COMBINING LAND BASED WHIT SEA BASED
Post smolt is smolt produced bigger than a traditionally sized smolt. When the salmon fry reach the smolt stage they are ready for release into the sea based net pens for on-growing. The traditional size of smolts is around 100-200 grams, but bigger sizes have many advantages.
Larger smolt increases harvested volumes due to shorter time in sea which allows for better license utilization, as new smolt can be introduced more frequently. The lager smolt implies larger production at land which can be added to the production at sea. Producing more on land allows for more efficient production cycle. This can either be used to increase production in sea or keep sea production constant. Typically, the use of bigger post smolt, will reduce the overall production time from fry to fully-grown salmon by 3-4 months, depending of course on the harvesting size.
Larger smolt improves the fish health; the fish is more robust, and reduced time at sea leads to lower disease pressure and sea lice exposure. Improved fish health means that it gets an improved survival rate from less exposure to biological risk, reducing cost of mortality and biological treatments. The post smolt strategies most often result in lower mortalities overall, it also improves the feed conversion rate (eFCR), this because of a bigger end-biomass ready for harvest.
Typically, a Post-Smolt will be at sea for around one year, whereas a traditional Smolt would be at sea for one and a half year, before it is ready for harvest. The shorter period at sea gives the nature more time to recover if the following periods are extended, or potentially reduces fish escapes from fewer accidents when intervening whit, the fish. This better the environmental footprint.