Canadian Dogs, in Snow, and in Cold Weather.

 Remember any dog is happiest if allowed to live, and grow up, in his owner's home receiving needed love, and companionship. Forcing a pet to live a solitary, outside life leads to boredom. A bored dog is often a problem animal, prone to barking, chewing, or other misdeeds.

 No dog is biologically able to endure the unsheltered cold of our winters except sheepdogs, St. Bernards, Chow Chows and Siberian husky, and these do require shelter.

However, many dogs, except toy breeds, young puppies, dogs with very short hair coats, and sick or old dogs can adapt to outdoor living provided they receive necessary food, care, shelter and attention.

 If a dog is kept outside, special considerations must be made

before purchasing or building a shelter based on the animal's size. If the dog isn't kept in a fenced yard

-- the preferred outdoor situation -- it should have a large run or kennel (at least 4-6' wide and 8-12' long) as well as daily exercise with its owner. If the animal is kept on a chain or similar device (never encouraged as it may make the dog aggressive, but unfortunately in many Canadian, urban locations) it should be at least 12' long, with swivel snaps on both ends to prevent tangling and knotting. A dog should never wear a 'choke chain' except during training. A proper restraint device for normal use would be a suitably-sized leather or nylon collar or harness with its snap-ring and buckle in good repair. Dogs should have a license, rabies tag and microchip at all times.

Special precautions insure the animal can't tangle its chain or rope around trees, posts and yard swings(most dogs have enough intelligence to easily untangle a chain, unless you have created a major obstacle course for them . Make sure the animal can't dig under or climb over fences, fall from porches, stairways or elevated patios. Fire, SPCA, and police departments respond to several such reports of hung and hanging dogs each year.

The shelter can be constructed from any of a wide variety of materials, such as exterior plywood, wooden barrels, hay or straw bales, crates, etch. When finished, the interior must allow the animal to sit, turn around and lay down.

The animal must be able to keep dry and warm on the inside and escape the direct rays of the sun on the outside.

Remember, the shelter is for sleeping and escaping weather extremes, not to live in. The interior should provide a comfortable sleeping area protected from drafts. Don't build it too large or it won't allow the dog's body heat to keep the air surrounding him warm.

Historically, dogs roamed at will on the farm and could find places to 'nest' at night or to rest where it was dry and warm -- in stables, barns or sheds -- where sufficient bedding was available or the dog could burrow in stored hay or straw. Modern dogs depend on their owners to provide necessary and proper shelter.

Acclimate your pet to the outdoors during mild weather so his coat and body adapt to seasonal temperature changes. His coat will become thick enough to withstand even very cold temperatures provided his shelter is dry and wind tight. It is important for outdoor dogs to have a sufficient covering of flesh before and during winter since muscle mass and fat covering provide body insulation. If a dog shows signs of poor condition (such as lack of fleshiness over the hips, ribs and backbone) increase its food intake. During winter, the dog should be fed several small meals rather than one large meal. It needs additional caloric intake (about 15% more food for each 20 degree F. drop in temperature) and a bit more animal fat or vegetable oil to help convert energy to body heat.

The shelter opening should be just large enough to allow the dog to enter and exit and should face away from prevailing winds. Shelters should be caulked and raised off wet and frozen ground and be well-insulated. Bedding should be a thick pad with washable cover, containing cedar chips or shredded newspaper. Check bedding daily to be sure it is dry and clean as a dog's coat and feet bring in moisture.

Check on the dog's food and water frequently during the day to be sure they are not frozen. Ice will slip out readily if you put a thin film of petroleum jelly inside the water bucket each time you fill it. A hollow plastic bowl for water won't crack if frozen.

Dogs respond to cold by shivering and depressing their breathing. Hypothermia (excessive cooling of the body's core) prevention requires adequate shelter, protection against wetness or wind, good physical condition, and adequate food and water. A healthy animal's hair coat, skin, underlying tissue and fat protect against hypothermia.

Most heat loss occurs through radiation, convection, and conduction of heat from body surfaces. Conduction is the transfer of heat by direct contact. Convection is the transfer of heat to the environment via air or water movement over the body. Radiation is heat transfer which occurs if an animal goes into the cold without an adequate hair coat or body condition.

Close off empty spaces between the bottom of the doghouse floor and the ground or concrete to prevent the wind from blowing under the shelter. In the worst weather, a protected light bulb can supply additional warmth to the doghouse interior.

Extremely cold weather can lower an animal's resistance to disease and bring on ailments like pneumonia and arthritis. Check the dog's feet frequently for build ups of snow, ice, salt and chemicals.

A good temporary shelter can consist of a shipping crate, wooden or metal drum or even a large cardboard box. The container should be placed on a solid piece of wood set on bricks. Insulate the box or drum with an old blanket or quilt, then encase the entire shelter in several thicknesses of sturdy garbage bags taped or stapled to the structure. The temporary shelter should be replaced as soon as possible with a suitable, permanent shelter.

The best place for a doghouse or shelter is inside another building, such as a garage or shed. The doghouse might be placed on the shady side of a home during summer and on the sunny side during winter.~~Al (Alex-Alexander) D Girvan.

Like its North American Cousin, the European Bison, Also Known as Wisent or the European Wood Bison are not Buffalo.

 The root *wis-, also found in weasel, originally referred to the animal's musk.

Animal

The European bison, also known as wisent or the European wood bison, is a Eurasian species of bison. It is one of two extant species of bison, alongside the North American bison. Three subspecies have existed in the past, but only one survives today. In the 17th century, the Caucasian wisent still populated a large area of the Western Caucasus. After that human settlement in the mountains intensified and the range of the Caucasian wisent became reduced to about one tenth of its original range at the end of the 19th century. In the 1860s the population numbered still about 2000, but was reduced to only 500-600 in 1917, and only 50 in 1921 poaching continued; in 1927, the three last Caucasian bison were killed.

A Hybrid in Poznań Zoo

Only one Caucasian bison bull is known to have been in captivity. This bull, named Kaukasus, was born in the Caucasus Mountains in 1907 and brought to Germany in 1908 where he lived until 26 February 1925.

While in captivity, he bred with cows from the lowland subspecies Bison bonasus bonasus.[3] Thus, he became one of the twelve ancestors of the present Caucasian–lowland breeding line of the European wisent pedigree book.
European Bison are smaller than their better-known North American Bison relatives. They have a body length between 2.1 and 3.1 m (7 - 10 ft), a tail length between 30 and 60 cms (12 - 24 inches) and females typically weigh between 300 and 540 kgs (660 - 1,190 lbs) and males between 400 and 920 kgs (880 - 2,028 lbs), although some large bulls have been recorded at 1,000 kgs (2,200 lbs) or more.Scientific name: Bison bonasus

European Bison are smaller than their better-known North American Bison relatives. They have a body length between 2.1 and 3.1 m (7 - 10 ft), a tail length between 30 and 60 cms (12 - 24 inches) and females typically weigh between 300 and 540 kgs (660 - 1,190 lbs) and males between 400 and 920 kgs (880 - 2,028 lbs), although some large bulls have been recorded at 1,000 kgs (2,200 lbs) or more.

