Fisheries Committee on April 14th, 2010

[Randy Kamp, Conservative, Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge—Mission, BC]

Thanks for that.

In the executive summary of the sea lice management strategy that you provided for us, it refers to the strategic use of Slice, and it says that it is used fewer than two times per finfish grow-out cycle. Perhaps you can just tell us how long that cycle is.

Then it also says that there has been a steady decline in the drug's overall annual use since 2005. It is used less frequently than it used to be, I would conclude there.

It also says in that same section that the abundance of sea lice on farmed salmon has remained low and has continued to trend downward since 2005. So you're using it less and we're seeing fewer lice.

Why are we seeing fewer lice if we're using it less? I guess that's kind of where I'm going with that.

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Those are very good questions, Mr. Kamp.

To begin, the grow-out period for typical Atlantic salmon that get into the cages would be somewhere in the neighbourhood of 20 to 24 months. At the outset it would be 24 months, or maybe 18 to 22 months. It depends on water temperatures, etc.

I said it's used up to two times in that grow-out period. You can imagine that when the small fish come from the hatchery into the ocean in the fall, they're exposed to that influx of lice from new Pacific salmon, so sometimes those small fish, which we call smolts, are treated with Slice before March to reduce any lice load that those small smolts have. The goal is to minimize the amount of lice on the farmed fish in the period from March 1 to June 30, which is the wild fry out-migration period. Those small fish may get exposed once to Slice. The second treatment on that same group of small fish is not likely to occur until the next winter, so on average it's once per year.

Does that answer that question?

In terms of the decline in use of Slice, it is unfortunate you didn't get these graphs, because we monitor this very closely through the province. The graph indicates that the amount of Slice has been declining over the years. What you cannot see, which is very important here, is the scale, which ranges from zero to 1 gram of active ingredient per metric tonne of fish. In 2008, 0.2 grams of the product was used per metric tonne of fish. I can tell you that in 2009 that declined to 0.15 grams. To put things into relative perspective, you'd be hard pressed to get 0.15 of a gram on your fingernail. It's just such a tiny amount of Slice that is used in B.C.

Your third point, Mr. Kamp, was that the information that doesn't generally get out there is that over the last five or 10 years the production of Atlantic salmon has gone up, the mortality has decreased, the lice abundance has decreased, and the use of the control product has decreased. This control product is not used because the farmed salmon need it; it's largely to meet the social expectation of the farmers, the industry, and the province in trying to do what they can to minimize the abundance of lice or the risk of lice transferring into those wild fry in that spring period.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you.

Go ahead, Mr. MacAulay.

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

Thank you very much, and welcome back.

In 2004 about 2 million sockeye disappeared, and in 2009, of course, a bigger disaster. Do you think there's a link there?

Second, what I've heard today differs from a lot of things I've heard up to now. I have been told that the farms were put in improper places, in direct line with the returning wild stock, and that the farmed fish were causing the lice problem.

What you have told us today is totally different. Is that the way it is? To me it's.... We've heard a lot of stuff. Somebody is not right here.

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Yes, and I--

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

Either we wasted a lot of time, or....

There's another thing, if you get a minute. We were speculating that we might do a review of the fishery on the west coast. Do you think that would be harmful or helpful? Would it make any difference during this time of the hearing?

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Those are all good questions.

I'm thrilled to be here--really--in person. I thank you so much, because there are an awful lot of myths that needed debunking.

The scientists and veterinarians within the federal government and the provincial government are diligent, hard-working people who really try to bring some scientific objectivity and neutrality to the story, but as you know, most citizens have decided they don't want to believe industry, they don't want to believe business, and they certainly don't want to believe government, so we, as provincial employees, don't get the story out. It just doesn't sell in the newspapers. Facts interfere with the story.

It's all on our website. I'm happy to leave you with cards to find this information. It's just that the general public doesn't access that information; they just reach for the newspaper or go on the Internet where, unfortunately, claims and allegations are made, and then we're busy trying to defend them.

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

Let me just add that we have seen pictures of fish eaten by the....

So you're telling us that it's the wild fish that brought the lice in, not the farmed fish that put the lice to the wild salmon. That's what you're telling us.

