In August, 305,000 farm-raised Atlantic salmon weighing 8 to 10 pounds apiece escaped into Puget Sound when a net collapsed at a floating fish farm near Cyprus Island. Three months later, 102,000 of the fish remain unaccounted for, and Atlantic salmon are being caught by anglers and fisheries crews some 40 miles up the Skagit River, said the Skagit Valley Herald.
“Their presence in the Skagit River system suggests that while Cooke Aquaculture, the company that owns the collapsed farm, said the farmed fish would not survive outside their net pens, some are alive and mingling with Pacific salmon,” said the Washington State newspaper. “If the nonnative fish are now infiltrating salmon spawning grounds in the upper Skagit River, tribes and others are anxious about how the Atlantic salmon will affect the already imperiled wild Pacific salmon in the river.”
The Wild Fish Conservancy filed suit against Cooke in November, saying the collapse of the net pens and release of the Atlantic salmon violated the federal clean water law. The conservancy says the farm-raised salmon may compete with Pacific salmon for food, spread disease to them, or breed with them.