Is salmon meat pink? If so, you should be more clear the next time you ask your parents to get you a salmon-colored sweater for your birthday. This is because four-fifths of the salmon meat eaten in the U.S. S. isn’t naturally pink—it’s gray. Plus, color is probably the least interesting thing about salmon. Whatever traits we want to give these fish, we should note that they are sensitive, talkative, quick learners with good memories.
Salmon is one of the most popular fish consumed around the world. Its distinctive orange-pink color makes it easily recognizable on a plate or in the wild. However there has been some controversy lately surrounding the color of farmed salmon. Do salmon farmers actually dye their fish to achieve that vibrant hue? Let’s take a closer look at the facts.
Why Are Salmon Pink in the First Place?
Wild salmon get their color from eating krill, shrimp, and other small crustaceans that are rich in carotenoid pigments like astaxanthin These pigments are absorbed into the fish’s muscle tissue, which results in the pink flesh we are all familiar with.
Salmon are genetically programmed to metabolize carotenoids this way, The gene known as beta-carotene oxygenase 1 is responsible for this conversion and likely explains the variation in flesh color between salmon and other fish species,
Do Salmon Farmers Actually Dye Their Fish?
This is a common myth about farmed salmon that is simply not true. Salmon farmers do not dye their fish – they add astaxanthin supplements to the feed to recreate their natural diet.
On fish farms, thousands of salmon are kept in enclosed pens rather than being able to forage in the ocean. Since they cannot consume krill and shrimp, astaxanthin is added to their food pellets so that they obtain the same nutrients.
Astaxanthin, which is used in fish food, is chemically the same as the color that makes wild salmon pink. It is often sourced from algae or synthetically produced. The same metabolic pathways make the flesh of farmed salmon turn pink when they eat this feed as do the flesh of wild salmon.
Why Do Farmers Add Astaxanthin to Salmon Feed?
Astaxanthin does more than just affect pigmentation – it has several health and growth benefits for salmon:
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Powerful antioxidant: Protects cells from damage and prevents disease. 100x stronger than vitamin E.
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Reproductive health: Boosts egg quality and production, sperm quality, fertilization rates.
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Immunity: Enhances antibody production and immune cell activity.
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Liver health: Improves liver function and defences against oxidative stress.
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Source of vitamin A: Boosts the activity of this essential vitamin in fish.
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Growth promoter: Stimulates faster growth and healthier fish.
So astaxanthin is added to farmed salmon diets for its nutritional value and health benefits first and foremost. Pigmentation is a secondary result. Without it, salmon would be more susceptible to disease and have impaired growth.
What If Salmon Weren’t Fed Astaxanthin?
Without dietary astaxanthin, farmed salmon would lack the pink pigmentation that consumers expect. Their flesh would appear a pale gray or white color instead.
This is because they are not able to forage for carotenoid-rich foods like their wild counterparts. The natural salmon diet provides essential nutrients that support their health and growth.
However, gray-fleshed salmon are still perfectly safe to eat. The lack of color does not indicate poor nutrition or quality. But the public has come to associate salmon’s pink hue with freshness, so farmers add astaxanthin to satisfy this expectation.
The Takeaway
Many people mistakenly believe that farmed salmon are artificially dyed by farmers. However, this is simply a myth.
The truth is salmon farmers add astaxanthin supplements to their feed to replicate their natural diet and provide health benefits. The result is the familiar pink pigmentation that consumers expect to see in salmon fillets.
So the next time you come across this misconception, help set the record straight. Farmed salmon get their color the natural way, just like wild salmon do. There is no dyeing or artificial coloring involved in salmon aquaculture.
Dye to Make Salmon Pink Is Hardly the Worst Part
The water in salmon farms is always dirty because so many fish are crammed into small pens. This is how diseases, infections, and parasites get around. Farmers put antibiotics in the water, and the fish eat them. The fish then pass the antibiotics on to people who eat them. Wild fish also take in chemicals from the water they live in, and the meat and fat of fish can have very high levels of toxins like lead, arsenic, mercury, PCBs, DDT, dioxins, and PCBs. You may be chowing down on fire retardant in your salmon patty. Chemicals left behind in salmon meat can be up to 9 million times stronger than those in the water where the fish live.
You are what who you eat—and what they eat—which, along with pesticides and antibiotics, according to Quartz. com, is a “kibble made from a mishmash that could include oil and fish flesh from smaller fish… corn gluten, ground-up feathers, soybeans, chicken fat, genetically modified yeast, and more.” “That doesn’t sound very good, and astaxanthin is an important part of all salmon feed. Fish farms try to use just the right amount to make dead fish bodies look appetizing. One company that makes fish food even has a kind of color wheel that shows how the chemical’s amount will change the color of salmon.
Salmon farmers treat fish like paint cans that need to be mixed, not like people who can learn and remember things and communicate with squeaks, squeals, and other low-frequency sounds that people can only hear with special tools.
Eating Fish Is Simply Not Safe for You or the Environment
It’s not just pregnant or nursing mothers who need to steer clear of both farmed and wild-caught salmon. Scientists have shown that people who only eat two servings of fish a month have trouble remembering things they learned thirty minutes ago. This is because of the high levels of mercury, lead, and PCBs in their blood. PCBs are synthetic chemicals polluting water that become concentrated in fish flesh. They behave like hormones, messing up the nervous system and linking forgetfulness to a wide range of illnesses, such as cancer, infertility, and other issues.
Fish farming also wreaks havoc on the environment. It was found that salmon farms in British Columbia made as much trash as a city with 500,000 people. To put it in perspective, a 2-acre salmon farm produces as much waste as Sedona, Arizona. The Norwegian government says that its salmon and trout farms alone make about as much sewage as New York City! Fish farms are like a tap that is always running, dumping raw sewage, dead fish, and antibiotics from fish food into the ocean. The gross, constantly moving sludge settles below salmon farms and breaks down the ocean floor, which is bad for marine life.
You can now watch Seaspiracy on Netflix, which was made by the same people who made Cowspiracy. It’s about how eating sea animals is hurting our oceans, water supplies, and, in the end, our planet.
Why The U.S. Government Decides The Color Of Our Food – Cheddar Explains
FAQ
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