Bonjour. Good afternoon. My name is Barb Cannon, and I'm the biology manager for Creative Salmon.
I'll start by telling you a little bit about myself. I have a marine biology degree from Dalhousie University in Halifax. Although I'm originally from Ontario, following graduation I moved west to Ucluelet and started out whale watching and guiding sport fishing charters. Once I was settled and decided I'd like to stay on the west coast, I set out to find a career job, something I thought I could see myself doing for years, making a decent wage and giving me the opportunity to grow and challenge myself as a biologist. I've now been working with Creative Salmon for eight years, two and a half in my current role as biology manager.
A lot has changed in my life in these eight years, and I credit this to having a secure, well-paying job that I enjoy. I'm now married, the mother of two young boys, and I hope I can raise my family in an area that I've come to love.
Now I'll give you a brief overview of Creative Salmon. Our home base is Tofino, but our farms are located in Clayoquot Sound, a designated UNESCO biosphere reserve, and we operate within the territory of Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation. Creative Salmon is a Canadian-owned company, and we've been in business since 1990. This is our 20-year anniversary.
Currently we are North America's only major producer of chinook salmon and are fully integrated from egg to plate. That is to say, we raise our own brood stock, rear our own smolts, and harvest and process our own fish. Since our inception, our focus has been on quality, not quantity. We are a small player in the B.C. aquaculture industry, producing on average 1,400 metric tonnes per year, but take great pride in the product we produce.
Although we have six site locations, we operate only four farms at any one time. This gives us the flexibility to change locations and leave sites fallow for extended periods of time. Although we are not yet certified organic, it is our hope to soon become one of Canada's first organic salmon farming companies. Creative Salmon is a founding member of the Pacific Organic Seafood Association, and our current focus has been in the development of the national standards.
We feel that as stewards of the environment, it is our responsibility to farm sustainably. Despite substantial additional cost, we are committed to growing our fish as naturally as possible with the least possible impact on the environment. As I mentioned earlier, we grow only chinook and have committed to grow them in low densities without antibiotics in untreated nets and feed them a natural diet. In order to do this, we have strict fish health management and bio-security protocols, as well as stringent environmental monitoring practices.
Creative Salmon has a team of three biologists who keep close tabs on aspects of fish husbandry practices and environmental monitoring. We are proud to say that we have not had to treat our production fish with antibiotics since 2001. We also take a natural approach to our nets. They're untreated, and we clean them in situ, using net cleaners or with sunlight and salt water.
Chinook salmon do not respond well to stress, so our goal is to promote fish health and welfare, while at the same time minimizing any stress. We do this by limiting handling, ensuring proper diet, feeding techniques, and humane harvesting, and we make every effort to reduce predator interactions.
This issue of predator interaction is something we have focused a great deal of attention on in the past few years. Learning from our own experiences and consulting with marine mammal experts has given us a good understanding of sea lion behaviour, and we have modified our predator systems accordingly. We feel we've taken the necessary steps that have made significant improvements to our predator system, and with these improvements we've virtually eliminated predator interaction.
Sea lice are another issue, or should I say non-issue, which I would like to elaborate on. Chinook salmon are naturally tolerant to sea lice, and although we do monitor our fish for evidence of sea lice, we have never been required to treat them. Since 2003 we've been involved in a collaborative working group called the Clayoquot Sound Sea Lice Working Group, a collaboration of Tla-o-qui-aht, Creative Salmon, Ahousaht, and Mainstream Canada. This has been a very successful and rewarding experience and we hope this will continue.
I'm done? Okay.