosenberg
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Rosenberg, A. The price of lice. Nature 451, 23–24 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/451023a

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