The New York Times ran a profile yesterday of a British Columbia salmon farm critic fighting to protect killer whales. Alexandra Morton, a self-trained biologist, says farmed salmon are partly responsible for infecting wild salmon, the whales' main diet, with sea lice , endangering the whale population.
"She doesn't come from a science background but she has had a lot of influence in highlighting the issue," Ray Hilborn, a University of Washington researcher, told the newspaper.
Titled "Saving Wild Salmon, in Hopes of Saving the Orca," the profile includes a seven-plus-minute video of Morton's crusade on the Times' Web site, www.nytimes.com/pages/science/?8dpc.
Also interviewed for the profile was Kelly Osborne, who manages British Columbia salmon farm sites for Marine Harvest. He said farmed fish are treated with an anti-louse drug called Slice as smolts begin their migration to the ocean. The drug is so effective, he said, that perhaps only one in 10 penned farmed fish have a live louse.
Government officials told the Times that it's premature to blame salmon farms for declines in wild salmon runs, because the numbers fluctuate naturally.