Fury as caviar farm approved

SCOTLAND’S first caviar farm has been given the go-ahead despite opposition from campaigners.

Councillors yesterday approved plans for Fynest Caviar to build a closed containment aquaculture facility by Loch Fyne. The firm will now be able to start work on three new buildings containing three water tanks for sturgeon at the site at Ardkinglas Sawmill, Cairndow.

Fynest Caviar aims to have Scottish-produced caviar, which can cost as much as £1,000 per 500g, on the market by Christmas 2020. Animal campaigners earlier launched a petition against the farm, branding it ‘cruel, unnatural and inhumane’, which attracted more than 5,000 signatures.

The objection states: ‘Intensive fish farms cause immense suffering to the fish confined there. In the wild, sturgeon live in open rivers and migrate vast distances upstream to breed.

‘On fish farms, there are confined to tiny, severely crowded tanks (and) at the end of their miserable lives, they are transferred to an ice bath where their gills are cut and they are left to bleed out – a slow, painful death.’

In response, Fynest Caviar stated: ‘Our fish will mature at seven to ten years old. At this time they will measure 27-40 inches in length and weigh 10-12 kilos. When certain fish have been identified for processing they will be moved to a smaller diameter tank containing cold water. This causes the metabolism of the fish to slow greatly. Clove oil will be introduced into the water to anaesthetise the fish.’