cohochinook
Well-Known Member
I am posting a copy of the letter recently sent to Minister Murray by the Public Fishery Alliance regarding Skeena Steelhead.
Letter to Minister Murray regarding Skeena Steelhead
- Thread starter cohochinook
- Start date
Sharphooks
Well-Known Member
Nice to see some out there clearly recognize that the Skeena Steelhead run could easily go over the same cliff as the Interior Fraser Steelhead, and for all the same reasons.
However, I take issue with the following comment in their correspondence to Minister Murray:
QUOTE
Fishing closure is not a recovery plan: It is a solution for managers to avoid doing the work).
UNQUOTE
It strikes me that there absolutely SHOULD HAVE BEEN a fishing closure in September, 2021 but the managers got brow-beaten by the lodge owners and guides and left it open through mid October
That simple act, leaving the Skeena open to the lodges and their guides, was the true ” avoidance of doing the work”.
A fishing closure, which absolutely was warranted under the circumstances, would have been the correct thing to do and would have been a shot across the bow of all user groups that the Skeena steelhead situation was indeed dire and required immediate draconian action.
I think the Public Fishing Alliance got that part backwards
However, I take issue with the following comment in their correspondence to Minister Murray:
QUOTE
Fishing closure is not a recovery plan: It is a solution for managers to avoid doing the work).
UNQUOTE
It strikes me that there absolutely SHOULD HAVE BEEN a fishing closure in September, 2021 but the managers got brow-beaten by the lodge owners and guides and left it open through mid October
That simple act, leaving the Skeena open to the lodges and their guides, was the true ” avoidance of doing the work”.
A fishing closure, which absolutely was warranted under the circumstances, would have been the correct thing to do and would have been a shot across the bow of all user groups that the Skeena steelhead situation was indeed dire and required immediate draconian action.
I think the Public Fishing Alliance got that part backwards
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SpringVelocity
Crew Member
Good letter. Well written.
Sharphooks
Well-Known Member
If I had a different colored passport and was in a position to write a letter, I’d be banging the drum loud and clear to Minister Murray and her fellow MP’s and MLA’s that they should take great care to give full weight and full credence to the science when it comes to interpreting the dismal results of the Tyee Test Fishery.
You can bet the Terrace and Smithers guide and lodge industry are already scheming how to best throw shade on those Tyee TF results—-the water was too clear or the water was too turbid or a pack of sea lions spooked huge aggregates of migrating steelhead away from the drift nets that otherwise, would have supported numbers showing a robust run last September......
You can already hear the narrative: Our clients caught too many fish to count. One of the best years ever. Clearly, status quo should be the operative phrase going forward...... and God bless our fleet of jet boats and our leveraged lodge debt in the meantime
And meanwhile, it’s a bit disconcerting to me that the steelhead pictures associated with the PFA website show anglers either holding Thompson River steelhead or standing on Thompson River rocks.
If my Mission Statement was based on fighting “Loss of Access”, I’m not sure I’d be bemoaning the “loss of access” to a river that was documented to have less than 100 returning spawners, down from multiple thousands of spawners not too many years ago
You can bet the Terrace and Smithers guide and lodge industry are already scheming how to best throw shade on those Tyee TF results—-the water was too clear or the water was too turbid or a pack of sea lions spooked huge aggregates of migrating steelhead away from the drift nets that otherwise, would have supported numbers showing a robust run last September......
You can already hear the narrative: Our clients caught too many fish to count. One of the best years ever. Clearly, status quo should be the operative phrase going forward...... and God bless our fleet of jet boats and our leveraged lodge debt in the meantime
And meanwhile, it’s a bit disconcerting to me that the steelhead pictures associated with the PFA website show anglers either holding Thompson River steelhead or standing on Thompson River rocks.