European Bison have shorter hair than the American Bison, but strangely, they tend to have hairier tails. Their head is set at a slightly higher angle than the American Bison, and this means they tend to browse more from slightly higher foliage, and graze less from ground-level grasses.

European Bison are less tamable than American Bison, and as such they breed less readily with domestic cattle.

Habitat

European Bison used to inhabit temperate, coniferous forests in much of Europe. From Russia and southern Sweden, down to the Balkans and Northern Spain. However for centuries their numbers have dwindled as they were hunted and driven out of their natural habitat due to forestry and farming. Slowly the European Bison was eradicated from countries across Europe and in 1927 the last wild European Bison was killed by poachers in southern Russia. In that year fewer than 50 European Bison existed, all of them in zoos.

Thankfully, since then numbers of the European Bison have been gradually increased and a number of herds have been returned to the wild in several countries. European Bison can now be found in nature reserves in Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, Latvia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova and Spain. There are plans to reintroduce the animal to additional reserves in Germany and the Netherlands.

Higher classification: Bison

Conservation status: Vulnerable (Population increasing)

Mass: 610 kg (Adult)

Gestation period: 266 days

Trophic level: Herbivorous The English word 'bison' was borrowed around 1611from Latin bisōn (pl. bisontes), itself from Germanic. The root *wis-, also found in weasel, originally referred to the animal's musk.

The word bonasus was first mentioned by Aristotle in the 4th century BC when he precisely described the animal, calling it bόνασος (bonasus) in Greek. He also noted that the Paeonians called it mόναπος (monapos).

Albertans Have, for Years, Claimed That Alberta is Rat Free; However Both Muskrats and the RD’S KANGAROO RAT are Indigenous to Alberta.

Their homes on the range are becoming rare.

Unique rodent can live without water, but can’t survive with man.

Dipodomys ordii

Status: Vulnerable

Main threat: Agriculture, habitat degradation and fragmentation.

Numbers: Varies with moisture conditions, but overall the population is considered to be low in Canada, no more than a few thousand.

Range and Habitat: Sand dunes and hard packed soils of arid grassland environment of southwestern Alberta and south eastern Saskatchewan.

Size: 50 to 96 grams.

Breeding habits: May produce young once or twice a year, one to six born after gestation of 28 to 30 days.

Lifespan: Can live in captivity for up to seven years, but few in the wild survive beyond a year or two.

Outlook for survival: Fair to good if enough of the sand hills and arid regions of southern Prairies are left undisturbed.

In the fall of 1993, rancher Danny Fieldberg was ploughing some land on his property in southern Alberta when up popped some creatures hopping about like miniature kangaroos.

Fieldberg counted six in all and managed to catch one. He then phoned the local Fish and Wildlife office and asked if someone could come and look. The wildlife officer was initially sceptical. But not only did he end up seeing one of the miniature kangaroos running along a furrow, he concluded after further investigation that the creatures were denning on the property.

To many people, the Ord’s kangaroo rat is a figment of the imagination — something children in southern Alberta conjure up when they encounter large field mice in the barn.

"They’re like a fairy tale," says Fieldberg.

"I remember seeing a few in the bale stacks when I was a kid. But talk to most people down here, they’ll tell you that they don’t exist in southern Alberta."

Fearing he might bring harm to the kangaroo rats, Fieldberg decided to forgo ploughing the 20 hectares of land.

He never thought much about it until a young University of Calgary student came looking to rent his farmhouse some time later. David Gummer had answered a call from a professor who said the Committee on the Status of Endangered Species in Canada was having trouble finding someone to do a status report on the kangaroo rat.

"I got the job because no one else seemed to know anything about them," says Gummer.

"I had just started research on them at the Suffield Military Reserve, and just by coincidence, I went to see Danny about renting his place. I knew nothing at the time about his report to Fish and Wildlife until he told me the story later.

Gummer says that when he grew up in Regina, the only time he ever heard about the kangaroo rat was in school, where the animal’s ability to go without water for most of its life was extolled.

"Most people on the Prairies will tell you they know nothing of the species," he says. "But there’s a reason for that. There are only a few places in south eastern Alberta, and southwestern Saskatchewan, where you can find them. And because they are nocturnal, you’re not likely to see them unless they’re out at night or if they disturb their dens during the day."

More Chickens 101-First Chickens in Americas Were Brought From Polynesia

 Of Course you Already Know, Fried Chicken is Really Chinese Food.

That is right, not a typo. The original ancestors of all domestic chickens came from China.

The chicken (Gallus gallus domesticus) is a domesticated fowl, a subspecies of the red junglefowl. As one of the most common and widespread domestic animals, with a population of more than 19 billion in 2011. There are more chickens in the world than any other species of bird or domestic animal. Humans keep chickens primarily as a source of food, consuming both their meat and their eggs.

The earliest known domestication occurred in Northern China 8,000 BCE determined from archaeological chicken bones

Why did the chicken cross the Pacific Ocean? To get to the other side, in South America. How? By Polynesian canoes, which apparently arrived at least 100 years before Europeans settled the continent. Such is the conclusion of an international research team, which reported that it had found “the first unequivocal evidence for a pre-European introduction of chickens to South America,” or presumably anywhere in the New World. The researchers said that bones buried on the South American coast were from chickens that lived between 1304 and 1424. Pottery at the site was from a similar or earlier time. A DNA analysis linked the bones, which were excavated at El Arenal on the Arauca Peninsula in south central Chile, to chickens from Polynesian islands. The presence of the South American sweet potato in pre-European sites in Polynesia also indicates some prehistoric contact between the Americas and the Polynesian islands.

The findings published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The lead author Alice A. Storey, an anthropologist at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, and other team members are from American Samoa, Australia, Canada and the United States.

Much later; in Northern Italy, near the port of Leghorn, were found a landrace of fowls, known as Livornese. Smallish in body, but which lay very many eggs. In 1852, Captain Gates entered the harbour at Mystic, CT, and arrived with the first importation of Leghorn chickens that were to be ancestors of today’s flocks. The birds were what we now call Brown or Red in colour. In 1853 F.J. Kinney received an importation of Brown/Red Leghorns at Boston Harbour, while Mr. Simpson received a shipment of White Leghorns. From this point, forward Leghorn chickens began to win the hearts of North Americans. The Best Egg-Layer of the older most familiar breeds: They’re generally friendly, though they can be noisy and a bit aggressive at times. Leghorns are good layers of white eggs, laying an average of 280 per year and sometimes reaching 300–320. Better egg layer than brooder

Rhode Island Red: The Best Dual-Purpose Bird: Easy to care for and a good layer! Theyare a popular choice for backyard flocks because of their egg laying abilities and hardiness. Although they can sometimes be stubborn, healthy hens can lay up to 5–6 eggs per week depending on their care and treatment.

Rhode Island Red hens lay many more eggs than an average hen if provided plenty of quality feed.

Buff Orpington: The Best Pet Chicken:

The one caution on this breed is that their docile nature will often make them a target for bullying from other birds.

Bred to be an excellent layer with good meat quality. They can go broody very often, and make great mothers. Due to their build they do well in very cold climates. If you choose to raise a Buff Orpington, be careful not to add aggressive breeds to your flock.

Delaware: The Meaty Bird: Delaware’s are inquisitive and friendly, and generally low maintenance birds. They do tend to have tough moults though, and while most have mild dispositions, some can be a bit cranky.

