PORT ANGELES – Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (F&W) has approved an application from Cooke Aquaculture to begin farming sterile (triploid) rainbow trout/steelhead in the Puget Sound area. It’s the first major hurdle in clearing the way for Cooke and the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe to begin farming steelhead and sablefish at the recently closed net pen facility in Port Angeles Harbor.

Last Fall, the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe announced a joint venture with Cooke Aquaculture Pacific to invest in new equipment and technology for the project.

F&W approved a five-year permit Tuesday after conducting a review under the State Environmental Policy Act (SEPA), allowing Cooke to transition its net pens from Atlantic salmon to steelhead and sablefish.

We asked Kurt Grinnell, CEO of Jamestown Seafood, if there were still some hurdles to clear before the joint operation could begin.

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After hundreds of thousands of Atlantic salmon escaped a Cooke net-pen structure in 2017, the state legislature voted to phase out farming of nonnative fish in Washington waters and the company was fined about $332,000. In November, Cooke settled a lawsuit with Wild Fish Conservancy Northwest under the Clean Water Act for $2.75 million.

The Port Angeles facility was closed in 2019 after the company raised their existing fish to harvest.

(Photo: Port Angeles net pen facility.)