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Communities Rally to Defend their Water

Tension grows over mink farming in Yarmouth County

by Steven Wendland

A YMCA summer camp had to relocate from Lake Fanning after 81 years due to health concerns.  Photo: Carlene MacDonald
A YMCA summer camp had to relocate from Lake Fanning after 81 years due to health concerns. Photo: Carlene MacDonald

HALIFAX--A proposal for a lakeside mink ranch near Carleton, Nova Scotia - roughly 20 kilometres north of Yarmouth - has resulted in some community members calling on the provincial government for a moratorium on lakeside farming.  Residents are worried their lake will be condemned to the same fate as many other water-bodies in the Carleton River watershed, which have been overrun by blue-green algal blooms.

“The pollution is so bad," says Carlene MacDonald, a Carleton resident.  " I’m sure if more people could be made aware of the situation they would scream 'Pollution!’ along with us.”

Tensions have been running high in Yarmouth County as residents debate the source of the blue-green algae, known as cyanobacteria, that have overtaken a number of lakes in their region. Many citizens believe their waters are being contaminated by manure, urine, offal, caustic cleaning liquids and fly control chemicals from riverside mink ranches in neighbouring Digby County. One and a half million minks are raised in Nova Scotia each year at almost 80 mink farms, according to the CBC.  The majority of those mink farms are located in Digby and Yarmouth Counties. 

Other potential contributing factors to the algae are faulty lakeside septic systems and run-off containing agro-industrial fertilizer.

Last October, Yarmouth County Municipal Council voted to amend a municipal land-use bylaw, increasing, from 328 to 500 feet, the required minimum set-back distance from lakes and rivers for buildings and manure storage facilities used in conjunction with fur ranches, and hog and fowl farms.

On March 30, 2010, the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board will hear an appeal filed by the Nova Scotia Mink Breeders Association and a Yarmouth-area livestock farmer in response to the municipality’s decision to amend its set-back bylaw. The Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture, which had initially been named among the appellants but recently withdrew its name from the appeal, has allied with the NS Mink Breeders Association to jointly present at the hearing.

The blue-green alga that is thriving in many Yarmouth County lakes is a toxin-generating microscopic plant that thrives in water containing high levels of phosphorus and nitrogen.  The algae's prevalence has raised concerns over health and safety, property values, local ecologies, and the proper regulation of industry.

In July, 2009, Camp Wapomeo, a YMCA summer camp for local youth that had held its water recreations on the same lake in Yarmouth Country for eighty-one consecutive years, had to relocate their activities due to the algae and consequent safety concerns. Camp director Kathleen Whyte stated publicly that the algae’s growth is becoming more apparent each year and is inclined to attribute declining camp registration on parental concerns over health risks.

Carlene MacDonald, says the government's response has been unacceptable. 

"The mink breeders choose to use 100 kilometres of river systems as their toilet and the government allows it by not responding,” says MacDonald.

“They have overlooked the pollution for so long," she says. "[I] just found out that the first complaint of mink farmers polluting the Tusket River system [of which the Carleton River is the west branch] was lodged with the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture and the provincial government by an area resident in 1986.” Apparently, neither body responded to the situation. 

Randy Cleveland is a member of the Tusket River Environmental Protection Agency (TREPA), a group comprised of residents and concerned citizens from Carleton.  TREPA has been conducting its own research and investigation into the community’s water issues.

Cleveland points to the fact that mink and fur farms are only subject to recommended guidelines for reducing environmental risk in their operations.  He says Carleton needs "bylaws so the municipality would have recourse when it comes to establishing and enforcing regulations for mink and fur farms.” Presently, mink farmers in Nova Scotia are largely self-regulating entities.

In its mission statement and progress report entitled Environmental Performance of the Agricultural Sector in Nova Scotia 2009: A Report Card, the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture acknowledges that “manure management in areas of livestock concentration has to be improved,” and that “the mink sector, in particular, is primarily located in an area with a small cropland base, reducing alternatives to effectively manage mink manure and other wastes close to mink farms…”

The Report also states, however, that self-regulation is working.  "Nova Scotia’s environmental acts and regulations support [positive on-farm environmental practices] by encouraging compliance and by establishing a culture of self-regulation, minimizing the need for a harsh regulatory approach…”

Cleveland disagrees.  “The waste problem has been acknowledged and the ecological consequences are now apparent, but the culture of self-regulation is not effectively operating," he says. "The provincial acts and regulations are either too broad to be useful or not being properly enforced.”

Cleveland emphasizes that TREPA does not oppose fur farms in general, but wants to see them regulated and operated in an environmentally sound manner.  

Steven is a writer and filmmaker from Harmony, NS.
 


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Comments

Much more than contaminated waterways

I hardly call a nearly 500ft  structure, housing 10,000 animals in extremely confined spaces and the only use for their growth is to kill them in a horrible way, hope they're dead when you skin them  so you can sell the pelts for  unnecessary  fur clothing, any type of farming. These structures are fur factories plain and simple.

 

While your recent article focuses on the resulting algae problem connected to mink farms, I can assure you this is just the more tactile and evident problem you will encounter. The stench will stop any family barbeque, meditative gardening, wood piling, star gazing, or outside activity you may have planned. It will force you to close your windows and doors to summer breezes. It will invite predatory animals closer to your homes and beloved pets. It will force you to find alternative accommodations for your summer visitors. It will perpetuate flies that no strip or can of spray will deter. It will invite seagulls that only air guns or real guns will displace. It will sting your eyes and take your breath away. It will be a constant reminder of the loss of freedom to enjoy your property. And if you care to go this far, it will be a constant reminder of how cruel and senseless fur farming really is.

So, is this “reasonable use of land”. Of course we all know economic development is essential, but at what costs? If our municipality’s guidelines are now the most stringent in South West Nova then we are on the right track. Let’s continue in that direction and acknowledge that these guidelines were created when fur farming was a back yard event with maybe forty animals and not these mega structures that hold up to 10,000 animals. We must change the existing distance requirements and we must insist on underground storage tanks and dumping locations. If we cannot stop fur farming because it is still a wanted commodity let’s at least become worldly in the way this “farming” is practiced. Waste management, now voluntary, must be made mandatory. The "oh hum" attitude of Departments of Agriculture and Enviornment has to change. We need new laws and legislation that bring the responsibilties of the mink industry into this century.

Factory (Mink) Farming

The Minister of Agriculture has recently introduced a new bill on Factory Farming in support of Mink Farmers who threaten to wipe out our $150 million tourist industry in SWNS by destroying our environment (waterways and eventually drinking water). The bill passed with little intelligent debate. The Dept. of Environment will relegate its' responsibilities to the Dept. of Agriculture, where ecology and environmental issues are concerned. It is kind of like asking your Dentist to read your chest xray! Where do we find these idiots?

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