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whitewater_cowboy
Guest
In my opinion our license fees should be fully reflected in the sports fishery's budget...we pay our taxes like everyone else, so license fees shouldn't enter general revenue for the Province. Does anyone know where to find out the number of licenses the province sells each year? I would like to start a petition for better management of the fisheries and this information would be invaluable. We see next to zero enforcement due to limited CO budgets and our hatcheries are seriously strained. The San Juan hatchery hasn't produced coho for years. There has been a moratorium on steelhead while they study the problem and "try" to protect wild stocks. The end result is more pressure on the few remaining fragile populations of wild steelhead and on the Stamp/Somass system's hatchery fish, which also have returned in smaller numbers over most of the last few years. We need to see our license dollars at work. East coast island rivers like the Qualicums, Cambell, Englishman, etc. have been devoid (nearly) of steelhead and surely only contain impure genetics from previous hatchery plants and as such should be stocked heavily to relieve pressure on fragile stocks and remove the focus on the Stamp/Somass system. Stocking efforts should definitely increase to try and ameliorate the competition for a dwindling resource, so succinctly characterised by the 'Circus on the Stamp'. Definitely interested in any feed back, as well as information on creating a data archive that concerned fisherpeople can register on which will be forwarded to our BC Ministry of Environment as well as regional Members of Legislative Assembly. If this is impossible, perhaps people can get the word out at their locale tackle shop, marina, and have petition sheets put out for interested parties to sign. I'll try to get something thrown together that can be downloaded and printed off. Tight lines!