Delawares are hardy birds that mature quickly. Hens are good layers of large to jumbo brown eggs and will go broody. Not the friendliest bird in the yard but a good layer.

 Ameraucana (sometimes mis-spelled Americana): AKA the Easter-Egger: This breed makes wonderful backyard chickens. They will thrive well either in confinement or free-ranging. They have a calm, non-aggressive disposition, and are very easy to handle. This is possibly the best bird for a family with kids.

The Wyandotte

is a docile, dual-purpose breed kept for their large brown eggs and for meat. Wyandotte hens are devoted mothers. The Wyandotte is a versatile chicken and can adapt to different temperatures. These chickens do fine on free range or in a fenced in yard. The hens will lay around 200 eggs a year. The Wyandotte is a hen that will need her vent checked regularly because of the thickness of her tail feathers she is prone to become clogged if not kept clean.

True Meat Breed: It's not the breed, it's the strain.

Jersey Giant-Weight: TEN POUNDS-a capon of course, would be even larger.

Big, sweet and a truly gentle giant, this ten pound bird is the least economical chicken out there. It is not a good enough layer, though it is a fair layer, to be worthwhile there and it simply eats too much to make it worth while on the dinner table. But, if you're looking for a sweet and loving bird that loves to be picked up and petted, this is the best bird for you. And even though they aren't great layers, the hens are robust and hardy, and quite willing to work steadily through the winter.

Brahma: Weight: 9 Pounds

The origins of the Brahma have been in dispute for more than 150 years. They were introduced in the 19th century to either London or New York and were probably imported from Shanghai, however it is also possible they came from China, India or some other East Indies port. They have also been called Chittagongs, Shanghais, and Brahmapootras. They are fair layers of brown, average sized eggs and very robust and cold hardy. They are very gentle birds which is good as their size could make them quite formidable.

Cochin: Weight: 8 1/2 lbs.

An uncommon chicken, this bird hails from China and shared a name with the Brahma, Shanghai. This breed launched interesting poultry shows as they resemble a large ball of fluff and feathers. Interestingly, the bantam version of this bird is known as a Pekin instead of a Bantam Cochin, though you can certainly find them for sale under the Bantam Cochin moniker. They lay a small, yellowy brown egg and are robust and cold hardy. They are calm, docile and easily handled.

Cornish Game: Weight: 8lbs.

These are the meat birds of the poultry industry and with a solid 8 lbs, it's not hard to see why. They were developed in Cornwall and are often breed with Plymouth Rocks to make the excellent birds we all love to eat. They are a poor layer of small eggs but cold hardy and early maturing. Easily contained, they are less active and more docile than most other game birds.

Orpington: Weight: 8 lbs.

A dual purpose bird, the Orpington is a bit small on the weight side but definitely not on the appearance side. The loose feathering makes the Orpington appear much larger (nearly two times) the size of some other hens and when they are brooding or aggressive they fluff out and appear even bigger. The Orpington is a good layer of above average sized eggs and hardy in all weather. Cold doesn't faze them so you can expect them to continue laying during the cold seasons!

Before the onset of the Cornish Cross broilers, the meat breeds were usually Delaware, New Hampshire, or White Rock. Chosen mainly because the light coloured feathers gave a prettier carcass plucked. You can see the dark pin feathers much easier than the light coloured ones.

But, these breeds were bred and maintained for maximum meat production. Unless you reinforce certain traits in each generation of chickens by selecting your breeders for these traits, you quickly lose those traits. Hatcheries do not select for those traits that give you good meat production. They are in the business of mass producing chickens for backyard flocks, not specialty meat birds. That's what the Cornish Cross is for. You are not going to find good dual-purpose meat birds from a hatchery. It is not a breed thing. It is purely the way they select their breeders.~~Al (Alex-Alexander) D. Girvan.

If Indeed, Some Of You Still Require Such; More Proof That Something Desperately Needs To Be Done About Air Pollution.

Not so long ago, our ancestors, fathers mothers, uncles aunts knew an ELK

- on sight. They also knew that a Wapiti 

(found only in North America; mostly in Canada) was not an ELK. AND that an Elk did not, even remotely, resemble a mouse.

Mice are a large group of mammals, with more than 130 species found worldwide. In Alberta, there are 7 species of mice and 12 species of voles.

The most troublesome and economically important of the species found in Alberta are the house mouse

(which is not a native species), the white-footed mouse

and the meadow vole commonly called field mouse).

(

Economic Losses to Mice.

There is no way of placing a monetary value on human suffering and damage caused by mice. The greatest loss is probably not what mice eat, but what is wasted and contaminated. In six months, one pair of mice can eat more than two kilograms (4 lbs.) of food and deposit about 18,000 droppings. Food contaminated by mice is about ten times greater than the amounts eaten. Food wasted by mouse nibbling is also much more than the amount eaten. So common are mice that it is no wonder their hairs and sometimes droppings, end up in all types of food commodities, from canned beans to loaves of bread.

Structural damage caused by rodents can be expensive. In recent years the trend toward use of insulated confinement facilities to raise swine and poultry, for instance, has led to increased rodent damage. Mice are very destructive to rigid foam, fibreglass batt, and other types of insulation in walls and attics of such structures.

Mice also gnaw wooden structures causing grain and feed to be wasted. They also undermine buildings by burrowing, which eventually causes structural failure and collapse.

Electrical wiring gnawed by mice causes many fires each year, listed as "cause unknown".

Public Health Impact.

Mice and their parasites are implicated in the transmission of a number of diseases including salmonellosis, rickettsia pox and most recently hantavirus. Bacterial food poisoning occurs when foods become contaminated with infected rodent droppings. Mice also carry many types of tapeworms and roundworms, infectious to pets and humans. Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, which causes severe illness and even death in humans, is transmitted by several mouse species including the white-footed mouse.

To reduce the risk of contracting organisms transmitted by mice, you should practise these common sense precautions:

·         Eliminate mice from residential areas by removing food sources and access for mice.

·         Clean up mouse-contaminated areas by using wet methods, including disinfectants such as Chlorine Bleach.

·         Handle mice and other rodents with gloved hands.

·         Avoid sweeping and vacuuming when possible, and wear a dust mask to reduce exposure to fine dust particles.

·        Campers should avoid obviously infested areas. In high risk areas wear a high efficiency, particulate respirator.

·        Discourage children from playing with or trapping mice. Wild mice should not be kept as pets, or for "science projects".

·         De-worm household and farmyard pets regularly. ~~Al (Alex-Alexander) D. Girvan.

State Symbols of the United States of the Americas, Many Dont Exist in That or any State.

Though we will probably never know the reasons why; the United States of the Americas, from their very conception. has always had great difficulty with the English language, respecting the rights, property, and traditions of other countries, and in thinking globally, or even beyond its own borders, except that is, to steal from others. We do know that without their domineering, and obstinate interference, there would be a lot less world conflict.

Home on the Range, the State song of Kansas, original words by Dr. Brewster Higley, a man who, obviously, knew very little about the animals, or, plants, native to North America. In any case, as per usual, like most people living in that area (now United States of the Americas), he got things, just little, screwed up.

