95TH IPHC Meeting in Victoria

[SVIAC]

The 95th Annual General Meeting of the International Pacific Halibut Commission got underway at the Empress Hotel in Victoria today. It runs from Monday 28th to Friday 1st Feb at which point we'll know what the Canadian total allowable catch will be for the 2019 season.
Two newsworhty items so far:
1. The USA and Canada have still not reached harmony after last year's impasse regarding the 2018 fishing regime.
2. The presentation by I. Stewart (Summary of the Pacific halibut data, and assessment, and mortality projections) indicated that the total Pacific halibut spawning biomass is expected to decline slightly if the total catch is the same as 2018, we would have to drop to 20 million lbs total catch to avoid a drop in spawning biomass.
SVIAC president Chris Bos will attend the meeting and exercise our vote at the Conference Board in the best interest of Canada and the public.

 

[Redfisher]

Keep us posted on what is being said regarding the ongoing trawl by catch issues in the Bering Sea if you would please.

 

[Clint r]

Hmmmm anybody know if Ryan, the new president of the SFAB is at the meeting? I heard he’s at the boat show in Seattle and might not even be attending? Someone in the know able to say yay or nay on this? Hope it’s just a rumour but thought I’d better see if anyone knows for sure.

 

[Cuba Libre]

So what if he isnt there-- the SFAB is well represented by others.

 

[Clint r]

Oh yeah? I disagree. He’s top dog of the sfab. His is one of the voting seats for our halibut allocation isn’t he? Unless there’s something more important going on at the boat show he needs to be there. Every voice counts man and if the head guy can’t be bothered to put in an appearance that pretty much says it all eh?

 

[Derby]

Hmmmm anybody know if Ryan, the new president of the SFAB is at the meeting? I heard he’s at the boat show in Seattle and might not even be attending? Someone in the know able to say yay or nay on this? Hope it’s just a rumour but thought I’d better see if anyone knows for sure.

lol... So who pulling your strings to post this garbage up??? So your second chair Chris is representing SFAC-victoria / SVAIC at the IPHC meeting & Ryan is currently representing Victoria and now has invested a couple hundred hrs into the SRKW process that is currently in plays.. looks to me that the Victoria area has the best representation on the coast...perhaps ask before u post BS up..... This to me is sounding more like some people have a hate on because he either better fisherman or businessman then others...

 

[Derby]

Oh yeah? I disagree. He’s top dog of the sfab. His is one of the voting seats for our halibut allocation isn’t he? Unless there’s something more important going on at the boat show he needs to be there. Every voice counts man and if the head guy can’t be bothered to put in an appearance that pretty much says it all eh?

To answer your question..Gerry is the only voting representation of the SFAB at the IPHC conference and is attending...Ryan is SFAC chair for Victoria...

 

[Clint r]

Ohh touchy eh? Ask a few questions and you give a me a paragraph? All I wanted to know was if he’s there in the capacity I thought he was supposed to be. And to clear up something I didn’t know. That’s why I asked. It’s questions not statements. And rather than yet another hissy fit, a simple yes or no would’ve suffused. Thanks.

 

[Clint r]

To answer your question..Gerry is the only voting representation of the SFAB at the IPHC conference and is attending...Ryan is SFAC chair for Victoria...

Now theres a simple answer to a simple question. Easy eh? Pfft thanks....

 

[Derby]

Ohh touchy eh? Ask a few questions and you give a me a paragraph? All I wanted to know was if he’s there in the capacity he’s supposed to be. A and to clear up do
Ergo g that I didn’t know. That’s why I asked. It’s questions not statements. And a simple yes or no from you would’ve been sufficient. Thanks.

not me my friend... If you wrote it the way u have in this quote its simply put.. and just that just a question... perhaps re read your other stuff and you will see....

 

[Clint r]

My other posts have absolutely nothing to do with the question I asked or with what I heard.
You don’t like that? Oh well......

 

[Derby]

okay... feel free to ask anytime..

 

[Aces]

Yeah I remember why I took a vacation from this forum. FT out!

 

[Whole in the Water]

Chris Bos, president of SVIAC is attending as SVIAC has a permanent seat to represent Canada on the IPHC. I am sure he will do a good job as the other reps from Canada (e.g. SFI-BC and SFAB, etc.) to represent the Canadian rec sector at these meetings. It's the US (i.e. Alaska) you have to look out for and all their overfishing and unsustainable bycatch at everyone's our expense!

 

[Cuba Libre]

To answer your question..Gerry is the only voting representation of the SFAB at the IPHC conference and is attending...Ryan is SFAC chair for Victoria...

