Non-native salmon species spreading fast in the North Atlantic

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Salmon Business

Hundreds of Russian pink salmon have been found along the northeast coast of England, over 10,000 miles from their natural habitat, reports the British newspaper the Daily Mail.

Britain’s Environment Agency (EA) fears the Russian salmon pose a threat to native Atlantic salmon found along British coasts, by competing with them for food and habitat.

The EA said about 200 Pacific pink salmon were caught in the Yorkshire and North East coastal net fisheries, and several had been caught by individual anglers in the Rivers Tyne and Coquet. There have also been confirmed catches in rivers in Scotland and Western Ireland recently.

The organisation urges fishermen to catch and kill as many of the Russian salmon as they can.

Norway

The Pacific pink salmon are thought to originate from the White Sea region of northern Russia.

According to the Environmental Agency, the Russians introduced thousands of the fish there to develop a commercial net fishery. These fish have now established populations in rivers in Russia, Finland and Norway.

So far, 1,500 pink salmon have been caught in 215 different Norwegian rivers. During the season, the unwelcome salmon have now appeared in both Norway and Finland.

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