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A chinook Smolt with Sea Lice
Farmed Salmon is bad for you and bad for the environment
Farmed salmon is bad for you
Total PCBs, dioxins, dieldrin, and toxaphene are consistently and significantly more concentrated in the farmed salmon than in the wild salmon.
The Environmental Defense Fund has issued a health advisory for farmed salmon due to high levels of PCBs and warning to avoid or eat infrequently until improvements are made. Specifically, adults should eat no more than 1 meal per month, kids age 6-12 should eat no more than 1 meal per month, and kids up to age 6 should eat no more than ½ meals per month.
Farmed salmon are routinely treated with pesticides to control sea lice and other parasites.
Farmed salmon are routinely treated with antibiotics to control furunculosis (appears as boil-like lesions on the skin) and other diseases.
Artificial colorants are added to the fish food to make the flesh look orange. Otherwise, it would be grey or yellow.
Farmed salmon is bad for the environment
It generally takes three pounds of wild fish to grow one pound of farmed salmon. As a result, farming salmon actually uses more fish than it produces, which puts more pressure on wild fish populations, not less.
Most salmon are farmed in open pens and cages in coastal waters. Untreated waste from these farms is released directly into the ocean. Parasites and diseases from farmed salmon can spread to wild fish swimming near the farms and escaping farmed salmon can harm wild populations.
Finally, think about the amount of fossil fuel you are using to eat farmed salmon. Most farmed salmon comes from Scotland, Norway, Canada, the United Kingdom and Chile.
All salmon farmed in ocean net pens get an Avoid ranking from Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch.
Thanks to the efforts of the Monterey Bay Aquariums Seafood Watch and Greenpeace, Target Corporation announced on January 26 that they have eliminated all farmed salmon from its fresh, frozen, and smoked seafood offerings in Target stores nationwide. This announcement includes Target owned brands Archer Farms® and Market Pantry® and national brands. All salmon sold under Target owned brands will now be wild-caught Alaskan salmon. Additionally, sushi featuring farm-raised salmon will complete its transition to wild-caught salmon by the end of 2010.
Thanks for the efforts of GreenPeace, Trader Joes has agreed to:
Offer only sustainable seafood in stores by December 31, 2012.
Work with a third-party, science-based organizations to establish definitions and parameters for addressing customer concerns about overfishing, destructive catch or production methods, and the importance of marine reserves.
Remove red-listed seafood from their shelves. They stopped selling Chilean Sea Bass in 2005, Orange Roughy in July of 2009, and Red Snapper in March of 2010.
Provide accurate information on all seafood labels, including species Latin names, origin and catch or production method.
Use their buying power to leverage change in the seafood industry.
These are huge victories. Now other stores and restaurants need to follow their lead.
What can you do?
There are a number of very easy and simple actions that you can take.
1. Dont buy it. Ever. Monterey Bay Aquariums Seafood Watch lists good alternatives, especially to buy wild caught Alaskan salmon which has been managed responsibly.
2. Print this and tell your friends.
3. Take action on BuzzGenie by joining the Stop Selling Farmed Salmon group and sending postcards and letters to business leaders and political decision makers, printing the flyer and giving it to your friends, sign the petitions, and buying and wearing the No Farmed Salmon T-shirt.
4. Join Monterey Bay Aquariums Seafood Watch and Become a Seafood Watch Advocate.
5. If you are a Yelper then give low ratings to stores and restaurants that sell farmed salmon.
I love shopping or eating at my favorite store or restaurantshould I stop?
Absolutely not! Your store or restaurant is only going to get serious about sustainable seafood if their customers and potential customers demand it.
I dont eat seafood. Why should I care?
You dont have to eat seafood to be concerned with the health of our oceans and sustainability of fisheries.
Is there any hope?
Absolutely. Thanks to growing awareness of the plight of our oceans, and consumer interest in supporting businesses that make every effort to implement sustainability, there is progress such as Targets elimination of the products. But more needs to be done and its easy so why leave it up to others? Your own actions are so vitally important. So, thank you!
Juvenile Pink Salmon with Sea Lice
If you are recycling, keeping you tires inflated, and turning off appliances or using them at off-peak hours, not over-fertilizing your lawn then you are making a difference in the evolution of our planet. If you have taken much larger steps such as removing your grass lawn all together, purchasing a hybrid vehicle, or installing solar panels even better.
But, did you know that your food choices have more to do with shaping our planet than all of the above? The simple choices that you make 3-5 times a day influence large and powerful industries who in turn have the ultimate influence on our land and oceans.
This may sound corny to you, but the Food Movement has begun. We have seen time and time again how information, from diet fads to government reports, affects behavior and that affects how food production industries behave. Now, with people and organizations taking issues into their hands and the Internet helping to spread the truth and join people together, consumers are starting to learn the truth about food production and the havoc it is wrecking on our environment and ourselves.
There are many examples of the growing food movement about which you may have already heard. Michael Pollen's books. Movies such as The Cove (Academy Award® Winner for Best Documentary of 2010) and Food Inc. (nominated for the award), and The End of the Line.
