7 ms·

We should be fixing farmed fish. When was the last time people ate wild cow. It's not sustainable for a population to be exploiting wild fish, farm properly a

We should be fixing farmed fish. When was the last time people ate wild cow. It's not sustainable for a population to be exploiting wild fish, farm properly and learn to do it quickly. As long as we eat meat, we have to do it in the least intrusive way.

i_am_proteus 6y ago
Since cow are definitionally domesticated, nobody has ever eaten a wild cow, but people eat wild mammals on a regular basis. Game is typically much healthier as a food source than domesticated animals; this includes wild-caught fish vs. farm-raised fish.
- MattGaiser 6y ago
  > but people eat wild mammals on a regular basis. Not in meaningful quantity. It would bet that the median time since a typical Westerner last had wild mammal could be measured in months if not years.
  - s_dev 6y ago
    >Not in meaningful quantity. Enough wild meat to introduce a new Virus and pandemic though.
    - beached_whale 6y ago
      probably not if most families in Sydney and Melbourne went out hunting.
  - phonypc 6y ago
    I'd bet a typical westerner has never eaten wild mammal meat. I expect the statement in born from the misconception that "game" meat as found in restaurants and for sale is from wild animals, when it is actually farmed.
    - MattGaiser 6y ago
      > I expect the statement in born from the misconception that "game" meat as found in restaurants and for sale is from wild animals, when it is actually farmed. If we assume that about the bison and venison I have had over the years, it has been at least over a decade for me. Not sure if we farm muskrats.
    - Gieskanne 6y ago
      It is quite common here to shot deer to keep it under control and it gets sold to local butchers. At least in germany. My father is also a hunter. Its looks like this: https://www.google.com/search?q=jaeger+deutschland&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwiin7-DqaXrAhUP8IUKHWVNC8UQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=jaeger+deutschland&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzoECAAQQzoCCABQ5A9Y8h1g9R5oAHAAeACAAWOIAbwHkgECMTKYAQCgAQGqAQtnd3Mtd2l6LWltZ8ABAQ&sclient=img&ei=lxU8X-L3AY_glwTlmq2oDA&bih=948&biw=1657 https://www.google.com/search?q=jaeger+deutschland&tbm=isch&...
    - bosie 6y ago
      At least in Austria there is a game season (hunting is quite big) and game meat is in abundance.
- beached_whale 6y ago
  And our ability to manage wild animals is worse than our ability to farm. It's hugely politically negative to reduce the number's allowed, and there is always pressure for more even when counter to the evidence that it is detrimental. How many species of fish will go extinct before we figure this out. Fish used to be very common(look at the stories of the colonists coming to North America). Also, people are still eating bluefin tuna, it's endangered.
BucketsMcG 6y ago
Problem is the farmed fish are fed on wild fish, so it's several times less efficient than just eating whatever you would have fed them.
- dharma1 6y ago
  Some farmed fish (like tilapia) can live on a variety of things, including soy and corn pellets. Algae, which can be used for many things - human consumption, farmed animal/fish feed and even fuel - can also be farmed sustainably. I think we urgently need global legislation and enforcement of rules, as well as satellite monitoring to stop overfishing. World leaders need to work together on this. Marine ecosystems may not come back once collapsed and that would be a huge disaster. I hope there is some kind of self-limiting dynamic here where industrial fishing becomes unprofitable, but we avoid extinctions and total collapse of ecosystems - but I'm not sure that's the case.
  - ping_pong 6y ago
    In fact, tilapia from Vietnam and China are fed pig feces and packed in ice made from polluted water, which is why it's so dangerous to eat them. https://abcnews.go.com/Business/consumers-eating-feces-tainted-shrimp-fish-seafood-asia/story?id=17491264 https://abcnews.go.com/Business/consumers-eating-feces-taint...
    - dharma1 6y ago
      Yep, I wouldn't buy farmed fish from Asia.
      - rdtwo 6y ago
        Agreed I avoid shrimp from Asia as well. They are using manure to dose nitrogen but it’s still not a sanitary practice
    - wenc 6y ago
      Why did you link to a story from 2012? I eat farmed tilapia from Asia all the time with no ill effects.
bosie 6y ago
Can you cite a single type of fish that is currently farmed properly (i.e. sustainably)?
- danans 6y ago
  US/Canada Farmed Steelhead Trout, Rainbow Trout: http://seafood.edf.org/trout http://seafood.edf.org/trout Arctic Char: http://seafood.edf.org/arctic-char http://seafood.edf.org/arctic-char US Farmed Tilapia: http://seafood.edf.org/tilapia http://seafood.edf.org/tilapia US Farmed Catfish: http://seafood.edf.org/catfish http://seafood.edf.org/catfish Basically, avoid any fish farmed in Asia, as there are no environmental regulations on those.
