Mowi Canada East Managing Director Gideon Pringle confirmed to SeafoodSource that there was a mortality event exceeding 10 percent of the site’s population at its Little Burdock Cove marine site in Newfoundland, Canada.
Pringle did not confirm the exact number of fish affected, but the total salmon population at the affected site in Bay Management Area 2 near Rencontre East, Newfoundland, is 176,249, Mowi said in a notice posted on the Newfoundland Aquaculture Industry Association’s website.
The event happened on 20 July due to a transient period of increased water temperatures in association with decreased oxygen levels, which was recorded by the environmental sensors at the farm, according to the notice. The site’s aeration system was active.
“The remaining fish onsite show no signs of elevated mortality,” Mowi said.
The site was in the final two weeks of harvesting, so mortalities have been removed and harvesting has been completed, according to the firm.
This event was isolated to a single farm and was “quickly and fully resolved,” Pringle said, adding that the company “has taken all responsible steps under the oversight of the Newfoundland and Labrador Department of Fisheries, Forestry and Agriculture and has complied with all government approved policies.
This is not the first time Mowi has experienced mortalities in Newfoundland.
In 2021, Mowi site “AQ#1135 site (The Gorge),” located off the southern coast of Newfoundland, had 92,700 fish die out of a total of 900,000 at the site. Before that, Mowi had over 2 million salmon die in Newfoundland during the summer of 2019.
All three events included low oxygen levels in some capacity.
