Summary

• Main Authors: Jeff Linesa, Jade Spenceb
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Arctic; Slaughter; Arctic charr; Northern Sweden
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.621.5441; http://www.northcharr.eu/pdf/humane_slaughter_of_charr.pdf

Electric stunning trials were carried out on farmed Arctic charr in northern Sweden in collaboration with the Swedish Life Sciences University. The fish were stunned in water using a range of electric field strengths and exposure durations and checked for both immediate and permanent insensibility. They were then bled and filleted to check for internal haemorrhages. A set of electrical stun parameters were identified that could be used to achieve humane, high quality, high speed harvests at an acceptable price. In collaboration with a potential manufacturer, funding is being sought to build a prototype machine to demonstrate and further test this approach. 1. Background Farmed Arctic charr are currently slaughtered using carbon dioxide narcosis or asphyxiation in ice slurry. Both methods are being phased out because they compromise the welfare of the fish. A replacement method is therefore needed. The aim of this work was to identify an alternative approach to charr slaughter and to measure the parameters required to build prototype equipment.