CAMPAIGNERS objecting to the establishment of an "industrial scale" fish farm on a renowned and historic Highland sea loch fear it will destroy a celebrated landscape and wildlife.
Loch Etive, north of Oban, has the famous Falls of Lora at its mouth and Ben Cruachan to the east.
Fish farm firm Dawnfresh has five trout farms on the loch but wants a sixth which will be the largest. The £2.5 million development would be a 14-pen rainbow trout farm.
Campaigners say it would cover an area the size of three-and-a-half football pitches on the surface but its mooring grid would be equivalent to 14 pitches.
Lawyer Guy Linley-Adams, who is representing a local estate fighting the plan, said: "It will physically bar others using the loch from a huge area of the loch surface including removing safe and easy access in an inlet for the anchoring and mooring boats."
Gideon Pringle, fish farm manager for Dawnfresh, said: "Trout farming has been established on Loch Etive for 30 odd years without causing the damage being predicted."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article