  - bosie 6y ago
    is trout really sustainable when you need to feed more fish than you can get out of the fish?
    - danans 6y ago
      It depends on the feed fish and it's environmental footprint.
openasocket 6y ago
One of the biggest issues with the fundamental concept of fish farming is that many of the fish we like to eat are carnivores. So to truly sustainably farm salmon, you would have to farm a bunch of bait fish to use to feed the salmon (in practice I believe the bait fish are usually wild caught). And indirectly you would need to be farming a bunch of algae or seaweed or something to feed the bait fish. Compare that to farming cows or chickens, where you just need to farm a bunch corn to feed them (or if you have enough land available you can make them free range). That extra level of indirection makes farming much more inefficient, which is why essentially all of our domestic animals we use for food are herbivores. Of course this isn't true of all fish, tilapia being the prime example of a commonly eaten herbivorous fish. And shellfish, being filter feeders, are very easy to farm and actually tend to be beneficial for the surrounding ecosystem. EDIT: interestingly, according to https://ourworldindata.org/seafood-production https://ourworldindata.org/seafood-production in terms of tonnage the amount of wild-caught fish has remained relatively steady since 1990 while the amount of farmed fish has steadily increased and is now more than 50% of our source of fish. There's actually some very interesting data in that link
Depurator 6y ago
I'm doing a Ph.D. in salmon farming, it's an exciting field for sure. Just to address some common misconceptions: * The feed used for norwegian salmon is about 70-80% plant based, so the fish is a net producer of marine protein. The majority is soy, and the industry is trying to transition to sustainable feed ingredients such as insects (see Protix) and micro algae for EPA/DHA (See veramaris) * The farmed salmon does not contain any contaminents over allowed limits and they do frequent tests (see https://sjomatdata.hi.no/#/seafood/1577 https://sjomatdata.hi.no/#/seafood/1577) * The indsutry is beginning to transition from traditional net-pen farming to offshore, land-based and into cell-based and plant-based production, thus also getting production closer to market and spread over areas that may be less susceptible to pollution.
- bjoli 6y ago
  Are there any viable solutions to the problems with off-shore farming? Last time I checked the ecosystem around you typical Scandinavian salmon farm in the ocean was devestated. We take extreme care not to flush our own sewers into the sea, yet happily permit salmon farms with the equivalent fertilizing effect of a town of 25000 having all their toilets flush everything out on the shore.
  - GordonS 6y ago
    There are lots of different approaches being taken to offshore farming, but few have been tried at scale yet. One of the concepts is closed-containment farming, where the fish are kept in a sealed enclosure. The fish can be kept below the sea lice level, and all waste can be collected. The downsides are cost, failure modes, and welfare (the fish have less area than open-pen near-shore farms, and will never see sunlight, for example).
  - Depurator 6y ago
    To compliment Gordons reply, here's a (norwegian) overview of the environmental conditions around the farms: https://www.fiskeridir.no/Akvakultur/Drift-og-tilsyn/Overvaaker-miljoepaavirkningen/B-undersoekelser https://www.fiskeridir.no/Akvakultur/Drift-og-tilsyn/Overvaa... The last years they have hovered around 95% being very good or good. So statistically you are very wrong. But sure there are some localities that have bad conditions, and those should be closed and new localities should be opened for those farmers. Such as offshore localities when the technology is mature. Many smart people are trying to figure that out with strong scientific backing, but the report from havmerden is avaliable to read if you understand norwegian In norway there are many environmental institutions following the state of the fjords, so I wouldn't be too concerned.
Gieskanne 6y ago
We should fix the mental image of having meat/fish every single day. And the rest of it. A few month ago we were in a nice restaurant, my wife got a non meat dish and i got a meat dish (i also order non meat dishes it just happend that time) The waiter told me exactly what meat i had and for my wife he said 'the vegetarian dish'. No its not the vegetarian dish. It has a name and its tasty.

i_am_proteus 6y ago

Since cow are definitionally domesticated, nobody has ever eaten a wild cow, but people eat wild mammals on a regular basis. Game is typically much healthier as a food source than domesticated animals; this includes wild-caught fish vs. farm-raised fish.

