In October 1984 I followed a family of killer whales into the Broughton Archipelago. It was a dark, wet day with mist clinging to the steep-sided inlet walls. The winding channels led me deeper into a wilderness of unimaginable beauty. Underwater, the whale's calls echoed in the cold silence. I knew immediately this would become my home. I was searching for a place to begin a long-term, year-round study on killer whales, and it seemed fitting that the whales should lead me there.

Looking back on the first years of my research, I did not know how lucky I was to spend my days wandering the archipelago in the company of whales. I thought they would always be here, visible from the windows of my homestead. Three years after I began my study, however, the first salmon farm appeared. Today, whales don't come here anymore.

How bad can a salmon farm be? A small set of pens anchored in the vast ocean, producing food for a hungry world, without touching the wild salmon. This was my first reaction; they looked like a great idea. However, the fishers who have taught me the ways of fish noticed otherwise almost immediately.

In 1991, IBEC, a corporate chicken farmer, put tens of thousands of Atlantic salmon into the archipelago that were infected with a bacterial disease, called furunculosis. IBEC's farms were on the migration route of coho salmon. That fall, a small coho enhancement hatchery which had been operating for ten years saw its first case of furunculosis. In the previous decade at the hatchery, broodstock mortality averaged three percent and that year it jumped to 28 percent. The next year it went higher. Eventually, to keep any hatchery fish alive antibiotics had to be administered.

In 1993, a Norwegian company called Scanmar put thousands more Atlantic salmon into the archipelago. They were infected with a strain of furunculosis resistant to all antibiotics used in salmon farms in British Columbia. That fall the returning coho were infected with a strain of furunculosis also resistant to antibiotics. Local Chinook stocks crashed across all age-classes.

I tried unsuccessfully to determine if the strains of furunculosis were the same in the farmed Atlantic salmon and the wild Pacific salmon, but the farmers were unwilling to release that information. An environmental review of the industry currently underway in BC also tried to extract this information without success. Government and industry representatives have asked us to believe the repeated simultaneous epidemics are mere coincidence. Norwegian research, however, has found that fish farms on salmon migration routes are one of the leading causes of disease in enhancement hatcheries.

Prawn fishing neighbors were distraught to find that salmon farms also ruin prime prawn habitat. When placed near fish farms, prawn traps come up empty. Not only are there no prawns, there is no life at all and a stinking ooze adheres to the trap mesh. Research in Denmark discovered the same results, reporting loss of all macro-invertebrates near salmon farms.

When the farmers first began importing Atlantic salmon, they said none would escape. Ten years later there are so many escaped Atlantics they have earned a spot in the BC fishing regulations and a daily quota. Humanity is curiously keen to move species around the planet, even though we often express huge regret later and expend terrific effort to undo what we have done.

On an exquisite, calm day in June 1993, I lowered my underwater listening device from my boat, placed the headset on my ears and turned on the recorder. I have done this thousands of times to listen for whales, but this time I yanked the headset off my ears as fast as possible. The sounds coming from underwater were painfully loud. The nearby salmon farm, owned by Stolt, a tanker corporation, was broadcasting high pitched frequencies in an effort to keep seals from attacking their fish. As I proceeded down the channel I noticed that all the harbour porpoise were gone.

A year later, I was able to prompt the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) to conduct a study at that location on the effect of acoustic harassment devices on harbour porpoise. It revealed that porpoises flee as soon as the devices are turned on. The Canadian Fisheries Act prohibits disbursement of whales, dolphins or porpoises. Despite this, four years later there are more acoustic harassment devices than ever and whales rarely come into these painfully loud waters anymore.

Ironically, the DFO study also showed that seals were actually attracted to the devices, not repelled. It appears seals have learned that where the noises exist fish are easily caught. It's a dinner bell. As a result, fish farmers still shoot hundreds of seals per year, including pregnant and lactating females.

In the case of salmon, international experts agree that introducing another species into the rivers of the five salmon already here is a game of Russian roulette. A high ranking DFO official wrote ten years ago, "Repeat shipments of non-indigenous stocks into BC will with time, guarantee the introduction of exotic diseases." Then he continued granting permits for repeat shipment of Scottish Atlantic salmon into BC. It is difficult to fathom how someone can knowingly risk one of the most beloved and productive fisheries on this planet.

I have placed my research aside and resisted the temptation to head north so that I could study this issue and perhaps help minimize its impact. It would be great if this industry really could help preserve wild stocks, but my conclusion is that no ecosystem has ever withstood the impact of corporate farming. In the marine environment, the impact is compounded because pathogens, escapees, drugs, deadly pesticides, antibiotics and anti-foulants flow into direct contact with wild fish.

When the farms first appeared, well-written guidelines prohibited them from using salmon migration, feeding or holding areas, as well as important areas for other species. This policy was adopted by Norway after their wild stocks were threatened by the introduction of exotic parasites and pathogens. As soon as the guidelines were written, however, they were violated. Because Pacific farmers want to use the richest waters on this coast, the farms are releasing their toxic chemicals and diseases directly into the most vital cradles of life in the Pacific Northwest.

Around the world, wherever salmon farms have appeared, in Chile, Scotland, Ireland, eastern Canada and the US, there has been severe damage done to wild stocks and heated controversy. Salmon farming cannot coexist with wild stocks because it over-taxes the marine environment's ability to flush away deadly byproducts. Places which can support hundreds of wild fish are now burdened with hundreds of thousands of domestic fish.

Many people express confusion at my attitude towards salmon farms, telling me they eat farm salmon specifically to preserve wild stocks. I wish it were that easy, but it is not. I would never feed my children a farm salmon, knowing what goes into themïeven their colour is artificial. But more importantly, salmon farming is having a deadly impact on the already threatened wild salmon.

We have the most efficient salmon production system imaginable on this coast already. The fish head out to sea small, returning full grown with the richness of the oceans stored in their flesh. This wealth sustains predators of enormous varietyïwhales, seals, humans, bears and eagles. It is not caged away for the sole consumption of wealthy people.

Humanity can only survive by relearning of natural laws. Corporate farmers break too many of these laws, reshuffling the natural order with drugs, pesticides, hormones, anti-foulants, bio-engineering, etc. They break the food-chain which sustains this planet, ripping the web of life into fragments for sale. We like to think we exist above natural laws, that we can outsmart them. Imagine instead, if we used our extraordinary resourcefulness to ally ourselves with the tremendous power of the natural world, if not for ourselves, for our children.