And Chuck Ashcroft is there too.
This from 2009, but it is still relevant. https://www.sportfishingbc.com/forum/index.php?threads/a-great-big-thank-you.42189/

 

[Derby]

correct.... Chuck is a very import part of the team..

 

[SerengetiGuide]

Yeah I remember why I took a vacation from this forum. FT out!

That’s all it took. Wish I knew that earlier

 

[profisher]

Chris Bos is at the meetings and has a vote for the Canadian delegation and is there as president of SVIAC. SVIAC has sent a rep to these meetings every year since its inception. Including paying for and sending Martin Paish to the meeting in Alaska during the time he was no longer employed by the Oak Bay Marine Group and before his new job with SFi. Chris as always will devote many hours to our interests and fight hard for the best deal possible. He always does...as will the other Canadian reps attending.

 

[UkeeDreamin]

Numbers being reported to the IPHC that should concern us (excerpted from IPHC Fishery Statistics 2018):

BC’s recreational harvest and “discard mortality”, 2013-2018 (1000’s of lbs):

2013 - 814/45
2014 - 913/33
2015 - 981/61
2016 - 1,021/66
2017 - 1,138/52
2018 - 802/74

From 2013-2017 release mortality assessed against our quota ranged from 3.6%-6.4% but last year it magically increased to 9.23%??,! That’s a 50% jump that’s not supported by any real data or studies! This “fudged” # is reported as 177% of our allocated release mortality and also fudges our total rec mortality closer to the allocated 928k lbs, from just 86% modelled harvest up to a 95% total rec mortality using those ridiculous release mortality #’s!

Basically DFO is saying that the slot and max size is increasing bycatch mortality significantly but I don’t think they have any actual numbers or studies to back that up. I can’t find any stats for any year, let alone 2018, that estimates #’s of recreational release or why it jumped so dramatically last year. I also don’t feel DFO or others have properly weighted the fact the total harvest was down dramatically not just b/c of fish being released but also b/c many of us simply aren’t fishing for halibut as much as in the past due to the idiotic regs. I would be very surprised, given the anecdotal info I’m aware of, if the #’s of halibut being handled but not harvested by our sector hasnt decreased significantly by folks not bothering at all and or significantly reducing the amt of time spent targeting Hali’s. Regardless, I find a 50% increase to be hard to stomach!!

Cheers!

Ukee

 

[GLG]

Numbers being reported to the IPHC that should concern us (excerpted from IPHC Fishery Statistics 2018):

BC’s recreational harvest and “discard mortality”, 2013-2018 (1000’s of lbs):

2013 - 814/45
2014 - 913/33
2015 - 981/61
2016 - 1,021/66
2017 - 1,138/52
2018 - 802/74

From 2013-2017 release mortality assessed against our quota ranged from 3.6%-6.4% but last year it magically increased to 9.23%??,! That’s a 50% jump that’s not supported by any real data or studies! This “fudged” # is reported as 177% of our allocated release mortality and also fudges our total rec mortality closer to the allocated 928k lbs, from just 86% modelled harvest up to a 95% total rec mortality using those ridiculous release mortality #’s!

Basically DFO is saying that the slot and max size is increasing bycatch mortality significantly but I don’t think they have any actual numbers or studies to back that up. I can’t find any stats for any year, let alone 2018, that estimates #’s of recreational release or why it jumped so dramatically last year. I also don’t feel DFO or others have properly weighted the fact the total harvest was down dramatically not just b/c of fish being released but also b/c many of us simply aren’t fishing for halibut as much as in the past due to the idiotic regs. I would be very surprised, given the anecdotal info I’m aware of, if the #’s of halibut being handled but not harvested by our sector hasnt decreased significantly by folks not bothering at all and or significantly reducing the amt of time spent targeting Hali’s. Regardless, I find a 50% increase to be hard to stomach!!

Cheers!

Ukee

Correct me if I'm wrong but release mortality is based on the amount of dead halibut that are released alive and not on the amount of halibut that are retained, because those clearly are dead. So to compare harvest to release mortality would be a mistake.

Going from memory on the details but I'm sure someone could correct me if I'm wrong.
Your partial right about how much our sector is getting charged on our release mortality. As you may know IPHC wanted us to account for our share and gave us some time to do so. DFO was tasked to figure it all out but since they did not know how much we released each season it took time to get a handle on it. Enter iREC and we started getting numbers on the halibut released each year. Those numbers didn't look good and put us in a pickle. We were not sure if they were correct or not so we kicked the can down the road till we got a few years of data. During that time we used 50% of what the data was telling us. Fast forward to last year when we ran out of time and the can could not be kicked down the road anymore. That will be why you saw that jump in the release mortality.

Do you have a link to the report that you are referring to?