MattGaiser 6y ago
> but people eat wild mammals on a regular basis. Not in meaningful quantity. It would bet that the median time since a typical Westerner last had wild mammal could be measured in months if not years.
- s_dev 6y ago
  >Not in meaningful quantity. Enough wild meat to introduce a new Virus and pandemic though.
  - beached_whale 6y ago
    probably not if most families in Sydney and Melbourne went out hunting.
- phonypc 6y ago
  I'd bet a typical westerner has never eaten wild mammal meat. I expect the statement in born from the misconception that "game" meat as found in restaurants and for sale is from wild animals, when it is actually farmed.
  - MattGaiser 6y ago
    > I expect the statement in born from the misconception that "game" meat as found in restaurants and for sale is from wild animals, when it is actually farmed. If we assume that about the bison and venison I have had over the years, it has been at least over a decade for me. Not sure if we farm muskrats.
  - Gieskanne 6y ago
    It is quite common here to shot deer to keep it under control and it gets sold to local butchers. At least in germany. My father is also a hunter. Its looks like this: https://www.google.com/search?q=jaeger+deutschland&tbm=isch&ved=2ahUKEwiin7-DqaXrAhUP8IUKHWVNC8UQ2-cCegQIABAA&oq=jaeger+deutschland&gs_lcp=CgNpbWcQAzoECAAQQzoCCABQ5A9Y8h1g9R5oAHAAeACAAWOIAbwHkgECMTKYAQCgAQGqAQtnd3Mtd2l6LWltZ8ABAQ&sclient=img&ei=lxU8X-L3AY_glwTlmq2oDA&bih=948&biw=1657 https://www.google.com/search?q=jaeger+deutschland&tbm=isch&...
  - bosie 6y ago
    At least in Austria there is a game season (hunting is quite big) and game meat is in abundance.
beached_whale 6y ago
And our ability to manage wild animals is worse than our ability to farm. It's hugely politically negative to reduce the number's allowed, and there is always pressure for more even when counter to the evidence that it is detrimental. How many species of fish will go extinct before we figure this out. Fish used to be very common(look at the stories of the colonists coming to North America). Also, people are still eating bluefin tuna, it's endangered.

BucketsMcG 6y ago

Problem is the farmed fish are fed on wild fish, so it's several times less efficient than just eating whatever you would have fed them.

dharma1 6y ago
Some farmed fish (like tilapia) can live on a variety of things, including soy and corn pellets. Algae, which can be used for many things - human consumption, farmed animal/fish feed and even fuel - can also be farmed sustainably. I think we urgently need global legislation and enforcement of rules, as well as satellite monitoring to stop overfishing. World leaders need to work together on this. Marine ecosystems may not come back once collapsed and that would be a huge disaster. I hope there is some kind of self-limiting dynamic here where industrial fishing becomes unprofitable, but we avoid extinctions and total collapse of ecosystems - but I'm not sure that's the case.
- ping_pong 6y ago
  In fact, tilapia from Vietnam and China are fed pig feces and packed in ice made from polluted water, which is why it's so dangerous to eat them. https://abcnews.go.com/Business/consumers-eating-feces-tainted-shrimp-fish-seafood-asia/story?id=17491264 https://abcnews.go.com/Business/consumers-eating-feces-taint...
  - dharma1 6y ago
    Yep, I wouldn't buy farmed fish from Asia.
    - rdtwo 6y ago
      Agreed I avoid shrimp from Asia as well. They are using manure to dose nitrogen but it’s still not a sanitary practice
  - wenc 6y ago
    Why did you link to a story from 2012? I eat farmed tilapia from Asia all the time with no ill effects.

bosie 6y ago

Can you cite a single type of fish that is currently farmed properly (i.e. sustainably)?

