Anadromous salmonids and salmon lice in Jökulfirðir

In the summer of 2021, the Natural Science Institute of the Westfjords (NAVE) received a grant from the Fiskræktarsjóði to conduct research looking into sea lice load on wild salmonids in the Jökulfjörðum fjord system. Quantifying sea lice load on wild salmonids in areas where there is no open pen aquaculture provides baseline information regarding “natural” sea lice load. This baseline data can then be compared to data collected in the future and used to draw inferences as to the potential effects that increased open pen aquaculture in the vicinity may have on sea lice load on wild salmonids in the fjord system.

Results indicate that there is a population of Arctic charr (Salvelinus alpinus) in this secluded area. No fish lice (Caligus elongatus) were found on them and the salmon lice (Lepeophtheirus salmonis) load on Arctic charr in the region was relatively low, with counts being lower than in other areas of the Westfjords.

The report, “Monitoring sea lice on wild salmonids in Jökulfjords, Iceland 2021” can be found at https://en.nave.is/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Voktun-sjavarlusa-a-villtum-laxfiskum-i-Jokulfjordum-2021.pdf  

Readers interested in reports from previous years can find them on our website https://en.nave.is/documents. NAVE will continue monitoring sea lice load on wild salmonids in the foreseeable future, having recently received a grant from the Umhverfissjóði Sjókvíaeldis in 2022 to continue the NAVE Sea lice monitoring project. As part of that project, data collected from two locations within Arnarfjarðar during the summer of 2022 is currently being analyzed. Moreover, the project also aims to cover Patreksfjörður, Tálknafjörður, Dýrafjörður and Kaldalón in the Westfjords as well as Seyðisfjörður and Stöðvarfjörður in the Eastern part of Iceland during the summer of 2023.

– Margrét Thorsteinsson