YOU SAY TOMATO...

Your fishing columnist Michael Wigan’s comment piece in last month’s issue [La La Land, May 2017] that the Monterey Bay Seafood Watch warns against eating from only one out of 53 world salmon sources – Scottish farm salmon – prompted me to look up the MBSW website.

In fact, his statement should be classed as ‘fake news’, and should be corrected (not that I am any supporter of the SNP or SEPA’s approach to managing wild salmon).

A closer reading of the website shows that his 53 ‘sources’ fall into five categories, only three of which (marine pens, freshwater pens and closed tanks) are farmed. These three contain 12 of his ‘sources’. The other 41 ‘sources’ are all catches of wild salmon in various specific bays and rivers, listed under two categories (basically driftnets and purse seines).

Of the marine farmed categories, almost all salmon are classed as ‘avoid’, whether Scottish, Chilean, Canadian or Norwegian. The Scottish ones are by no means the worst of these. Adair Anderson, Selkirk

Michael Wigan replies: ‘My piece in last month’s Scottish Field is, and remains, correct. On the Monterey Bay website there is a chapter written in 2014 on Scottish salmon farming, but that is not the one I quoted. If you search for ‘salmon’ on the Monterey Bay Seafood Watch website – www.seafoodwatch.org/seafood-recommendations/groups/salmon – Scottish salmon is clearly classified as a worst option with an ‘Avoid’ listing.’