VERSE 1:

Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam,

Where the deer and the antelope play,

Where seldom is heard a discouraging word

And the sky is not clouded all day.

VERSE 2:

Oh, give me the gale of the Solomon vale,

Where life streams with buoyancy flow,

On the banks of the Beaver, where seldom if ever

Any poisonous herbage doth grow.

Free, wild buffalo and antelope have never existed in the Americas. Much of the native herbage (berries, fruits, vegetables, plants in general) growing along the banks of the Beaver- or any river, stream, brook- anywhere in the Americas is, indeed poisonous, to some degree..

State Animals-Mammals

Alaska state land animal-moose= elk, known round the globe.

Kansas state animal-United States of the Americas buffalo= bison.

Maine state animal-moose= elk, known round the globe.

Texas state animal-Texas Longhorn= Spanish Longhorns, evolved from several ancient BREEDS of cattle, brought to the Americas; by, of course, the Spanish.

Utah state animal- elk=Wapiti, is not an elk, exists only in North America.©Al (Alex-Alexander) D Girvan. All rights reserved.

The Ancestor of Domestic Cattle-they are not all cows and they do not reproduce asexually..

Restoration of the aurochs based on a bull skeleton from Lund and a cow skeleton from Cambridge, with chart of characteristic external features of the aurochs

The aurochs (Bos primigenius), the ancestor of many domestic cattle, was a type of large wild cattle which inhabited Europe, Asia and North Africa, but which is now extinct; it survived in Europe until the last recorded aurochs, a female probably a cow, died in the Jaktorów Forest, Poland in 1627. Her skull is now the property of the Livrustkammaren ("Royal Armory") museum in Stockholm, Sweden.

The word "aurochs" comes to ENGLISH from German, where its normal spelling and declension today is Auerochs/Auerochse (singular), Auerochsen (genitive), Auerochsen (plural). The declension in English varies, being either "auroch" (singular), "aurochs" (plural) or "aurochs" (singular), "aurochses" (plural). The declension "auroch" (singular), "aurochs" (plural), acknowledged by MWU, is a back-formation analogous to "pea"-from-"pease" derived from a misinterpretation of the singular form ending in the /s/ sound (being cognate to "ox/Ochs(e)"). The use in English of the plural form "aurochsen" is not acknowledged by AHD4 or MWU, but is mentioned in The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. It is directly parallel to the German plural and analogous (and cognate) to English "ox" (singular), "oxen" (plural).

The words "aurochs", "urus", and "wisent" have all been used synonymously; however, the extinct aurochs/urus is a completely separate species from the still-extant wisent. The two were often confused, and some 16th century illustrations of aurochs and wisents have hybrid features. The word urus (/ˈjʊərəs/) comes to English from Latin, but may have come to Latin from Germanic origins- such as English. It declines in English as urus (singular), uruses (plural). In the German language, Ur derived to Auer in course of a diphthongization in the language during the 13th century. Later, "-ochs" as added, which is meant to refer to a wild bovine. This is how the German name of the animal turned to Auerochs/Auerochse.

The name of the aurochs in other languages seems to be derived by "urus" as well. Such as uro (spanish language) or urokse (danish language).

Records show that during the early Holocene in course of the Neolithic Revolution, aurochs were domesticated in at least two domestication events. One, concerning the Indian subspecies, lead to Zebu cattle, and the other one concerning the Eurasian subspecies lead to taurine cattle. Other species of wild bovines were domesticated as well, such as the Wild water buffalo, Gaur and Banteng. In modern cattle, there are numerous breeds that share characteristics of the aurochs, such as a dark colour of the bulls with a light eel stripe and light colour in cows, or a typical aurochs-like horn shape.

Evolution

During the pliocene, the colder climate caused an extension of open grassland, which increased the evolution of large grazers, such as wild bovines. Bos acutifrons is an extinct species of cattle sometimes claimed to be the ancestor of aurochs, but it was a species with very long, outwards-facing horns. The oldest aurochs remains come from about 2 million years, India. Therefore, the Indian subspecies was the first aurochs subspecies to appear. During the pleistocene, the species migrated into the Middle East and further into Asia, and reached Europe about 270,000 years ago. The South Asian domestic cattle, or zebu, descended from Indian aurochs at the edge of the Thar Desert; this would explain the zebu's resistance to drought. Domestic yak, gayal and Javan cattle do not descend from aurochs.©Al (Alex-Alexander)DGirvan. All rights reserved.

Rainbow/Steelhead Trout, What BC ??? Fisheries and the United States of the Americas Choose to Ignore; or Would Rather You Didn't Know.

Its OK to live and shop locally, 
even think globally;
but nature is the entire cosmos.
Sustainable fishery?
That depends on whether you're talking about a wild fish stock;
or a food industries, government/advertising/merchandising
(GAM) scam.

Recreational fishing for steelhead trout in British Columbia is world-renowned and in several rivers, cultured fish WILL represent a significant contribution to the catch.

The steelhead program of the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C., UNDER THE DIRECTION AND POLICY OF B.C.'S MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT,and in cooperation with several Federal Fisheries hatcheries, generates hatchery smolts for release. The resultant angling opportunities are  OPTIMISTICALLY ,AND MOST HOPEFULLY, IN FACT ,promoted as being of high value to the Provincial economy. NOT!
There is no doubt what ever; that the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C. and the BC Ministry of Environment cater to the special interest,private celebrity, ownership interests from the United States of The Americas.

The use of hatchery steelhead (Oncorhynchus mykiss) and catch and release of wild steelhead do provide angling benefits, but may also impose dangerous and wholly unnecessary risks to wild stocks. 
In short; this, so called, "sustainable" fishery, may, WILL,very soon, cause any,still existent-if indeed it has not already happened-truly WILD stocks to become extinct. Hatchery raised Oncorhynchus mykiss ,with chemically manipulated flesh colour, are NOT and NEVER WILL BE "wild"steelhead TROUT.

Most rivers with steelhead present in B.C. ARE "classified"as wild but, farmed/hatchery fish are none the less routinely released into them and the farmed/hatchery fish can and do displace wild parr, consume wild fry. Some even survive the summer and winter to spawn with wild adults thus producing genetically impure mongrel fish stocks. That may not be adequately equipped to survive.

The presence of hatchery returns and restrictive catch-and-release regulations do probably serve to conserve some wild fish populations when the recruitment of wild fish is relatively abundant, i.e., in the routine management zone by providing marked hatchery fish to harvest and the release of captured wild adults but only if this release is properly and thoughtfully carried out. Most often(watch some of the fishing shows on TV) it is not. In order to hold a fish while removing a hook, many anglers will insert their fingers into the gills. This practice causes haemorrhaging which may-quite likely will- kill the fish and spread diseases.

Further Policy Precautions in Hatchery fish Culture and Liberation Include: random selection of wild natal broodstocks, and the placement of marked (adipose fin clip) hatchery smolts in the lower portions of rivers. The latter not only focuses the returning hatchery fish into the area of the sport

fishery, it also is supposed to insure that there is less interaction with the wild population,  again, however, both at release  and in the return many smolts fail to migrate, thus the potential reduction in fitness in wild fish when wild and hatchery fish spawn together).  

