Tag Archives: nonnative Atlantic salmon

Jury awards $595,000 in damages to Lummi Nation for 2017 fish spill

Cooke Aquaculture accidentally released tens of thousands of nonnative Atlantic salmon in 2017, threatening native Pacific salmon, and the Lummi Nation’s traditional reliance on them. In 2017, a floating industrial salmon farm in the Northwest’s Puget Sound broke loose, releasing tens of thousands of Atlantic Salmon into the ecosystem. The nonnative salmon, raised in crammed industrial scale fish pens and considered a threat to native Pacific salmon, quickly swam throughout the bay. The Washington Department of Ecology later found that the farm owner, Cooke Aquaculture, the largest privately owned salmon-farming agribusiness in the world, had neglected to take care of its equipment. >click to read< 13:43