danans 6y ago
US/Canada Farmed Steelhead Trout, Rainbow Trout: http://seafood.edf.org/trout http://seafood.edf.org/trout Arctic Char: http://seafood.edf.org/arctic-char http://seafood.edf.org/arctic-char US Farmed Tilapia: http://seafood.edf.org/tilapia http://seafood.edf.org/tilapia US Farmed Catfish: http://seafood.edf.org/catfish http://seafood.edf.org/catfish Basically, avoid any fish farmed in Asia, as there are no environmental regulations on those.
- bosie 6y ago
  is trout really sustainable when you need to feed more fish than you can get out of the fish?
  - danans 6y ago
    It depends on the feed fish and it's environmental footprint.

openasocket 6y ago

One of the biggest issues with the fundamental concept of fish farming is that many of the fish we like to eat are carnivores. So to truly sustainably farm salmon, you would have to farm a bunch of bait fish to use to feed the salmon (in practice I believe the bait fish are usually wild caught). And indirectly you would need to be farming a bunch of algae or seaweed or something to feed the bait fish. Compare that to farming cows or chickens, where you just need to farm a bunch corn to feed them (or if you have enough land available you can make them free range). That extra level of indirection makes farming much more inefficient, which is why essentially all of our domestic animals we use for food are herbivores. Of course this isn't true of all fish, tilapia being the prime example of a commonly eaten herbivorous fish. And shellfish, being filter feeders, are very easy to farm and actually tend to be beneficial for the surrounding ecosystem. EDIT: interestingly, according to https://ourworldindata.org/seafood-production https://ourworldindata.org/seafood-production in terms of tonnage the amount of wild-caught fish has remained relatively steady since 1990 while the amount of farmed fish has steadily increased and is now more than 50% of our source of fish. There's actually some very interesting data in that link

Depurator 6y ago

I'm doing a Ph.D. in salmon farming, it's an exciting field for sure. Just to address some common misconceptions: * The feed used for norwegian salmon is about 70-80% plant based, so the fish is a net producer of marine protein. The majority is soy, and the industry is trying to transition to sustainable feed ingredients such as insects (see Protix) and micro algae for EPA/DHA (See veramaris) * The farmed salmon does not contain any contaminents over allowed limits and they do frequent tests (see https://sjomatdata.hi.no/#/seafood/1577 https://sjomatdata.hi.no/#/seafood/1577) * The indsutry is beginning to transition from traditional net-pen farming to offshore, land-based and into cell-based and plant-based production, thus also getting production closer to market and spread over areas that may be less susceptible to pollution.

bjoli 6y ago
Are there any viable solutions to the problems with off-shore farming? Last time I checked the ecosystem around you typical Scandinavian salmon farm in the ocean was devestated. We take extreme care not to flush our own sewers into the sea, yet happily permit salmon farms with the equivalent fertilizing effect of a town of 25000 having all their toilets flush everything out on the shore.
- GordonS 6y ago
  There are lots of different approaches being taken to offshore farming, but few have been tried at scale yet. One of the concepts is closed-containment farming, where the fish are kept in a sealed enclosure. The fish can be kept below the sea lice level, and all waste can be collected. The downsides are cost, failure modes, and welfare (the fish have less area than open-pen near-shore farms, and will never see sunlight, for example).
- Depurator 6y ago
  To compliment Gordons reply, here's a (norwegian) overview of the environmental conditions around the farms: https://www.fiskeridir.no/Akvakultur/Drift-og-tilsyn/Overvaaker-miljoepaavirkningen/B-undersoekelser https://www.fiskeridir.no/Akvakultur/Drift-og-tilsyn/Overvaa... The last years they have hovered around 95% being very good or good. So statistically you are very wrong. But sure there are some localities that have bad conditions, and those should be closed and new localities should be opened for those farmers. Such as offshore localities when the technology is mature. Many smart people are trying to figure that out with strong scientific backing, but the report from havmerden is avaliable to read if you understand norwegian In norway there are many environmental institutions following the state of the fjords, so I wouldn't be too concerned.

Gieskanne 6y ago

We should fix the mental image of having meat/fish every single day. And the rest of it. A few month ago we were in a nice restaurant, my wife got a non meat dish and i got a meat dish (i also order non meat dishes it just happend that time) The waiter told me exactly what meat i had and for my wife he said 'the vegetarian dish'. No its not the vegetarian dish. It has a name and its tasty.