trophywife
Crew Member
bigger thinking, is a full hatchery at indian river with a salmon ranching model? !! . not enough water? it does support its own small runs already.
Indian Arm Chinook net pen project - historical info
- Thread starter TheBigGuy
- Start date
TheBigGuy
Well-Known Member
They had hatchery on the river briefly for 2 years in 78-80 I believe. It was shut down for lack of funding, but I also think there was an issue with the water supply. The water had a poor chemical composition for raising fish. Maybe hatchery technology has advanced and that wouldn't be such a problem today. I have no real idea, as I'm not a fisheries biologist. I'm just going by the old DFO document that was posted earlier in this thread. Maybe someone else with more knowledge on that topic could comment.
TheBigGuy
Well-Known Member
Same problem as the Cap. I belive they have made the mouth of the Seymour a no fishing zone. Maybe I'm wrong.
trophywife
Crew Member
these sub-areas/ zones could easily have seasonal regs, gear restrictions, fishing type restrictions.. i assume these are for rockfish conservation..
Derby tied the pipelines into the post at reply#16 to get the ball rolling.
i dont follow and how is it the same as the cap?
your looking for a better fishing spot locally other than in front of the cap. so why not utilize a hatchery close by. would save tons of money and DFO might even authorize it. eggs are already taken from the seymour river hatchery on the indian river already, you just need to crank up production and have them release them in the indian for imprinting them (2 year program on norton Lake) having the seymour closed is a blessing, this way fishermen cant take advantage of stacking fish in front due to low water which is the current problem at the cap. fishing opportunities would be cates park or raccoon island or twin islands or....
giving seymour a $100,000 a year would almost double there federal budget and they and the volunteers would due all the daily tasks win win win
you could also split inventory and apply to noons creek hatchery
nothing at all like the capilano in my opinion
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TheBigGuy
Well-Known Member
What I meant was if the smolts were coming from the Seymour hatch/River and returning to the Seymour River then there would still be no terminal fishery permitted. Whether the brood stock comes from the Seymour or Cap really doesn't make a big difference. It's spreading the terminal fisheries from the hatcheries to areas that are open to fishing that is the idea behind this thread.
TheBigGuy
Well-Known Member
Personally I think it is a great idea and I would be up for lending a hand trying to help. However, I'm planning on retiring and moving to the Island next year, so I can't commit to a long term project like this. If I was still going to be around to help out then I certainly would.
Nice. What part of the Island are you moving to?
I think it maybe hard to get the powers to be change to the RCA's from 'NO FISHING" to fishing with certain methods or time of year .Once something gets closed its not "often" it get reopened .
tincan
Well-Known Member
as @TheBigGuy mentioned there is water quality issues with the Indian River that don't make it a great candidate for net pens. See below for summary:
--
Review of Salmonid Resource Studies in Indian River and Indian Arm, and Enhancement Proposals for the Area (Federonko and Shepherd, 1984)
Impacts:
· High recreational boating area
· Intensive interceptive commercial fisheries
· BC Hydro right of way - 1969
· Extensive logging – 1920s, 1960
· Mineral claims - ~13km2 in the area claimed, some since the early 1900s – copper, zinc, silver, gold, lead
Major DFO Activities: Between 1979 – 1982, DFO conducted 3 major programs in the area:
· Operation of a Chinook pilot hatchery on Indian River from 1979-1980.
o Closed in 1980 due to lack of funds
o Transported ~250,000 chinook eggs from Capilano hatchery
o IR water quality not highly suitable for rearing due to very low hardness (2-5 mg/l CaCO3) and supersaturation (up to 106% N2) of the groundwater supply source.
· Coho sea-pen rearing in Indian Arm from 1979-1981
o Mostly conducted to enhance sport fishing with delayed release of smolts
o In 1979 and 1980, ~120,000 and 100,000 coho fry respectively were transported from Cap hatchery to Indian Arm sea pen
· Groundwater exploration in the Indian River watershed from 1972-1982
o Groundwater of IR considered to be unsuitable or only marginally suitable for fish culture purposes. This water has extremely low buffering capacity (4-15 mg/l as CaC03), extreme softness (2-15 mg/l as CaC03), low pH (5.3-6.9), dissolved gas problems and in some cases, higher than recommended concentrations of copper, iron and zinc.
Indian River supports runs of chum, pink, coho and steelhead. The recent establishment of a small Chinook run in the Indian may be the result of Chinook transplants, but more likely is due to Chinook straying from the Capilano hatchery. Populations of cutthroat and Dolly Varden are also present in the system.
Until the 1950’s, over 100,000 salmon spawned annually in the Indian during the dominant odd-year pink runs. During that period, the annual escapements averaged 85,000 odd-year pinks, 17,600 chum, 1500 coho and 100 steelhead (both winter and summer runs). Escapements began to decline in 1960s.
Timing of migrations and spawning:
· Pink: spawn mid September to October with a peak in late Sept.
· Chum: early October to December with a peak in late October to November
· Coho: similar to chum but will spawn into January.
TheBigGuy
Well-Known Member
Yes it was posted on the first page of the thread, but thank you for posting it Tincan. It is a very interesting read, and it wouldn't hurt to have it posted again I think some of the water quality issues (as regards to well water) could be improved by conditioning the water as some hatcheries do. That would of course be more expensive, but conditioning could probably address some of the water quality issues.
I don't think most guys are expecting DFO to construct a new hatchery on the Indian River anyways. The main topic of conversation on the thread was spreading current hatcheries production to new terminal fisheries by utilizing net pens as was done in the past. I didn't fish the Buntzen powerhouse very regularly as I live in Vancouver and that was a bit of a run. The times I did go up there I think I got a spring or more on every trip, except one. The fishing was quite good when the net pen project was in operation, There were not many boats fishing the powerhouse considering how good the fishing was. The beauty of the location and the lack of wind make it a great destination as a terminal fishery. Very close and accessible from Port Moody or Cates Park launches.
I don't think most guys are expecting DFO to construct a new hatchery on the Indian River anyways. The main topic of conversation on the thread was spreading current hatcheries production to new terminal fisheries by utilizing net pens as was done in the past. I didn't fish the Buntzen powerhouse very regularly as I live in Vancouver and that was a bit of a run. The times I did go up there I think I got a spring or more on every trip, except one. The fishing was quite good when the net pen project was in operation, There were not many boats fishing the powerhouse considering how good the fishing was. The beauty of the location and the lack of wind make it a great destination as a terminal fishery. Very close and accessible from Port Moody or Cates Park launches.
the fog ducker
Well-Known Member
Deryk
for whatever its worth , between myself an 3 others with boats in the area ,
im sure we could all contribute a hand in all this , know the area well ,
possible waterfront property in the making for us near there !!
helped out a little here at Poett with the pen projects in the winter , was kinda cool
let us know if we can do anything
felix
for whatever its worth , between myself an 3 others with boats in the area ,
im sure we could all contribute a hand in all this , know the area well ,
possible waterfront property in the making for us near there !!
helped out a little here at Poett with the pen projects in the winter , was kinda cool
let us know if we can do anything
felix
TheBigGuy
Well-Known Member
I know you rarely get any appreciation for all your tireless work on anglers behalf. So, a big thank you is overdue for all your hard work.will do...... have some hurls to go thru but it does look promising....
Much appreciated, thank you.
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