Pet food contaminant found in feed at Oregon fish hatchery

SALEM, Ore. — Young salmon at an Oregon fish hatchery were given feed made by a Canadian company that was contaminated with the chemical linked to the pet food recall, but there were no indications it harmed any of them, state officials said Tuesday.

The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife stopped using the feed at its Marion Forks Hatchery in Idanha last week after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration confirmed it was contaminated with melamine, said department spokesman Rick Hargrave.

No ill effects were seen in any of the 870,000 spring chinook produced for the Willamette River system that were given the contaminated feed, said Steve Williams, assistant administrator of the department's fish division.

"FDA hasn't found any cause for concern for fish or human health, but it's something we've got to be cautious and prudent about," Williams said.

The same Bio Vita Starter, 1 crumble grade, lot 32734, feed produced by Skretting Co. of Vancouver, B.C., part of a lot purchased last December, was shipped to six other Oregon hatcheries, which have also stopped using it, Hargrave said.

They are the Willamette, Gnat Creek, Big Creek, Cole Rivers, Butte Falls and Leaburg hatcheries. Only one of them has released any fish recently. That is the Big Creek hatchery near Astoria. The feed at those hatcheries has not been tested yet to see if it was contaminated, Hargrave said.

Skretting said in a statement that it has recalled a batch of its fish feed shipped to the United States after FDA testing found a very low level of melamine, and had received no complaints of ill effects for fish.

Since March 16, more than 100 brands of pet food have been recalled because they were contaminated with melamine, a chemical found in plastics and pesticides that is not approved for use in pet or human food in the U.S. The contaminated pet food sickened or killed an unknown number of dogs and cats.

Hargrave said the fish that ate contaminated feed are not expected to carry it in their bodies as they grow.

Federal officials have said melamine has also been found in feed for farmed fish, pigs and chickens, but at levels too low to pose a threat to humans eating those foods.