Bycatch of wild fish on salmon farms
By-catch is the accidental harvest of marine species other than target species being fished or farmed. Open net-cage fish farms catch wild fish that can swim into their nets and until recently it's been hard to know just how big the problem is. A recent court action spotlighted this issue and now salmon farmers in British Columbia are required to report all bycatch of wild species and to immediately return them to the ocean outside the pens in a manner that causes the least harm as a condition of their aquaculture licence.