If my Mission Statement was based on fighting “Loss of Access”, I’m not sure I’d be bemoaning the “loss of access” to a river that was documented to have less than 100 returning spawners, down from multiple thousands of spawners not too many years ago
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Derby
Crew Member
Maybe I'm wrong ? the PFA letter is not cutting it for you because it may have missed a point or 2 that is important to you? But before you were demanding everyone step up! Right? That was the reason I asked everyone else on here that ( likes your posts) put there letters up.. I'm pretty sure you would find fault in there letters also as they would not be your points or missed a couple. That being said it has been my expience that most letters sent are not or will not be prefect but applaud those that have sent a letter and put the time in to do so.. I hope many of the folks that steelhead are near and dear too them will spend 20 minutes and sent a note ... As for you being disconcerting about there mission statement on there website Perhaps sending a Steelhead letter is a little out there wheel house but appluad them for doing so.
As for the pictures of the Thompson Steelhead on website .. everyone of us that fished that river remembers those fish and it is a reminder to me (#1) how important those fish were to each of them( #2) Just how BADLY WE failed to save those fish ( #3) how badly the government have failed the Fish and the PEOPLE.
As for the pictures of the Thompson Steelhead on website .. everyone of us that fished that river remembers those fish and it is a reminder to me (#1) how important those fish were to each of them( #2) Just how BADLY WE failed to save those fish ( #3) how badly the government have failed the Fish and the PEOPLE.
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wildmanyeah
Crew Member
I think if numbers continue you will get your wish that steelhead fishing is closed
as much as I agree the Provence should of acted faster on in season information and shut down given the returns.
It sure looks like First Nations nets are now causing the largest mortality on returning adults.
we know that trying to reduce Supreme Court rights will in turn result in the finger point back. Insuring recreational restrictions never being lifted.
i don’t think it’s wrong starting that closing fishery’s is not a recovery plan and that other option like selective harvesting is s path forward.
your alienating your cheerleader who want to also see healthy fishery.
searun
Well-Known Member
To be fair, a fishing closure is not a recovery plan.
A recovery plan would entail much more robust actions than simply closing recreational fishing. I believe or at least took the letter writer's point that they are simply stating much more action is required than taking the usual easy way out. After all, fishing closures for recreational fishery is simply amounting to window dressing. Numerically the number of steelhead that may succumb to hook mortality will be exceedingly small by comparison to the in-river net fishery.
A recovery plan would need to help address all fishery removals, and find that balance between allowing mixed stock fisheries to proceed (sockeye) using selective harvest methods as opposed to the "preferred" gill net fishery. A robust recovery plan would also seek to identify and address the larger causal factors contributing to the declines that are within our reasonable power to address. Clearly there are factors such as in-river and early ocean entry predation which could be addressed. Additionally, the Skeena is now starting to suffer the same fate as IFS and Stream-type Chinook that has taken place for over a decade on the South Coast - learn from those, and adapt a plan. We certainly know that the impact of climate change on fresh water survival is a factor. There are potential solutions. Those are the types of measures that form a robust recovery plan.
Taking pot shots at recreational fishers, FN's or guides will amount to nothing more than feeling vindicated for pounding our chests. Real solutions will come from all interested stakeholders learning to work together collaboratively to find real, meaningful and effective solutions.
An ever increasing number of lodges, with an ever increasing number of guides and assistant guides, with an ever increasing number of jet boats, and an ever increasing number of clients, is not a recovery plan either.
Pretty hard for the "Public fishery alliance/skeena guide association" to point fingers given these circumstances.
Pretty hard for the "Public fishery alliance/skeena guide association" to point fingers given these circumstances.
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wildmanyeah
Crew Member
Sure a good plan will involve everyone making concessions.
I don’t think the alternative shut down rec fishing and then everyone try to get First Nations closed will work given that ENGOs don’t seem to want to touch steelhead and the feds reconciliation
cohochinook
Well-Known Member
I agree that anglers have to take ownership of their impact on the fishery, but that has been done by several measures:
-Non-Retention of Steelhead
-Seasonal Closures
-Gear Restrictions such as single barbless hook
-Bait bans
-Restricting Non-Resident Angler
-Restricting Number of Guides through Classified Waters
The single barbless hook is not the demise of Steelhead on the Skeena system! Angling closures have not resulted in recovery of any salmon or steelhead stocks.
