Who knew?
Everyone who has looked at the history of Atlantic salmon attempted introductions here in BC knew. That's who.
Why do you ask?
And do you think that having eggs, fry, juvenile fish and the like introduced during the early part of the 20th. century, mostly on Vancouver Island when native stocks of everything were still abundant is the same as having thousands of six to ten pound Atlantic escapees today, when native stocks of everything are mostly in a severely compromised situation is the same?
And the author attempted to link the Hells Gate disaster with the early introduction attempts when there was no connection at all that I'm aware of. Seems somewhat revisionist to me.
Atlantics are notoriously poor colonizers which is one of the reasons they are farmed and have not created any self-sustaining runs as yet but they have successfully spawned in rivers here on Vancouver Island and their progeny have been captured. Everyone who pays attention knows that.
Given there is virtually no attempt by the Feds to look for Atlantics in rivers here on the island it's difficult to know where we're at nowadays relevant to any reproductive successes, which might be a concern, n'est ce pas?
Colonization by escapee Atlantics is almost the least of the concerns relevant to open net-pen farming though, so I'm not going to freak too freely about escapees.
If I ever catch one in the Tyee Pool that might change though. LOL
Take care.