Sorry if this has been discussed already, but I thought I'd share an article i just came accross. What caught my attention was the idea that they could grow fish twice as fast, and that these fish eat more aggressively than 'normal' (i.e. easier to catch ). The other thing that caught my eye is that scientists in new zealand think a 550lb salmon is possible! Imagine that, salmon eating sea lions
Well, it all sounds pretty weird, but you gotta admit that if our 'cloned' hatchery brats were running 25lbs on the average, instead of 8, they'd get a lot more respect!!

Article:
http://espn.go.com/outdoors/fishing/news/2002/0320/1354936.html

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — In the latest battle over genetically modified food, federal regulators must decide if fish given super-growth genes — Frankenfish, as critics call it — is safe for the dinner table.

A Food and Drug Administration ruling on the modified Atlantic salmon is expected to influence the fate of dozens of other animals that could be genetically engineered, such as cows, chickens and pigs.

The genetic tinkering is aimed at faster stocking of supermarket meat counters and dairy cases. The engineered salmon, raised by Waltham, Mass.-based Aqua Bounty Farms Inc., grow to market size twice as fast as their unmodified cousins.

Supporters say these salmon would sell for less in supermarkets, while easing pressure on wild or hatchery-raised fish.

But opponents fear the engineered fish will hasten the demise of natural species if allowed to crossbreed. They also argue that human health risks have not been thoroughly studied.

While work on transplanting fish genes has been under way for about 15 years, the FDA application and the efforts of at least two states to make their own decisions about modified fish have brought the debate to a head.

The FDA has given no indication of when it may rule, though AquaBounty said it expects a decision by 2004. The company has been seeking approval since 1996.

In the meantime, one state has already permitted farming of genetically modified fish in ponds or lakes that don't connect to other waterways. Maryland passed the law last year, although gene-altered fish in the United States are currently raised only in tanks.

California, meanwhile, is considering outlawing modified fish. A bill pending in the state Senate would ban the import, possession or release of the fish anywhere in the state. Another pending bill would simply require supermarkets to label genetically modified fish.

Researchers are tinkering with other breeds. English scientists are working on tilapia, while Canadian researchers are concentrating on Chinook salmon. Transgenic tilapia are being considered for approval by Cuba, and genetically altered carp by China.

New Zealand researchers already developed salmon they said might reach 550 pounds, but halted the project because of public objections.

Some researchers say fast-growing fish could become a new staple in the developing world — providing an ample and inexpensive food supply.

But opponents say the escape of genetically engineered fish could drive wild populations to extinction, citing a Purdue University study showing that the "superfish" could have a competitive advantage over native fish for food, mates and habitat.

The Purdue study tracked tiny Japanese fish called medaka that were altered with a growth gene from Atlantic salmon. Environmental research so far shows the opposite may be true for salmon themselves, or for catfish, researchers said.

Gene-altered Atlantic salmon swim slower, reproduce poorly, use more oxygen and take more risks for food than their wild cousins, said Aqua Bounty vice president Joseph McGonigle and Auburn University fisheries researcher Rex Dunham.

Genetically engineered catfish have about a 10 percent lower survival rate if they're forced to compete with native fish, said Dunham.

"They're simply not adapted to life in the wild," McGonigle said.

But environmentalists argue the impact of genetically modified species can be hard to predict and difficult to control — in Mexico, for example, just a few years of unlabeled U.S. imports o fmodified corn wiped out natural varieties of the 4,000-year-oldcrop.

Already, more than half the salmon sold in the United States is farm-raised. Fish farming is a $40-million-a-year business in Washington state, where farmers raise about 10 million pounds annually. That's dwarfed by British Columbia, where farmers annually produce 80 million pounds of Atlantic salmon.

Naturally grown Atlantic salmon have escaped there from the ocean pens where they are raised. The fish are an ocean away from their normal breeding grounds, and biologists say interbreeding with Pacific salmon is unlikely.

However, Canadian biologists have found young Atlantic salmon in two streams on Vancouver Island, indicating that the farm-raised fish have been able to reproduce.

McGonigle said Aqua Bounty raises the modified fish in tanks and could not escape into local waterways. Regardless, researchers are attempting to head off the environmental debate by promising to use only sterilized fish that couldn't reproduce if they escape.

I'd like to see a 550lb. chinook run the riffles above tidwater in NW oregon, I don't think the wild fish would have to worry about inter-breeding w/that one. It would be beached down in tidewater Imagine the "bobber down!" tjat that one would create?!? Anybody got any 200# test power pro, and some beer kegs for bobbers?, I'm going geneticly engineered chinook fishing

I don't think chinook that big would compete w/native fish spawning, but they may wipe out the ocean's baitfish populations in a hurry.

Can you imagine the maggot heap a 550lb. chinook would make when it washed up on the beach of a spawning trib. in October?

Interesting stuff............

Aaron

:p :p They developed a fish back in the mid-west a number of years ago to help clean up the Great Lakes. It was a hybred cross made up of three fish species; a coho, a walleye and a muskie. They called it a Kowalski. It was so stupid that they had to teach it to swin but it could sure eat sh!t.

If it sounds too good to be true..............
We had a thread about farm raised salmon recently and everyone but myself was pro-farm-raised fish. I think we have to look 100 years ahead and make sure we don't royally screw it all up again. Remember, when the feds started throwing dams in every river early last century, they didn't believe it would harm fish populations because 1) the fish would just spawn below the dams, and 2) we can make them in hatcheries. Let's not ignore the lessons of the past.