BY KAREN BOSSICK
The road to extinction is paved with good intentions.
That’s the premise behind “Artifishal,” a new film released this year by Patagonia.
The Wood River Community YMCA will offer a free screening of “Artifishal” at 6 tonight—Thursday, Oct. 24. The film is being presented by the Roy A. Hunt Foundation.
The film shows how man’s efforts to engineer solutions to the dwindling salmon runs have simply hastened wild salmon’s slide toward extinction. And it shows the threats posed by fish hatcheries and fish farms.
It purports that hatcheries can’t make up for habitat loss, that putting more fish in the river results in fewer fish to catch and it looks at the impact of hatchery fish on starving orcas.
“Artifishal” is a film about wild rivers and wild fish that explores the high cost—ecological, financial and cultural—of man’s mistaken belief that engineered solutions can make up for habitat destruction.
It broaches an issue that strikes close to home, considering that the nearby Salmon River—a designated Wild and Scenic River—is one of the most iconic salmon rivers in North America.
The executive producer is Yvon Chouinard. The film’s director is Josh Murphy.