The overall purpose of the Provincial stream classification policy is to manage the risks in order to maintain healthy, self-sustaining wild steelhead stocks.???

Recently, Walters (2005) noted several internal and external differences between farmed or hatchery fish and wild stocks. Internal Differences : include larger spleen, liver, heart, and smaller brain)

External Differences: include body shape, fin erosion, and head size.

Then There are Morphological and Behavioural Differences (phenotypic divergence): between residualized hatchery smolts and wild smolts, and several potential life history, demographic, ecological and genetic impacts as a result of this residualism.

Despite a low-river release, downstream of the Keogh fish fence blocking upstream migration of these hatchery smolts for several weeks, several thousand of 20,000 to 30,000 hatchery smolts failed to migrate and became resident during summer. The residualism phenomenon has been observed in other Vancouver Island streams (Quinsam and Little Qualicum rivers), particularly in the spring drought of 2004. Several thousand residuals were observed in these two systems following their release from on-site hatchery rearing facilities. Regional biologists further reported this same behaviour in most rivers where hatchery smolts are released such as the lower Somass, Stamp and Sproat rivers near Port Alberni, and the Seymour and Chilliwack rivers on the Lower Mainland, after releases of hatchery steelhead smolts, at times swamping the wild parr in numbers, leaving little doubt of substantial density-dependent effects on wild steelhead (and others), particularly when wild recruitment is low. ?

Very little evidence is available to support the contention that hatchery steelhead can serve as a tool to re-build the wild population directly through the spawning of hatchery returns in wild rivers. Indeed, all available evidence suggests just the opposite . Because of , not despite the efforts of ,farming and hatcheries; pure WILD socks of most any type fish  are soon to become extinct, if indeed--they are not already.

Rainbow/Steelhead Trout, Female.

At the juvenile stage, there is no difference. Wild Steel Head or just a common Rainbow trout  depends  largely on where it is caught; and whether or not it has relatively easy access to salt water. Alberta and Saskatchewan are not considered easy access; otherwise, you just could find this  exact same fish (wild steelhead trout/USA salmon) in a beaver ponds, or dugout water reservoirs, throughout Saskatchewan or, maybe, in the Alberta Badlands. There is no, real, commercial steeelhead fishery; all the so called steel head found in a fish market or supermarket are farmed fish. If you are a recreational fisherman, the only "steel head" you are allowed to keep are farmed fish (fish with an adipose fin clip). Although it was, originally, recognised as a white fleshed fish; rainbow trout flesh can, now days, be white, pink, or even bright orange and is often said to have a delicate, almost nutty, flavour. This change is caused (very deliberately and as a marketing scam) by the food they eat (diet the fish are fed).

One almost never sees the term "fall bright used any more; so far as marketers are concerned, with good reason. The flesh of a fall bright Chinook salmon is generally white, you know, just like the flesh of a rainbow trout is generally white. The colour change is due, mainly-- more than salt water exposure-- to diet--what the fish has been feeding on; just as the change in FLESH colour of rainbow trout is due to what the fish has been fed in the hatchery.

Unlike salmon, rainbow trout or Steelhead, have a highly diverse life history, with greater variation in the number of years spent in both freshwater (1 to 5), and in saltwater (1 to 3), and ability to spawn repeatedly (usually 10% to 20% of returns are repeats, but it has been higher recently). Steelhead adults return in lower numbers than salmon and over a broader time frame, to spawn in the spring rather than the fall. Survival from egg to fry is higher than salmon, in general.

The typical steelhead life cycle, includes both freshwater and marine phases. Steelhead hatch in freshwater rivers or streams, remaining there for one to four years (Scott and Crossman 1973, Wooding 1994). They migrate to the ocean in spring and grow rapidly as they enter estuarine waters, doubling or tripling in size in approximately two weeks (Childerhose and Trim 1979).

Steelhead spend two to three years in the ocean, yet little is known about this phase of their lifecycle; they are regularly reported in Alaskan and Aleutian waters and may travel as far as Japan(Wooding 1994). For example, a steelhead caught in the Skagit River had been tagged six months earlier in the Sea of Japan (Ball 2006).

Like the Chinook salmon, two different types of steelhead are distinguished by the time at which they return to freshwater: winter run fish enter rivers and streams from November to May while summer run steelhead return between April and October. Both populations spawn in early spring (April to May), with eggs hatching four to seven weeks. Unlike Pacific salmon, adult steelhead may return to the ocean after spawning and spawn multiple times; up to 20% of steelhead are repeat spawners (Wooding 1994).

The scientific name of the rainbow trout is Oncorhynchus mykiss. The species was originally named by German naturalist and taxonomist Johann Julius Walbaum in 1792 based on type specimens from the Kamchatka Peninsula in Siberia. Walbaum's original species name, mykiss, was derived from the local Kamchatkan name used for the fish, mykizha. The name of the genus is from the Greek onkos ("hook") and rynchos ("nose"), in reference to the hooked jaws of males in the mating season (the "kype").

The oceangoing, (anadromous) form, including, those returning for spawning, are known as steelhead in Canada. In Tasmania, they are commercially propagated in sea cages and are known as ocean trout, although they are the same species.

Like salmon, arctic char; and also steelhead, return to their original hatching grounds to spawn. Similar to Atlantic salmon, but unlike their Pacific Oncorhynchus salmonid kin, arctic char and  steelhead are iteroparous (able to spawn several times, each time separated by several months) and make several spawning trips between fresh and salt water, although fewer than 10 percent of native spawning adults survive from one spawning to another.

The United States of The Americas much prefers; either to ignore the Arctic Char(a superior flavoured and textured fish) completely, or, to group it together with Rainbow /Steelhead trout, and market all as either "Alaska" Steelhead Salmon Or 'Washington State' Steelhead-You know, Like Alaska "KING" Salmon. 
Chinook Salmon of British Columbia, the actual, official name by the Fisheries Society, is derived from the aboriginal/indigenous, natives or an they were then known INDIANS; name that once lived along the Fraser River. 

Juvenile steelhead trout (wild or hatchery raised) are identical to rainbow trout until the period prior to their ocean migrations. Young trout and stunted adults have eight to thirteen Parr marks on their sides. There are five to ten Parr marks between the head and dorsal fin. Just prior to migrating to the sea, juvenile steelhead become very silvery and resemble miniature adults. They are called smolt during this life phase.

Spawning steelhead and rainbow, both, develop a distinct pink to red strip-like colouration that blends along the side, both above and below the lateral line. On steelhead, the rainbow trout colouration gradually fades following spawning to the more characteristic silvery colour that the fish display during their ocean journey. The distinct and beautiful colouration of steelhead during the freshwater spawning period is apparently important in regard to the mating and reproductive process

.

The above two fish images are PUBLIC DOMAIN because they were prepared by a

civil servant officer, or other employee, (perhaps the president) of the people (citizens) of The United States of the Americas, not AMERICA. 

