About half of the 305,000 farmed Atlantic salmon kept in a fish pen near the San Juan Islands escaped after the pen collapsed catastrophically Aug. 19, but as of Aug. 25, one Port Townsend fish seller hadn’t seen any of the fish show up.

“I think it’s bad news,” said Johnpaul Davies, owner of Key City Fish Company in Port Townsend, of the escaped Atlantic salmon.

“The worst-case scenario for farming Atlantic salmon is to let them free into the natural environment, because they potentially will create damaging effects on the wild stocks,” Davies said.

His shop sells seafood at the Port Townsend Boat Haven.

The failed pens are owned by Cooke Aquaculture Pacific and are located off Cypress Island, near the San Juans. The 305,000 fish weigh about 3 million pounds. Of those, 121,766 Atlantic salmon were still in the damaged pen and were removed at farm site no. 2, according to the Department of Natural Resources (DNR).

Cooke and a salvage contractor were to begin work Tuesday to remove the rest of the fish still contained in the pen and to begin dismantling the pen, according to DNR. The U.S. Coast Guard has set up a temporary safety zone in the area of the pens to protect work crews and divers.

Davies said he is not an expert, but thought the Atlantic salmon would affect native smolt.

Davies said as of Aug. 25 that he had not seen any Atlantic salmon show up at his store.

“We do bring in fish this time of year from Port Gamble, and so it’s not out of the question that we might see something, but we haven’t,” Davies said of escaped Atlantic salmon.

Davies said he obtains his fish for sale from the entire coast, most of it from Southeast Alaska.

“We sell generally the five Pacific salmon: King salmon, coho, sockeye salmon are the main three, but we also sell chum salmon and pink salmon occasionally,” Davies said.

“I don’t think there’s real health concerns,” he said of Atlantic salmon. “Of course it’s an approved product through the FDA [Food and Drug Administration] and all that stuff.

“I can certainly say it’s not as healthy as wild fish. This isn’t the first time that this has happened. It happened, maybe it was a decade ago,” Davies said.

“And last time, they got some super seiners to go down there and catch a lot of the fish.”

NOT A FIRST CHOICE

Key City customer Jim Daubenberger was sailing in the San Juans when the incident occurred.

“I wished I’d have stopped and gone fishing when I was up there cruising,” Daubenberger said.

“I would probably eat one, but you know it wouldn’t be my first choice,” he said, adding that he would eat one to “help the environment.”

“When my kids were young, they had net pens out here in [Port Townsend] bay, and the kids went out there one day and were trolling around the net pen trying to catch escaped fish, and the guy said, ‘Hey, come over here,’” and allowed the children to cast right into the pen, Daubenberger said.

“I think they were Atlantic salmon,” he said.

Daubenberger opined that the escaped Atlantic salmon would hurt native salmon.

“One: They can use habitat and food fish that Pacific salmon can consume. Two: They are big enough to eat small Pacific salmon,” he said.

HIGH TIDES, CURRENTS

In a press release, Cooke Aquaculture blamed “exceptionally high tides and currents” for damaging the pens; however, others have noted that the tides were within the normal range.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) has set up a Atlantic Salmon Catch Report web page (tinyurl.com/ybcu32xl) and is asking anglers who catch Atlantic salmon to report their catch.

There is no size or catch limit for Atlantic salmon, according to the WDFW.

There had been plans to expand the net pen operations, but the state has issued a moratorium on new net operations, according to The Seattle Times.

LAWSUIT POSSIBLE

The Wild Fish Conservancy (WFC), a nonprofit conservation organization dedicated to wild fish ecosystems, said in a press release that it intended to file a lawsuit against Cooke Aquaculture under the Clean Water Act. In the statement, WFC said it was “deeply disheartened by Cooke Aquaculture’s glaring negligence … which has led to an environmental disaster of epic proportion.”

“The escapement of Atlantic salmon poses threats of competition to native juvenile and adult salmon and steelhead,” said WFC fisheries scientist Nick Gayeski in the press release.

“The escaped fish still need to feed and thus are likely to compete with native juvenile Pacific salmon and steelhead, including preying on them.

“Like Pacific salmon, Atlantic salmon spawn in the fall. The escaped fish are capable of spawning and will begin entering Puget Sound rivers to attempt to spawn. Whether the escaped fish succeed in producing offspring or not, they will compete on the spawning grounds with native salmon, including endangered Puget Sound chinook, posing a threat to the spawning success of native salmon,” Gayeski said.