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

To clarify that, in the fall period at the end of each summer, the wild Pacific salmon come in with heavy loads of lice. I don't know whether you've had the opportunity to come and fish in that period of time, but beautiful silver, robust Pacific salmon come in, and it's not uncommon to see 40, 50, or 80 lice per pink salmon or chum salmon. They bring them to the coastline each year. That's what's unique about B.C. compared with other areas in the world.

I think what you're referring to, sir, is the debate about whether the farms have lice and whether they transmit those lice outward to the small Pacific salmon fry. That is the $64-million question, if you will.

It's no secret that the Atlantic salmon inside the farms will receive lice, and there can be amplification of the populations of those lice inside the cages. In general, in B.C. those numbers are in the ones and tens per fish, as opposed to what others like to compare with—Norway, Ireland, Chile—where the numbers are in the hundreds per fish, or even east coast Canada.

So these are very low numbers. We've set the number of three lice per fish as a trigger value, a very precautionary and very rational number to deal with. In most cases, throughout the year the average on farmed fish is fewer than three. It does rise above that in the fall and winter periods. That's not a problem. What we do is try to minimize the amount of lice on the farmed fish in the springtime period in order to minimize the risk of any transfer of lice to the small fry, which may be sensitive to the lice.

The argument has become, again, is it happening? Are the lice moving from the farms into the wild fry, or are the wild fry getting these lice from another source?

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

With regard to farm locations, is there no problem with where the farms are located?

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Twenty years ago there were problems with where the farms were located, but there has been tremendous improvement in the last twenty years in their locations.

Again, I think people have put some perspective forth that would allow.... I've heard words like “running the gauntlet”, or “farms everywhere”. I invite you to visit the B.C. coastline. You would be hard pressed to see one farm from another farm. They are at least three kilometres apart, sometimes 50 kilometres apart. There's a vast ocean out there of corridors where pink salmon, fry, wild salmon, can travel without seeing a farm.

It's not running the gauntlet. I don't know what impression has been left with you. The farms are spotted in very remote areas and not generally on the corridors. They are placed generally within bays, inside archipelagos, etc.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you.

Monsieur Lévesque.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

I understood from your opening remarks that the disappearance of the wild salmon is not due primarily to lice, but rather, to natural predators, at least in 97% of the cases.

In your opinion, what would you consider to be a natural predator? You talked about predators and I understood you to say that lice is not a predator of salmon.

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Please allow me to clarify, then.

Your question was about my previous statements about the 97% survival of Atlantic salmon inside the cages. I referred to that if we're talking about infectious disease agents and diseases. In other words, fewer than three percent of the farmed salmon usually succumb to that disease or those diseases.

Now, on average, the survival of the farmed salmon is in the range of 90%. The additional mortality is largely due to periods of low oxygen or harmful algae blooms or predation by seals and sea lions, but the loss of farmed fish due to bacteria or viruses is less than three percent. The loss of farmed fish due to lice is zero. The lice in B.C. do not kill farmed fish.

Does that answer your question?

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Yes, it's clear.

Have you observed a bigger decline in the wild salmon population as a result of seal predation? Do you have a method of calculating salmon losses from seal predation?

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Thank you.

Perhaps I should reiterate to make sure I have your question correctly.

You asked whether there was an increase or decrease in wild fish populations and is there any way to measure whether that increase or decrease is due to predators or farmed fish.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

I am talking about seals.

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Again, I think a DFO scientist would be more qualified to answer that question about the pressure of seal predation, or predation in general, on wild fish. It's outside of my expertise. We do know that it's generally accepted that seals and sea lions do certainly follow herring in and eat a number of herring and salmon. They grow up on salmon.

From the farm perspective, seals and sea lions are a significant problem in the winter months. The seals and sea lions accumulate around the farms, and they can literally kill thousands of fish each night. They are very strong animals. What they do--if you'd like me to explain--is just rush the nets, push it through, and grab a fish by its belly or throat. They just suck the internal organs through the net. They drop the carcass there, and they do it dozens of times. It's almost like a cat-and-mouse game. But that's the way they fill themselves up. You get groups of sea mammals that will do that over and over again. The farms have to deal with that.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

That's good to know. Thank you, Mr. Sheppard.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you.