Although it was, originally, recognised as a white fleshed fish; rainbow trout flesh can, now days, be white, pink, or even bright orange and is often said to have a delicate, almost nutty, flavour. 
Because Salmon and Steelhead are visualised as being much more exotic than a common rainbow “Pink” rainbow trout,  are often marketed (usually as Steelhead "Salmon",which they are definitely not) at a premium price. However, pink rainbow trout get their meat colour; and much of the “nutty flavour; from a synthetic carotenoid pigment that is added to the fish feed. Rainbow trout are now available year-round, primarily fresh, although it is also available frozen, smoked, and canned. Marketed forms include whole dressed trout, boned trout, skin-on pin bone-in fillets, & skin-on boneless fillets. According to some buyers, raceway-raised fish tends to have more consistent quality. Trout from pens or ponds that aren't managed properly may have an off flavour caused by algae, or even parasites,and bacterial infections. Fish escaping, or released, from such pens and or ponds, can and do, just like the insertion of ones fingers into the gills by practitioners of "catch and release", can and do, kill off many of our truewild fish stocks.

Buyer Beware: Just as most Canadian beef poultry and pork now contains up to 20% “Slime”; so do many fish products. And, many farmers(include farmed salmon, rainbow trout and supposed steelhead[so marketed but not necessarily ever gone into ocean water])add antibiotics to their feed so buyers who are concerned about this are advised to look for regional farmers who don’t use animal-based feeds, and limit or entirely avoid the use of antibiotics.

Here is a small scientific fact that you may, also, be interested in. Until 1988, steelhead (the anadromous form of rainbow trout) was classified in the ìgenus Salmoî along with Atlantic Salmon, brown trout, and several western trout species. With additional osteology and biochemistry data, biologists have now reclassified steelhead as members of the genus Oncorhynchus. The reason for this is that new information suggested that steelhead trout are more closely related to Pacific Salmon than to brown trout and Atlantic salmon.
As such, the United States of the Americans Fisheries Society/The United States of the Americas Society of Ichthyologists & Herpetologists Committee on Names of Fishes, voted unanimously to accept Oncorhynchus as the proper generic name.
The scientific name of steelhead was changed from Salmo gairdneri to Oncorhynchus mykiss. The generic names of other, North American varieties, golden, Mexican golden, Gila, and Apache trout were also changed to Oncorhynchus. Since all of these WESTERN trout including steelhead are biologically capable of repeat spawning and do not die after spawning, it has been suggested this group be called the Pacific trout.

Description

Like all trout, the steelhead is positively separated from the various salmon species by having eight to twelve rays in the anal fin. The rainbow trout/steelhead groups are then separated from the bull trout, brook trout, arctic char, lake trout, and Dolly Varden Char by the complete absence of teeth at the base of the tongue. Generally speaking, the steelhead is more slender and streamlined than resident rainbow. Like rainbow, the colouration on the back is basically blue-green shading to olive with black, regularly spaced spots. The black spots also cover both lobes of the tail. The black colouration fades over the lateral line to a silver white colouration blending more to white on the stomach. Steelhead trout from the ocean are much more silver than the resident rainbow trout. On steelhead the typical colours and spots of the trout appear to be coming from beneath a dominant silvery sheen. The silvery sheen, gradually, fades in fresh water, and steelhead become very, very difficult indeed to differentiate from resident rainbow trout as the spawning period approaches.

Steelhead and rainbow lack the red slash on the under jaw characteristic of cutthroat trout, but do have white leading edges on the anal, pectoral, and pelvic fins. 

Threats to Wild Rainbow Trout/Steelhead Fish Stocks

Rainbow/steelhead trout are the most widely known trout in the world and are highly sought after by anglers because of their strong fighting abilities. There are two commonly recognized forms of the rainbow trout and these sub-groupings or “forms” are based primarily on where they spend their time feeding and maturing.

The most common rainbow trout is the stream-resident form that lives its life entirely in freshwater with maybe short periods of time spent in estuarine or near-shore marine waters.

The second form is commonly known as steelhead and these rainbow trout leave freshwater as juveniles and migrate long distances in the ocean where they grow to maturity before migrating back to their original home waters.

Since rainbow and steelhead trout are the same species there are no major physical differences between them, however, the nature of their differing lifestyles has resulted in very subtle differences in colour, shape, size, and general appearance no fisherman will be able to differentiate, at least not while the fish is alive.

A 1996 Canadian study of all anadromous or ocean-going fish stocks in British Columbia and Yukon documented that 142 separate stocks or runs have already gone extinct out of a total of 9,662.

 In the United States, which has of course, as with most anything related to greed and/or monetary value; endured far more human impacts; Steelhead/ Salmon rivers and their watersheds, have lost over 400 indigenous stocks (29%) of the 1400 that originally existed. The majority of remaining native salmon and steelhead runs are endangered or highly threatened with vanishing forever.

The CANADIAN Skeena watershed represents one of the last true large river strongholds of wild, native Steelhead and salmon in all of North America.

While the Department of Fisheries began “stock enhancement” of the much-prized sockeye fishery in the Babine River in 1970, all of the Steelhead trout and four species of salmon represent the original genetic stocks that have evolved in these rivers for millions of years.

While the Skeena and its tributaries are recognized for their excellent water quality and habitat, these fragile fisheries are threatened by man’s activities(including Fisheries and Resource Management) that have DECIMATED NEARLY ALL OF THE WILD STEELHEAD AND SALMON FISHERIES ON THE CONTINENT: habitat degradation associated with logging, urbanization and hydropower, the poisoning of pristine water quality from mining, and overharvest from commercial and recreational fishing driven by short-term profit and greed.

No doubt about it; a fisherman’s BEST SHOT for tying into a huge wild steelhead is to head for the rivers of western Canada.

Storied rivers such as the Dean, Thompson, and Frazier are legendary; but, the mother of all B.C. rainbow/steelhead rivers is the Skeena.

One of the longest undammed rivers in the world, the Skeena begins high in the coastal mountains of the Spasizi Plateau and makes its way more than 350 miles to the ocean port of Prince Rupert. As this enormous drainage follows its course to the sea, it picks up more than 30 tributaries, some of which are sizable rivers in their own right. Three of these tributaries — the Bulkley, the Babine, and the Kispiox — account for the majority of the steelhead caught in the system because they afford the angler an incredible amount of fly-friendly water and support the highest number of returning fish. The prime fishing time for all three is early September through late October. During this period, the odds of hooking an once-in-a-lifetime steelhead are higher on these waters than they are anywhere else on the planet. How is it then that Washington state, in the United States of the Americas claims the steelhead as “their” state fish?

Commercial Over-Fishing and Steelhead Bycatch

The epic Steelhead runs of the Skeena are currently facing severe threats from the short-sighted, non-caring, Fisheries/Government policies, and overharvest, from commercial and especially “aboriginal/First nation”, fishermen targeting the Sockeye runs in the Skeena estuary. Using gill nets and purse seines, commercial fishermen incidentally harvest large numbers of Rainbow trout/Steelhead, Coho salmon and other non-targeted fish as they return from the ocean. In particular, the early run Steelhead that enters the rivers in August and the mid-season fish that enter the rivers in September have suffered significant mortality. This problem of fish “bycatch,” or nontargeted killing of fish, is a classic management problem confronting mix-stocked fisheries, or fisheries where fish of various species inhabit the same waters.

Fact: the Skeena Steelhead experienced severe declines in the early 1990s from commercial fishing in the estuary until the Canadian Department of Fisheries curtailed sockeye fishing in late August during this vulnerable time for the September Steelhead runs. But, increased lobbying pressure from private commercial fishing interests and Government, political decisions trumped proper ecosystem management of this valuable and diverse resource has threatened again the fragile Steelhead runs.

