Re: DFO Buried Scientists Concerns Regarding Steelhead
Originally Posted by
MichelD
A commercial guy posted this on Facebook:
I just don't understand how commercial fishing can be found to blame for the continued decline of interior steelhead stocks. In a four year period we fish for sockeye; one year for about 8 days and another year for 0 to 3 days. And the fishery in Johnstone Straits is also limited to this little time. We fish 2 days each year for chums in late October (long after the interior steelhead have migrated past).
Please notice that this leaves an enormous window for steelhead migration. Salmon harvesting is the “only substantial threat to Interior Fraser steelhead that can be immediately mitigated” to save a population that has fallen from 8,000 spawners to only 277, writes Zacharias. Does Mark Zachaias really believe that we are that effective in 10 days out of 4 years? Maybe commercial salmon fishing isn't the problem.
The big issue, is the Thompson River and Chilcotin stocks that go up the Fraser River. The provincial fisheries know when these fish have entered the lower Fraser River. During this time, there should be no commercial nets in the Fraser River at all. Unfortunately, the commercial openings are Federal, not Provincial, so they don't care about steelhead. One year, in the early 80s, about half of the Thompson River's forecasted 1200 steelhead were taken by a commercial chum opening, in the lower Fraser River. The Provincial Fish and Wildlife, and sports fishers, were up in arms over it, but the feds could care less, about wiping out half a sports fishery. Now the Thompson and Chilcotin steelhead are on the verge of extinction.
According to this 2017 report, 25 % on the annual Thompson River steelhead are still being caught in commercial chum fishery chum nets.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/briti...head-1.4388170
Last edited by Riverbc; 02-26-2019 at 04:11 PM.
I have learned silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet strange, I am ungrateful to those teachers.