Sal and Jane McCloskey – of One Morning in Maine fame – want to save their Penobscot Bay island from commercial salmon farming, a business they assert will irreparably damage the beauty, health and economy of the Little Deer Isle area.
An application to the Maine Department of Marine Resources to locate salmon pens near Scott Island, off Little Deer Isle, is pending. The McCloskeys and other critics would like to see it delayed for years, or denied.
Scott Island figures in the Robert McCloskey children’s books One Morning and Time of Wonder, and the islands (there are two) remain in the family.
Salmon farming, already well established in Cobscook Bay near Eastport, came close to home for the McCloskeys when Jorn Vad last year applied to the Department of Marine Resources to lease two 15-acre underwater parcels, one just off the Scott islands, the other a short distance away, beside Pickering Island.
Jane McCloskey, who handles public relations for the East Penobscot Bay Environmental Alliance, asserted that millions of farmed salmon have died or been killed because of infectious salmon anemia. With millions of federal dollars tagged for salmon farm support and research, taxpayers are subsidizing an industry that is devaluing the local economy and environment, she said.