Mining, Oil & Gas Drilling, Pipelines and Poisoned Headwaters

In the Skeena headwaters, several energy companies are eying deposits of coal bed methane and oil and gas. There is a proposed Enbridge pipeline to transport the oil and gas deposits from Alberta through British Columbia to the Pacific coast for transport by oil and gas tankers.

Canada’s but now due to government policy, mostly China, or United States of the Americas owned; mining industry, whether for minerals, oil, gas or coal, has a terrible environmental legacy of poisoned water quality, polluted rivers and devastated mountain communities(why should they care, they don’t have to live here?) Historically, the United States of the Americas is not really known to care about much of anything; other than monetary gain,

From the thousands of poisoned miles of cold water rivers and streams in the coal country of Pennsylvania and West Virginia, to the killing of up to 90% of the fish life in the Cheakamus River in 2006 from a railroad crash carrying toxic chemicals, to the threat of cyanide leachate poisoning the headwaters of Bristol Bay in Alaska from the proposed Pebble Gold Mine, Government; government policy, environmental policy, resource management, mining  policies, are no friend to wild steelhead and/or salmon.

The building of roads on rugged terrain, and especially through National and/or Provincial Parks, often result in increased storm water runoff and increased sediment loading into streams. The tendency of a river to “blow out” and become muddy and unfishable is often determined by the amount of roads and mining or timbering activity in its headwaters.

The Skeena watershed represents one of the last remaining HEALTHY producers of wild steelhead and salmon in North America, retaining its complete assemblage of native fish, a rarity in the United States or anywhere else in the Americas.

Protection of its headwaters from ill-advised mining and energy extraction for short-term profit must be paramount in the management of this unique resource. However, the Skeena estuary is also facing a potential assault from factory fish farms. Eighteen (18) new aquaculture facilities have been cited for the mouth of the Skeena River, with three (3) near approvals from provincial government agencies.

Aquaculture net pens typically raise around 600,000 Atlantic salmon, derived from European hatchery stock. The dense concentration of fish creates several serious threats to wild steelhead and salmon. Scientific research has revealed that the most insidious threat of aquaculture fish is the dense concentrations of parasitic sea lice and other diseases that occur in the estuary as a result of this unnaturally high concentration of adult fish raised artificially in net pens.

In, and with, Nature, the two species of parasitic sea lice present almost no threat to smolts leaving the rivers for ocean feeding grounds. Normally, adult salmon and steelhead are located far away from the estuary at feeding grounds in the open ocean when smolt leave freshwater in spring. But with the artificial propagation of millions of adult fish in the estuary, smolts run a gauntlet of sea lice. The smolts are extremely vulnerable to these sea lice, and will die when only 1 or 2 sea lice attach themselves to a young fish’s gills.

Research published in 2004 and 2007 determined that entire populations of pink salmon and chum salmon smolts were killed in southern British Columbia waters because of aquaculture-induced infestations of sea lice at river mouths.

In 2007 the aquaculture of salmonids was worth US$10.7 billion. Salmonid aquaculture production grew over ten-fold during the 25 years from 1982 to 2007. Leading producers of farmed salmonids are Norway with 33 percent, Chile with 31 percent, and other European producers with 19 percent.

Conservation groups have demanded that aquaculture farming be banned from river mouths like the Skeena that produce millions of wild steelhead and salmon, either to off-shore locations or on dry land. Research has suggested that leaving aquaculture net pens fallow in spring temporarily reduces the high concentrations of sea lice and may reduce wild steelhead and salmon mortality.

The aquaculture or farming of salmonids can be contrasted with capturing wild salmonids using commercial fishing techniques. However, the concept of "wild" salmon as used by United States of the Americas; and especially the Alaska State Seafood Marketing Institute includes stock enhancement fish, produced in hatcheries, that have historically been considered ocean ranching;  are all marketed as "wild Alaska salmon".

The percentage of the Alaska salmonid harvest resulting from ocean ranching depends upon the species of salmon, trout, and, the location

There is currently, and most understandably, much controversy about the ecological and health impacts of intensive salmonid aquaculture.

There are particular concerns about the impacts on wild salmon and other marine life.

Some of this controversy is part of a major commercial competitive fight for market share and price between commercial salmonid fishermen and the rapidly evolving salmonid aquaculture industry.

Methods of salmonid aquaculture originated in late 18th century fertilization trials in Europe. In the late 19th century, salmon hatcheries were used in Europe as well as in North America. From the late 1950s, enhancement programs based on hatcheries were established in the United States, Canada, Japan and the USSR. It is generally agreed that contemporary techniques using floating sea cages originated in Norway in the late 1960s.

Salmonids are usually farmed in two stages and in some places maybe more. First, the salmon are hatched from eggs and raised on land in freshwater tanks. When they are twelve to eighteen months old, the smolt (juvenile salmon) are transferred to floating sea cages or net pens anchored in sheltered bays or fjords along a coast. This farming in a marine environment is known as mariculture. There they are fed pelleted feed for another twelve to twenty four months, then they are harvested

Norway still produces thirty three percent of the world's farmed salmonids, and Chile (America, South) produces thirty one percent. The coastlines of these countries have suitable water temperatures and many areas well protected from storms. Chile is close to large forage fisheries which supply fish meal for salmon aquaculture. Unfortunately, Scotland and Canada are also significant producers.

Modern salmonid farming systems are intensive. Their ownership is often under the control of huge INTERNATIONAL agribusiness corporations, operating mechanised assembly lines on an industrial scale.

In 2003, nearly half of the world’s farmed salmon were in fact produced by just five INTERNATIONAL companies.

In 1989 steelhead was a classified as Oncorhynchus mykiss, a Pacific trout. Steelhead are an anadromous form of rainbow trout that migrates between lakes and rivers and the ocean, and are also known as steelhead salmon or ocean trout.

Rainbow trout/Steelhead are raised in many countries throughout the world. Since the 1950s production has grown exponentially, particularly in Europe and recently in Chile. Worldwide, in 2007, 604,695 tonnes of farmed Steelhead were harvested with a value of $2.59 billion. The largest producer is Chile. In Chile and Norway, the ocean cage production of steelhead has expanded to supply export markets. Inland production of rainbow trout to supply domestic markets has increased strongly in countries such as Italy, France, Germany, Denmark, and Spain. Other significant producing countries include the United States, Iran, Germany, and the UK.[72]

Steelhead are often said to have tender flesh and a mild, somewhat nutty (iodine) flavour. Steelhead meat is pink like Arctic Char or salmon (carotene/iodine rich food supply, plus , most often, the injection of fish based, pink slime), and is more flavourful than the light-coloured meat of  non-manipulated, rainbow trout. Both are highly desired food. However, farmed trout (including those “hatchery” raised); taken from certain lakes have a pronounced earthy flavour which many people find unappealing; many shoppers therefore make an attempt  to ascertain (good luck in the attempt but, you are not going to find out, other than possibly that it is a “Sustainable Fishery)) the source of the fish before buying.

