Partnership to boost trout, salmon egg production

The new partnership between Landcatch Natural Selection in Clackmannanshire, U.K., and Seattle, Wash., USA-based Troutlodge will create a mammoth production company for farmed salmon and trout eggs. Landcatch recently became a 45 percent shareholder in Troutlodge, and will increase the quality of its fish eggs with genetic technologies from parent company Hendrix Genetics.

“For us, it means that we can much more rapidly improve our stocks and the performance of our products for our clients,” John Dentler, a member of the executive team at Troutlodge, told SeafoodSource. Hendrix Genetics’ years of experience in genetic technologies in the broiler and layer poultry, turkey and swine industries can be applied to help Landcatch improve its trout and salmon breeding programs.

“We will be using technology to rapidly improve our stocks. We ship our eggs to 50 different countries, between 450 to 500 million eggs a year. This will really help us tailor programs to many different areas and climates, such as the islands of Peru to northern Europe,” said Jim Parsons, executive VP of production for Troutlodge.

The genetic technologies that Hendrix and Landcatch bring to the table will also help Troutlodge produce salmon and trout that are more disease-resistance, Parsons added. “Landcatch has just developed a marker for sea lice resistance that will have a big impact on the industry. And Landcatch was able to develop a genetic marker for Infectious Pancreatic Necrosis (IPN), which was a big help to the industry,” he said.

Already the largest global producer of salmonid eggs and rainbow trout eggs, Troutlodge recently expanded its facilities. In addition to its six hatcheries in Washington state and one in Oregon, the company recently built another hatchery in southern Idaho.

In addition, Landcatch and Troutlodge’s newly formed company in Chile, Landcatch-Troutlodge Chile SA, will allow Troutlodge to significantly grow its salmon egg market in Chile in the next three to five years.

“Our goal is to become a major player there. We have been in the range of 10 to 15 million salmon eggs [produced] annually, and we would like to be up in the 50 million range, depending on what the market does,” Dentler said.

While Troutlodge’s Chile facility will continue to produce steelhead trout eggs, there will be an increased emphasis on Atlantic salmon and coho salmon eggs. “It is also planned to develop a pedigree coho salmon program to service the Chilean industry. With all these programs combined, it is expected that employment will grow significantly,” according to a statement from Troutlodge.

The expansion program in Chile will add another 4,000 cubic meters to the existing 5,500 cubic meters of broodstock rearing capacity, an 80 percent increase.

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