Alexandra Morton: Biologists gone bad.
Special to Aquaculture Awareness, April 28, 2011
Give someone enough rope and they will hang themselves.
Salmon farmers on Vancouver Island have sat by politely over the last few years, watching one specific activist take a stab at biology for a few years before slowly morphing back into the comfortable activist role. While criticisms of our business were made (some justified and some pure BS), we continued to adapt our business to the science, and have seen considerable improvements made. Yes, we have admitted our faults, worked hard to correct them. And while some critics have acknowledged the maturation of our business, others have not.
Introducing Alexandra Morton.
As newspaper editor Neil Cameron points out in his latest opinion column, "Something was a little off ", Alexandra Morton’s latest stunts are quite “childish” and “unsettling”. Yes, she’s quite literally flinging mud.
When science fails to support your emotions, one will create distractions. They will play on people’s fears while using language couched with “maybe’s”, “could’s” and “what if’s”. They will also create a cult.
For years, Alexandra Morton had claimed that salmon farms near her home town of Echo Bay, were spreading sea lice to wild pink salmon – the end result being total extinction of the species. It has been widely reported in media around the world, and highlighted in a videos produced by the New York Times and Jean Michel Cousteau (the uneducated son of Jacques). She said the “science was in” – yep, it was concluded.
But then the Pacific Salmon Forum (PSF - a non-biased scientific body ordered to look into the issue) found that the studies she was citing (her own), were incorrect. Co-author Marty Krkosek agreed. The mathematical model was wrong. Morton and Krkosek were asked to “recalibrate” the model and to take a second look at the real numbers of returning salmon. PSF helped fund the study, so the results were to be published.
This is where the story begins to unravel for Alexandra Morton.
Very quietly, and without the pomp and ceremony previously pumped into studies, this study was released in October of 2010. Titled “Sea lice dispersion and salmon survival in relation to salmon farm activity in the Broughton Archipelago”, it concluded that “the survival of the pink salmon cohort was not statistically different from a reference region without salmon farms.” That’s right – no extinction. Not even a difference.
This agreed with another study released at about the same time by author Dr. Gary Marty. Not surprisingly, Alexandra Morton had criticized the results of the Marty study – although it agreed with her own results.
She doesn’t mention this study on her website. No other environmental organizations who campaign against salmon farming have made mention of this study.
The noose is tightening.