Steelhead that are truly wild and have lived on a diet of scuds (freshwater shrimp), insects such as flies, and crayfish are the most appealing but not keep able in BC. Dark red/orange meat indicates that it is either an farmed steelhead / rainbow trout given a supplemental diet with a high carotene/iodine content. The resulting pink flesh is marketed under such monikers (United States of the Americas origin) as Ruby Red (also grapefruit) or Carolina Red.

Feeding

Rainbow/Steelhead trout, like all Salmonids, are carnivorous; but Just as humans are now being fed huge quantities of potentially death causing “Pink Slime” they are currently being fed compound fish feeds containing fish meal and other feed ingredients, ranging from wheat by-products to soybean meal and feather meal. Being aquatic carnivores, salmonids don't tolerate or properly metabolize many plant based carbohydrates and use fats instead of carbohydrates as a primary energy source. With the amount of worldwide fish meal production being almost a constant amount for the last 30+ years and at maximum sustainable yield, much of the fish meal market has shifted from chicken and pig feed; to fish and shrimp feeds; as aquaculture has grown in this time period.Yes, due to the energetic—equally greedy- cooperation of our corrupt governments; work continues on substituting vegetable proteins and protein concentrates for fish meal in the farmed/hatchery salmonid diet.

 Many substitutions for fish meal are known and diets containing zero fish meal are possible. For example a planned closed containment salmon fish farm in Scotland uses ragworms, vegetable algae and amino acids as feed.

However, despite what you are told when viewing a “Blue Buffalo” or other such TV commercial; economic animal diets are determined by least cost, linear programming models that are effectively competing with similar models for chicken and pig feeds using the same feed ingredients, and these models show that fish meal is more useful in aquatic diets than in chicken  or human diets, where they can make the chickens taste like fish and beef taste like fish. Unfortunately, don’t tell the food industry, government, or Organic, Health Food Fanatics, this substitution can result in lower levels of the highly valued omega-3 content in the farmed product.

However, when vegetable oil is used in the growing diet as an energy source and a different finishing diet containing high omega-3 content fatty acids from either fish oil, algae oils or some vegetable oils are used a few months before harvest, this problem is eliminated.

Ever wonder what happened to the Cod or Halibut liver oil you were forced to take as a kid? At the present time, more than 50 percent of the world fish oil production is fed back to farmed fish. One highly profitable industry sacrificed for another, even more profitable one.

Farm raised salmonids are also fed the carotenoids astaxanthin and canthaxanthin, so that their flesh colour (ARTIFICIALLY DYED),matches wild salmon, which; or so the fish farmers, non-scrupled food industry, and “bought” politicians claim, also contain the same carotenoid pigments from their diet in the wild.

 On a dry-dry basis, it takes 2–4 kg of commercial fish food to produce one kg of fish flesh. Wild salmon require about 10 kg of forage fish to produce a kg of salmon flesh, as part of the normal trophic level energy transfer. The difference between the two numbers is related to farmed salmon feed containing other ingredients far and beyond fish meal and the fact that farmed fish don't spend a lot of metabolic energy catching a dinner that doesn't want to be caught.

The rainbow trout/steelhead is especially susceptible to enteric red mouth disease. There has been considerable research conducted on red mouth disease, as its implications for steelhead farmers are significant. The disease does not affect humans but may well cause the extinction of fish stocks, wild and farmed.

Hatcheries

Modern commercial hatcheries for supplying salmon smolts to aquaculture net pens have been shifting to Recirculating Aquaculture Systems-- where the water is recycled within the hatchery. This allows location of the hatchery to be independent of a significant fresh water supply and allows economical temperature control (Animal Manipulation) to both speed up and slow down the growth rate to match the needs of the net pens.

Conventional hatchery systems operate flow through where spring water or other water source flow into the hatchery. The eggs are then hatched in trays and the salmon smolts produced in raceways. The waste products from the growing salmon fry and the feed are usually discharged into the local river. Conventional flow through hatcheries, such as most of those found in British Columbia; use more than 100 tons of water to produce a kg of smolts.

An alternative method to hatching in freshwater tanks is to use spawning channels. These are artificial streams, usually parallel to an existing stream with concrete or rip-rap sides and gravel bottoms(very environmentally compatible, and, recreational fisherman friendly, wouldn’t you say). Water from the adjacent stream is piped into the top of the channel, sometimes via a header pond to settle out sediment. Spawning success is often much better in channels than in adjacent streams due to the control of floods which in some years can wash out the natural redds (pronounced same as the colour red) . Because of the lack of floods, spawning channels must sometimes be cleaned out to remove accumulated sediment. The same floods which destroy natural redds also clean them out. Spawning channels preserve the natural selection of natural streams as there is no temptation, as in hatcheries, to use prophylactic chemicals to control diseases. However, exposing fish to wild parasites and pathogens using uncontrolled water supplies, combined with “the high cost of spawning channels, makes this technology unsuitable for salmon aquaculture businesses. This type of technology is only useful for stock enhancement programs.”

Sea Cages

Sea cages, also called sea pens or net pens, are usually made of mesh framed with steel or plastic. They can be square or circular, 10 to 32 metres across and 10 metres deep, with volumes between 1,000 and 10,000 cubic metres. A large sea cage can house up to 90,000 fish.

They are usually placed side by side to form a system called a seafarm or seasite, with a floating wharf and walkways along the net boundaries. Aquaculture net pens typically raise around 600,000 Atlantic salmon, derived from European hatchery stock. Please, review previous paragraph beginning with the words: The dense concentration of fish creates several serious threats to wild steelhead and salmon… Additional nets can also surround the sea farm to keep out predatory marine mammals. Stocking densities range from 8 to 18 kilograms per cubic metre, for Atlantic salmon, and 5 to 10 kilograms per cubic metre, for Chinook salmon.

In contrast to closed or recirculating systems, the open net cages of salmonid farming lower production costs, but provide no effective barrier to the discharge of wastes, parasites and disease into the surrounding coastal waters. Farmed salmon in open net cages can and very often do, escape into wild habitats, for example, during storms. These escaped fish-especially Atlantic salmon which, according to Nature, do not belong on the Pacific coast in the first place, can and are driving wild stocks into extinction. An emerging wave in aquaculture is applying the same, amazingly catastrophically destructive, farming methods used for salmonids to other carnivorous finfish species, such as cod, bluefin tuna, halibut and snapper. However, or so our bureaucratic officials??? and corrupt ,”Sell-Out” government politicians would like us to believe “ this is unlikely to have the same environmental drawbacks as salmon farming.

Salmonid Production in Tonnes by Species

1982   2007

Species        Wild    Farmed         Wild    Farmed

Atlantic salmon     10,326          13,265          2,989 1,433,708

Steelhead                171,946                    604,695

Coho salmon          42,281          2,921 17,200          115,376

Chinook salmon     25,147                      8,906 11,542

Pink salmon            170,373                    495,986       

Chum salmon         182,561                    303,205       

Sockeye salmon    128,176                    164,222       

Total Salmonid Production

1982   2007

tonnes          percent        tonnes          percent

Wild        558,864    75       992,508        31

Farmed         188,132        25       2,165,321    69

Overall          746,996                    3,157,831   

© Al (Alex,Alexander) D. Girvan. All rights reserved.