OldBlackDog
Well-Known Member
Bob Hooton
17h ·For the record.....again. Here's a message sent to several people directly involved in the management of Skeena steelhead in late December, 2023. It followed receipt of the following clip from the Babiine River Foundation shortly before (see below)
My message went to the babine River Foundation, Minister Nathan Cullen, the head of his Ministry in Smithers and two of the key players in the Skeena Wild Conservation Trust. There was never a word of response from any of them. That story is all too familiar.
My message:
Greetings BRF,
Thanks for the latest message on behalf of Skeena steelhead or, more accurately, your interest in sustaining the business opportunities they afford. As one intimately familiar with the biology and management of those magnificent fish and the fisheries they have supported, allow me to offer a few comments on this recent release.
For openers, it is a misconception that commercial fishery interception is the factor you target as responsible for diminished steelhead returns. The now much noticed Southeast Alaska fishery, particularly the seines at Noyes Island and the gill nets at Cape Fox, is not news. They were formally flagged in terms of their consequences for Skeena and Nass steelhead in the mid-1990s. Their impact is anything but inconsequential, to be sure, but that impact has not increased such that it can be held responsible for the decline in steelhead abundance clearly evident over the past five years in particular. Besides, it is wishful thinking that the behaviour of the Alaskans is going to change any time soon.
Our own domestic commercial fisheries are a pale shadow of what they were a decade ago, much less before then. In fact there was no domestic commercial fishery in three of the past five years and only a fraction of the level of fishing that occurred in the 1990s in the other two of those five years. I have been a lifelong advocate of reducing commercial fishery interception of Skeena steelhead but I refuse to accept what remains is the only target of those whose income depends on sustained steelhead abundance. In river gill nets are far more consequential today than commercial nets. What does the Foundation have to say about those?
Protecting habitat is a no brainer. That is, by far, the most cost effective investment in the future of all Skeena fish. “Fixing” broken habitat is very rarely cost effective and will never happen on a scale that will make a detectable difference in Skeena steelhead abundance.
Beyond the commercial and First Nations fisheries and the habitat related issues, what remains that we can influence immediately? That would be the recreational fishery for steelhead that, in stark contrast to our commercial fisheries, has enjoyed complete immunity from any significant constraint on its impact over a 13-fold range in Skeena steelhead abundance (i.e. from a modern era record high in 1998 to the all time low in 2021). Does the BRF not understand there might be an impact of an ever more efficient recreational fishery, particularly that prosecuted by guides all the way from tidewater to headwaters? Look at the Babine steelhead fishery of 2023 for example. Has there ever been more jet boats in operation per unit time and area? Has the Babine River (and virtually every other prominent Skeena steelhead tributary) fishery ever been prosecuted during such drought conditions? When the Babine is flowing at 25 cms or less and the fish are seriously confined and vulnerable, surely we can agree the catch and release regulation, now pushing 30 years old, is no longer the only conservation oriented measure required? Surely lodge patrons and their hosts can appreciate C&R has its limits? Babine is the worst example among all Skeena tributaries in that its fish are at the end of their migration route well before the fishing season ends. They are effectively resident trout which the fisheries world long ago understood can only take so much exploitation. Babine is not alone in that context but it is definitely the most glaring example. (Think about the Sustut that has been closed to all angling from its confluence with the Bear River to its headwaters for more than 50 years. Contrast that with the Babine that is being fished throughout the entire length occupied by its steelhead.)
Please understand that steelhead abundance, as measured by the Skeena test fishery, and with much reduced domestic commercial fishery harvest has been at 30-50% of longer term averages for the past five years. Consider also that the test fishery estimate reflects the steelhead stock that reached that point, not the total stock (catch plus escapement) and not the spawning population. When the reductions that occur beyond the test fishery (e.g. in-river gill net harvest, predation, disease, poaching, catch and release impacts) are accounted for, there is a much more serious conservation issue in play than anyone cares to acknowledge. Five successive years of low spawner abundance, even under sustained suitable fresh water rearing conditions and smolt production capability, translates to five successive years of poor smolt crops. Those fish then enter an ocean environment increasingly less productive due to the historic rise of temperature in the sea surface layers occupied continuously by steelhead during their ocean residence. Collectively, those factors forebode steelhead returns incapable of sustaining the pressures we now bring to bear on them.
So, instead of pointing accusing fingers in random directions, I strongly encourage the BRF and its supporters to look in a mirror. The demand for Skeena steelhead now promoted by those focused on catching them has outstripped the supply of fish safely available. The last thing Skeena steelhead need is fund raising campaigns to “…..make a tangible impact towards research, stewardship and advocacy for meaningful policy change”. That is precisely the sort of trap that has been proven in numerous times and places to do nothing more than proliferate uncertainty and management impotence. We have to adjust expectations and behaviour immediately or Skeena will follow the same path as too many other steelhead stocks in British Columbia.
Sincerely,
R.S. Hooton
