Salmon Wars by Catherine Collins

Salmon Wars

The Dark Underbelly of Our Favorite Fish

Catherine Collins, Douglas Frantz

Henry Holt and Co. · Print & ebook · July 11, 2023

A Pulitzer Prize-winning correspondent and a former private investigator dive deep into the murky waters of the international salmon farming industry, exposing the unappetizing truth about a fish that is not as good for you as you have been told.

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Who it’s for
Investigative reporting makes the salmon industry’s health, environmental, and financial stakes hard to separate.
Themes
Industrial salmon farming, Food safety and public health, Environmental harm
Genres
Conservation, Fish, The Food Business

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About this book

A Pulitzer Prize-winning correspondent and a former private investigator dive deep into the murky waters of the international salmon farming industry, exposing the unappetizing truth about a fish that is not as good for you as you have been told. A decade ago, farmed Atlantic salmon replaced tuna as the most popular fish on North America’s dinner tables. We are told salmon is healthy and environmentally friendly. The reality is disturbingly different.

Continue reading

In Salmon Wars, investigative journalists Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins bring readers to massive ocean feedlots where millions of salmon are crammed into parasite-plagued cages and fed a chemical-laced diet. The authors reveal the conditions inside hatcheries, where young salmon are treated like garbage, and at the farms that threaten our fragile coasts. They draw colorful portraits of characters, such as the big salmon farmer who poisoned his own backyard, the fly-fishing activist who risked everything to ban salmon farms in Puget Sound, and the American researcher driven out of Norway for raising the alarm about dangerous contaminants in the fish. Frantz and Collins document how the industrialization of Atlantic salmon threatens this keystone species, endangers our health and environment, and lines the pockets of our generation's version of Big Tobacco. And they show how it doesn't need to be this way. Just as Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation forced a reckoning with the Big Mac, the vivid stories, scientific research, and high-stakes finance at the heart of Salmon Wars will inspire readers to make choices that protect our health and our planet.

Behind the Fish

Investigative reporting makes the salmon industry’s health, environmental, and financial stakes hard to separate.

Come here for

  • A closer look at industrial salmon farming and its effects on people and coasts
  • Colorful portraits alongside scientific research and high-stakes finance

Expect

  • Vivid reporting on a food industry with a troubled public image
  • A pointed account of health and environmental concerns

Where it sits

Fish40%
Conservation36%
The Food Business16%

Percentages are BookFrontier’s reading of the book.

Publisher categories

  • The Food Business
  • Health & Wellness
  • Coasts & Shorelines
Authors
Catherine Collins, Douglas Frantz
Publisher
Henry Holt and Co.
Published
July 11, 2023
Format
Print & ebook
Theme
Industrial salmon farming · Food safety and public health · Environmental harm
Reading lane
The Food Business