From Henry Law
Whether or not harvesting fish for aquaculture is sustainable, it is without doubt a waste of perfectly edible fish (2 October, p 16).
Your report mentions two species: horse mackerel and blue whiting. The former turn up regularly on the south coast of England during the summer. Given the choice between a piece of farmed salmon or a horse mackerel, I would give the farmed salmon to the cat and eat the horse mackerel. They are a delicious oily fish. Whiting, too, are excellent, as an ingredient for fish cakes or fish fingers.
If we knew how to make proper use of the range of available fish species, it would cease to be economic to catch perfectly edible fish and use it as fish food. Aquaculture has its place, but the appropriate species are sedentary herbivorous fish such as carp, which have been farmed for centuries.
Brighton, Sussex, UK