Mr. Donnelly.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Dr. Sheppard, if I've got it right, essentially you've presented a case that there is no problem whatsoever with sea lice or with the application of Slice. In fact it has diminished as an issue or problem over the years and almost every scientist and expert in British Columbia agrees with that.

I would like to ask three questions. Are you aware of any jurisdictions around the world using Slice that are developing resistance to this drug, and whether any countries are admitting they have a problem with sea lice? If they are having a problem, why does British Columbia not have a problem, and how are we able to manage a diminishing issue when other countries around the world are experiencing possibly the opposite?

Finally, there was a report that was just published in the U.K. by a salmon and trout organization. Have you read that recent report, and can you comment on that report at all?

[Dr. Mark Sheppard]

Thanks, Mr. Donnelly. Those are all good questions.

The answer to all of those questions, if I can bring you back to the key point, is that B.C. is different. Why is it different? That's been the big question. A number of different things affect the coastline of British Columbia. Let me reiterate those, and then I will answer each of your questions.

The key point is that the Pacific Ocean louse is genetically different from the Atlantic Ocean louse, and that largely explains why we don't see the same pathology, the same disease, the same virulence and pathogenicity, if you will, and ability to cause disease as is seen in other countries. It's a different animal, a different parasite.

The other main concern, of course, is that the farms are a long way apart, with very large distances between them. That's an important factor.

The third factor is that the waves of new lice that come in each year are naive to farming; they are naive to Slice. They haven't been exposed to things, because they come in every August, September, October on the returning Pacific salmon—five different species.

By the way, if I can backtrack a little bit, the genetic difference in the Pacific louse is likely due to the fact that, as it was related to its Atlantic cousin, upon exposure to the five different species through evolution it had to lose something, and it likely lost its capacity to attack one type of salmon. So that's why: they've adapted together, they exist, and we don't see any mortality or disease to it in B.C.

I should carry on and answer your questions, though. Is there resistance in other countries? Yes, there seems to be resistance to emamectin benzoate in most places that have been using it: Norway, Ireland, Scotland, Chile. That is true.

Now, it's a big stretch to extrapolate from those countries with Atlantic salmon and farms that are close together and that use Slice on a monthly basis sometimes to what is happening in B.C. In fact, I don't agree that the extrapolation should occur, given this other information, but people like to do it, and understandably so, because they don't understand the differences .

As a result, then, in these other countries Slice is becoming not very useful. As a result, they have had a much greater opportunity than B.C. to develop what is called integrated pest management. They have different techniques, different products that they can use to control lice in those areas. They have different in-feed products and they also have different topical products, which the fish can be dipped in and exposed to so that the chemical can contact the lice on the outside.

In British Columbia, we just have the one product, which is still very effective. We hope it will be effective for a long period of time, given the way we use it and how little we use of it. That said, the situation we just got through here, with the 20% of the fish that were marginalized that didn't access the in-feed product.... If they're not feeding, they're not getting the drug. Had B.C. had a topical product in which they could have dipped those fish, instead of trying to feed them and get the lice off, then we wouldn't have seen the same scenario. But we don't have those products in B.C.; we just have the one.

Will other scientists agree with everything I've said? If you ask the DFO scientists, the credible scientists who do the lab research and things, I feel in good company, that they would agree that there's insufficient information to suggest that lice on farms is affecting Pacific salmon in a detrimental way.

But the question that still needs answering--I'm not even sure if it's an answerable question--is that what we're.... There are reports, obviously, from both the anti-fish-farm people and the DFO scientists, to suggest that there is a slightly increased abundance of lice on fry nearer the farms. There's an association.

Does that make sense?

In other words, wild fry away from the farms have fewer lice than wild fry nearer the farms. There have been papers by Beamish, for example, that show the opposite of that. There are wild fry that have a significant amount of lice nowhere near the farms.

There is an association, however, with wild fry as they come near the farms to show a slight increase in lice abundance or prevalence--how many lice per are found in general.

But there is no proof to--

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Sorry, Dr. Sheppard, I have to interrupt here.

State your point of order.

[Gerry Byrne, Liberal, Humber—St. Barbe—Baie Verte, NL]

We've received testimony that the amount of literature on this issue is extremely limited. Could we ask the witness if he would be able to provide us with copies of the literature that he just cited?

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Dr. Sheppard, would you be able to provide copies?