Why I'll never eat farmed salmon again: It's the most popular fish in Britain, but the Mail's star food writer TOM PARKER BOWLES reveals why he won't be getting it again... and the truth about the 'organic' label

By TOM PARKER BOWLES, FOOD CRITIC AND AUTHOR Published: 00:59, 13 July 2026 | Updated: 00:59, 13 July 2026 The Atlantic salmon. Once upon a time, the all-conquering king of fish, a lean, muscular machine whose epic life cycle makes Odysseus look like Homer Simpson. Born in rivers across the land, these magnificent beasts migrate thousands of miles, out into the raging ocean, where they hunt squid, crustacea and small fish, before returning to fresh water, fighting their way upriver to the exact place of their birth, spawning and starting it all over again. The eating is equally majestic – a favourite of chefs and diners over the world, with firm, pale pink flesh, and a splendidly rich, elegant flavour. Wild salmon were once so abundant that some apprentices had contracts stipulating that they were not to be fed it more than twice a week. How times have changed. For this is a species in rapid and dangerous decline. Classed as ‘endangered’ in Britain in 2023, numbers have plummeted by around 70 per cent since the 1980s. A combination of increased river pollution (for which our woeful, wasteful and downright incompetent national water companies should bear much of the blame), habitat destruction (dams and weirs blocking their path back home) and climate change have ravaged wild populations. ‘The first problem they face is apathy in terms of how we treat our rivers and oceans,’ says Mark Bilsby, CEO of the Atlantic Salmon Trust charity (AST). ‘Salmon are key indicator species for the health of our rivers and oceans, and they are telling us clearly that all is not well.’ Salmon is often described as a nutritional ‘superfood’, brimming with high-quality protein and packed full of omega-3s, which reduce blood pressure and inflammation and decrease the risk of heart disease, as well as supporting brain function. The NHS recommends at least one portion of oily fish per week. Salmon is still the most popular fish in Britain, making up nearly 30 per cent of all fish sold Until there’s far tighter regulation, stricter standards and absolute transparency – not to mention a revival in wild stocks – Tom Parker Bowles will be giving farmed salmon a miss The NHS recommends at least one portion of oily fish per week. It’s still the most popular fish in Britain, making up nearly 30 per cent of all fish sold. But what was once an expensive luxury is now a cheap staple, thanks to vast open-net fish farms that hug the coasts of Scotland and Norway raising farmed Atlantic salmon. These underwater enclosures are formed with giant nets that can average up to 60 metres across and 50 metres deep with a lattice allowing sea water to flow in and out of them. Aquaculture, as it is known, makes the fish more affordable, while taking pressure off the wild stocks. Everyone’s a winner, right? Wrong. Because salmon farming is a hugely contentious and controversial environmental issue. And having looked closely into the whole murky business, I can no longer touch the stuff with a clear conscience. I’ve stopped eating it altogether. Sure, the packets might boast of being ‘organic’ and ‘responsibly sourced’. The truth, though, is a whole lot less palatable. ‘Salmon is a migratory species, and caging them is cruel,’ says Don Staniford, a marine biologist and virulent critic of farmed salmon. ‘It’s like farming eagles.’ Many coastal fish farms may appear ‘benign from the surface’, according to Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins in their book, Salmon Wars, but ‘beneath the waterline is a different story’. The currents are weak and the pens overcrowded. Those nets can grow clogged with mussels and other marine life, leading to ‘biofouling’ so dense that ‘the nets essentially become walls, impeding the flow of water, leaving pens murky with excrement, food waste and decaying fish’. This has a ruinous effect on the immediate environment. The waste ‘can smother marine habitats and create a toxic legacy for sea life’, says Nick Underdown, Scotland director of conservation charity WildFish. A 2014 study in Scotland found biodiversity was reduced up to 200 metres away from the cages, and the sea floor coated with a thick, stinking layer of sewage. Worse still are the hordes of sea lice – tiny, naturally occurring parasites. They thrive in these conditions and multiply ferociously, feeding on the fish’s mucus, blood and skin. In many cases, farmed fish are literally eaten alive. Wild salmon also attract the lice, albeit in relatively small numbers. Most are naturally detached as the fish power through the water. It’s the smolts (or juvenile wild salmon) that really suffer, as they pass from the wild through the netted area, their fragile skin gets torn apart by the fabric of the enclosures. The results are catastrophic, not just for wild salmon, but sea trout too. Noxious chemicals (including formalin, a liquid solution of formaldehyde – a disinfectant and known human carcinogen) are also routinely poured into the pens to fight the disease caused by so many fish in such a small space. Earlier this year, it emerged that Cooke Aquaculture, an organic salmon company that supplies to both Marks & Spencer and Waitrose, is under investigation for illicitly using formalin at their Garasdale site in Kintrye, Argyll. So much for ‘organic’, the certification which WildFish has challenged. There are plenty of other cases of pollution too, both deliberate and accidental, including dumping toxic pesticides in once pristine lochs. ‘Perversely,’ adds Underdown, ‘the production of farmed salmon in Scotland is contributing to the rapid decline of our iconic wild salmon populations and causes extensive damage to wider marine and freshwater ecosystems.’ This damage to the wild population can occur when the farmed fish escape from salmon farms, and not only spread disease among the wild population, but interbreed too, weakening their genetic resistance. Last year, 75,000 fish escaped from a farm operated by Mowi, the UK’s largest supplier of farm-raised salmon, in Loch Linnhe below Fort William. Mortality rates are also staggeringly high, sometimes up to 40 per cent. In Scotland, the death rate for farmed salmon quadrupled from 2002 to 2019. These figures are entirely unacceptable. Oh, and it takes around 1.5lb of feed to produce 1lb of salmon, which is inherently unsustainable, their feed pellets made from a mixture of plant-based ingredients, vitamins, astaxanthin (which also colours the flesh pink), and small wild fish such as anchovies. As demand for salmon grows, still more feed must be produced, depleting stocks of small fish that are dietary staples in many of the world’s lower-income countries. Suddenly that cheap piece of salmon starts to taste a bit off. While not all salmon farmers are guilty of abuse, the core issues remain the same. As for the flavour, the flesh is softer and fattier, thanks to their limited movement – not so much a burst of pure salmon succour as a dull cypher, a flabby shadow of its former self. Both Wildfish and the Atlantic Salmon Trust agree on one thing: ‘Don’t buy farmed salmon.’ It’s not just the activists who are shunning it. WildFish runs a campaign called Off The Table, which aims to take farmed salmon off menus entirely. Restaurants such as Angela Hartnett’s Murano group, St John, Mount Street, and The Pig hotels have signed up. As Hartnett explains: ‘Wild salmon populations are now endangered in the UK, and the farmed salmon industry is a major threat to their survival. As chefs, we have both the power and the duty to protect marine ecosystems and the future of British seafood.’ Amen to that. What, then, are the alternatives? One solution, into which billions of pounds are currently being poured, is inland fish farms. These land-based farms which raise salmon in enclosed, onshore tanks have been around since 2010, as opposed to the open water ones which emerged in the 1960s. However, it has taken until the past few years for there to be a surge in investment in these kinds of facilities, and fish farmers in Britain are only now getting planning permission for the tanks. Last month, Wiltshire approved their first land-based salmon farm and many more are likely to follow. The Atlantic Salmon Trust are cautious supporters. The ‘full, physical separation of farmed fish from wild fish’ is key for them, ‘regardless of whether production is on land or at sea. By farming salmon in that way, the two greatest threats from that industry to wild salmon and sea trout would be eliminated – the proliferation of sea lice parasites and the risk of escaped farmed fish.’ Classed as ‘endangered’ in Britain in 2023, Atlantic Salmon numbers have plummeted by around 70 per cent since the 1980s Bilsby argues that there are some ‘good examples’ of closed containment farming, and this ‘needs to be supported by governments and industry’. He has a point. Underdown disagrees. ‘While it might reduce the direct impacts on wild salmon’, he believes moving salmon farming onto land fails to ‘address the industry’s broader environmental impact on marine ecosystems’. He also has a point. Max Bergius is the founder of Secret Smokehouse in east London, and supplies the likes of The Ritz, Nathan Outlaw and The Fat Duck group. He’s somewhat of a pioneer, not only because his London cure is of exceptional quality but he was the first commercial smoker to smoke land-based salmon. ‘The fact that there are no escapees to dilute the wild stock is a positive thing,’ he says in his soft Scottish burr. ‘But you’ve then got the animal welfare – a fish swimming around a concrete tub for its entire life. No matter how they dress it, it’s not the best.’ He grew up on the west coast of Scotland, where the vast majority of farms are situated. ‘It was all beautiful lochs and happy days, but I go there now and there’s just these colossal great big factories with all the fish cages. ‘Do I like that? No. Do I approve of it? No. But I have to work out what’s going on. The land-based product yo-yos in quality. Sometimes, it’s amazing, other times you fillet the fish and literally pull the spine out with your finger. It’s that soft. But then you research all this stuff about farmed fish and what it’s doing to the environment, and it’s very difficult,’ he sighs. ‘Everything is still a massive experiment,’ Bergius admits, but with hundreds of millions of pounds being pumped into land-based farming by investors, getting it right means growing very rich indeed. And where there’s big money, there are the inevitable hordes of lobbyists and marketeers, furiously denying there’s anything wrong with salmon farming of any kind at all. As to the future? ‘Everyone’s just got to work together,’ he says, ‘to make sure they’re doing the right thing.’ Thanks to the likes of WildFish and the AST, there’s far greater public awareness of the immense problems involved in this industry. Of course, there are exceptions, with some farms rather more responsible than others. But for me, this is one of the great environmental crises of our time. And until there’s far tighter regulation, stricter standards and absolute transparency – not to mention a revival in wild stocks – I’ll be giving farmed salmon a miss.