-Non-Retention of Steelhead
-Seasonal Closures
-Gear Restrictions such as single barbless hook
-Bait bans
-Restricting Non-Resident Angler
-Restricting Number of Guides through Classified Waters
The single barbless hook is not the demise of Steelhead on the Skeena system! Angling closures have not resulted in recovery of any salmon or steelhead stocks.
Sharphooks
Well-Known Member
It is a fact that Region V1 Provincial fishery managers use an “absolute minimum” of 8,000 returning Skeena steelhead as their management target
It is a fact that a reliable test fishery projected there would only be a return of 5,300 Skeena steelhead in September 2021
It is a fact that FN groups that conducted in-river gill netting in the Fall of 2021 submitted catch figures to Provincial managers for harvested Skeena steelhead that equaled 1,941 fish
If one does the math, that equates to a total run equaling 42% of the “absolute minimum” steelhead required to seed the Skeena and all its tributaries
Meanwhile, a noted and very vocal Skeena fly fishing guide went on record this past November stating that 5% , or 1 out of every 20 fish, suffers mortality in a catch and release fishery....an “inescapable part” of catch and release fishing
If we mash that 5% mortality rate into the above math it appears that the “absolute minimum” number of returning steelhead spawners in the Skeena was actually 40% of the threshold number fishery managers have used in their management strategy
This chart is a visceral reminder of just how poor the Skeena steelhead returns were in the Fall of 2021:
Rec/guide groups such as PFA seem to be motivated by a fear of “losing access”; maintaining access to historical fresh and saltwater fisheries is their prime mover and based on their correspondence to Minister Murray, they intend to use political action to ensure that access is kept.
That’s fine as long as fishery managers have irrefutable science to support the fact that the resource in question can support that desired continuation of access.
Meanwhile, we’re all in agreement— the FN groups with either a box of gill nets or a fancy fish trap are not going away....... but I don’t care if you as a rec fisher or as a guide showed up on the Skeena in September of 2021 with a case of boraxed roe or a box of barbless hooks....the strength of the resource based on the Tyee Test Results absolutely did not support access of any kind for those two sectors.
It is a fact that a reliable test fishery projected there would only be a return of 5,300 Skeena steelhead in September 2021
It is a fact that FN groups that conducted in-river gill netting in the Fall of 2021 submitted catch figures to Provincial managers for harvested Skeena steelhead that equaled 1,941 fish
If one does the math, that equates to a total run equaling 42% of the “absolute minimum” steelhead required to seed the Skeena and all its tributaries
Meanwhile, a noted and very vocal Skeena fly fishing guide went on record this past November stating that 5% , or 1 out of every 20 fish, suffers mortality in a catch and release fishery....an “inescapable part” of catch and release fishing
If we mash that 5% mortality rate into the above math it appears that the “absolute minimum” number of returning steelhead spawners in the Skeena was actually 40% of the threshold number fishery managers have used in their management strategy
This chart is a visceral reminder of just how poor the Skeena steelhead returns were in the Fall of 2021:
Rec/guide groups such as PFA seem to be motivated by a fear of “losing access”; maintaining access to historical fresh and saltwater fisheries is their prime mover and based on their correspondence to Minister Murray, they intend to use political action to ensure that access is kept.
That’s fine as long as fishery managers have irrefutable science to support the fact that the resource in question can support that desired continuation of access.
Meanwhile, we’re all in agreement— the FN groups with either a box of gill nets or a fancy fish trap are not going away....... but I don’t care if you as a rec fisher or as a guide showed up on the Skeena in September of 2021 with a case of boraxed roe or a box of barbless hooks....the strength of the resource based on the Tyee Test Results absolutely did not support access of any kind for those two sectors.
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searun
Well-Known Member
Every human walking the planet is part of the problem
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