Ecopathology in aquaculture: risk factors in infectious disease outbreak.

This paper describes a study of the risk factors associated with disease outbreaks in fish species of fish farms and rivers of north-east Spain. We focused our work on the isolation of fish pathogens (bacteria, virus), the water quality (physicochemical and microbiological quality) and management characteristics. We have observed 2 important viral diseases, infectious pancreatic necrosis and spring viraemia of carp, and 2 important bacterial ones, furunculosis (Aeromonas salmonicida) and bacterial kidney disease (BKD) (Renibacterium salmoninarum). Our preliminary results show that there are some potential risk factors associated with the main diseases of fish, such as fish age, fish species, production system, season and water temperature, but their role depends on the disease.