Perhaps you saw The Cove and are mad at the Japanese for the dolphin killings, but shouldnt we first address our own back yard? (Although feel free to organize a boycott of Japanese products.)
What can you do?
Start with educating yourself and voting with your wallet, or as Michael Pollen says, vote with your fork, but that is just a start. People need two things to be powerful and really make a difference. Knowledge and numbers.
There are many examples of knowledge. Some examples are knowing that cows raised on pastures that never eat corn are much higher in Omega-3 fatty acids (the good ones people talk about that are in fish) than corn-fed which are higher in Omega-6 fatty acids (the bad ones). But that is just a small piece of the pie. An awful lot of fossil fuel energy goes into getting that corn-fed hamburger to your plate than a more locally raised pastured animal. The situation with fish isnt any better, in fact, its worse. Wild fisheries have or are collapsing. Atlantic cod off the Grand Banks is probably gone for good. For good. Thats it. Nada. No do over. Farmed salmon is full of carcinogens and parasites, is devastating to the surrounding waters, and is flown in from far away places. Genetically modified foods waltz through lax regulations and appears on your plate without notice.
All the while the food production industries are trying to hide it from you with happy cows from California, pictures on egg cartons of chickens running around on grass fields on farms, the artificial coloring of farmed salmon, and subsidies to artificially cost the food the garmongous food industries want you to eat while they destroy the planet and your health.
We need transparency into the economics and the process as to how our food gets to us, including the effects on the environment and our health. From sources that we can trust.
And we also need power in numbers. That means spreading the word and taking actions that change the course of how food is produced and delivered to your plate.
This Sucks
A lot of people offered to speak with me or give me tours after Tuesday's Jan 12 #agchat on Twitter.
Capturing them here for follow up:
@JeffFowle I would enjoy discussing your thoughts on pasture vs. non-pasture & AB use at another time. #agchat
@JeffFowle: Ahh. So you think "we" are defensive? Perhaps I now understand your earlier statement. Will connect w/ you later.
@Farm2U: please connect with us ~RLD
@NateJaeger < National Cattlemen's Beef Association >: good synopsis of last nights #agchat how can we make it better for folks like you? #profood
@follownathan Let me know when you arew willing to discuss this via video chat. I am always looking for passion #agchat #profood
@follownathan If you want to share your opinions here: http://bit.ly/8qBxC0 let me know ... #profood #agchat
@yourlocalfoods: recommend: @iTweetMeat for baseline info on meat. @carrieoliver for artisan view, @nycUlla for grassfed (incl list)
@yourlocalfoods are you finding totally AB-free sources? I have a beef guy up here saying it, but will have to scrutinize more.
@bruceaking We'd love your participation and to learn your perspective Your blog contains things we are all against and will fight w/u
@bruceaking Im open to helping get you a tour of US Pork and Poultry Prodcution
@bruceaking #agchat When can you tour facilities and meet people?
@bruceaking: #agchat Hey, nice to meet you. We will talk on email. Bedtime here in Central Time Zone. Good Evning.
@bruceaking yer blog contains also things not true in normal food production. Let us be the transparency u want #agchat
@bruceaking #agchat can we talk on email?
culinary.hatchet on google mail
@bruceaking: #agchat One last thing before I go... the pic on your website "broilers w/ melted beaks" are actually turkeys not chick
I haven't yet received an answer on this from farmsanctuary.org, but will keep after it. Thanks.
@iamafarmer2 You are invited to my farm to take pictures and if there is a ill looking animal you can watch the whole mgmt process
(Think these Dairy Cows Standing in Toxic Feces Might need Antibiotics?)
Well, Ive been slacking on posting for a while now cuz Im very busy with my start-up, but I participated in the Weekly Streaming Ag & Farm Conversation, or #agchat, on Twitter last night and got a few people riled up
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(Photo from Dannon Website)
Guess why Dannon Activia is the only yogurt to contain Bifidus RegularisTM? Because they trademarked the name of a common probiotic bacteria
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Just been having way too much fun. From judging BBQ contests to fishing for albacore tuna and makin our own bacon, there are just was too many fun things to do in N. Cali.
Several articles are in the works, however
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Kenneth FeldCEO of Feld Entertainment, the company that owns Ringlinghad to admit that he's seen handlers use bullhooks to hit elephants in the secret places where the wounds don't show up as much (i.e., under the chin, behind the ear, and on the back of the leg
[ Click here to read more ]
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Comment by Culinary Hatchet
on #agchat Action Items
Culinary Hatchet
Did You Know This?
@follownathan Let me know when you arew willing to discuss this via video chat. I am always looking for passion #agchat #profood
@follownathan If you want to share your opinions here: http://bit.ly/8qBxC0 let me know ... #profood #agchat
Nathan, I appreciate the complement, however, people like Rob Smart who started #profood, works tirelessly, blogs on the Huff post, etc. would be a much better choice than me.
Do you know him (@jambutter)?
C. H.