SpringVelocity
Crew Member
“Our salmon numbers are decreasing and we need to know why. You hear a lot about overfishing, which I think that might be happening in the coastal fisheries. But in our inland fisheries, we are able to make sure enough salmon have spawned. We do not take more than the population can sustain…. We respect the salmon. We rely on them and we want to make sure their numbers stay strong.
“If we move to more terminal harvest, we can identify surpluses when they arrive at the spawning grounds and safely harvest them. We would be able to have our cake and eat it too. We could rebuild salmon populations and promote economic opportunities.”
“It’s not only us that depend on the salmon. It’s the animals too. All around the Fulton River, you can see some of the most beautiful eagles hanging around and the bears, trying to get ready for winter too. Once the salmon spawn and die, that carcass is full of nutrients from the ocean, creating fertilizer for the forests and shores. It helps the ecosystem in a lot of ways.”
Greg Taylor says that moving to terminal fisheries would not only improve our ability to monitor and protect endangered populations, but would actually increase the size of our commercial harvests.
“Currently we are always on this knife edge, wondering if there is enough fish. We tend to underharvest the most abundant populations of salmon and overharvest those less abundant ones. That is just the nature of mixed stock harvest. Whereas if we move to more terminal harvest, we can identify surpluses when they arrive at the spawning grounds and safely harvest them. We would be able to have our cake and eat it too. We could rebuild salmon populations and promote economic opportunities.”
The vision, according to David Moore, is to restore 50% or more of the fishery to terminal selective harvests where we can have confidence in the sustainability of our fisheries. That way we can manage for escapement and also meet the priority food, social, and ceremonial fisheries before we commit to commercial and sport fishing. Escapement is the number of salmon that return to their natal streams to spawn.
Unfortunately, says Taylor, a key gap in our fisheries management strategy is the development of escapement goals for specific salmon populations.
“Believe it or not, management agencies have been loathe to set up escapement targets for all the stocks in the Fraser or Skeena river. With 44 sockeye populations in the Fraser river, we should have 44 escapement goals like they do in other jurisdictions. Once we have escapement goals, we can identify and measure when a population has met its escapement goal and safely harvest only the surplus. We can’t do it now because we don’t have the most basic of tools, which is an escapement target.”
The solutions, according to people in the industry like Taylor, Moore and Loyie, are to respect Indigenous fishing rights and to support the need for escapement for all salmon stocks by moving to terminal fisheries. If we do that, we give salmon a chance at surviving climate change, while potentially harvesting more salmon than we are today.
As consumers, we can support the development of terminal fisheries by asking retailers and distributors for terminally-harvested fish, like those bearing the River Select brand.
Anna Kemp is Communications Manager for Watershed Watch Salmon Society, a science-based charity advocating for the conservation of BC’s wild salmon.
“If we move to more terminal harvest, we can identify surpluses when they arrive at the spawning grounds and safely harvest them. We would be able to have our cake and eat it too. We could rebuild salmon populations and promote economic opportunities.”
“It’s not only us that depend on the salmon. It’s the animals too. All around the Fulton River, you can see some of the most beautiful eagles hanging around and the bears, trying to get ready for winter too. Once the salmon spawn and die, that carcass is full of nutrients from the ocean, creating fertilizer for the forests and shores. It helps the ecosystem in a lot of ways.”
Greg Taylor says that moving to terminal fisheries would not only improve our ability to monitor and protect endangered populations, but would actually increase the size of our commercial harvests.
“Currently we are always on this knife edge, wondering if there is enough fish. We tend to underharvest the most abundant populations of salmon and overharvest those less abundant ones. That is just the nature of mixed stock harvest. Whereas if we move to more terminal harvest, we can identify surpluses when they arrive at the spawning grounds and safely harvest them. We would be able to have our cake and eat it too. We could rebuild salmon populations and promote economic opportunities.”
The vision, according to David Moore, is to restore 50% or more of the fishery to terminal selective harvests where we can have confidence in the sustainability of our fisheries. That way we can manage for escapement and also meet the priority food, social, and ceremonial fisheries before we commit to commercial and sport fishing. Escapement is the number of salmon that return to their natal streams to spawn.
Unfortunately, says Taylor, a key gap in our fisheries management strategy is the development of escapement goals for specific salmon populations.
“Believe it or not, management agencies have been loathe to set up escapement targets for all the stocks in the Fraser or Skeena river. With 44 sockeye populations in the Fraser river, we should have 44 escapement goals like they do in other jurisdictions. Once we have escapement goals, we can identify and measure when a population has met its escapement goal and safely harvest only the surplus. We can’t do it now because we don’t have the most basic of tools, which is an escapement target.”
The solutions, according to people in the industry like Taylor, Moore and Loyie, are to respect Indigenous fishing rights and to support the need for escapement for all salmon stocks by moving to terminal fisheries. If we do that, we give salmon a chance at surviving climate change, while potentially harvesting more salmon than we are today.
As consumers, we can support the development of terminal fisheries by asking retailers and distributors for terminally-harvested fish, like those bearing the River Select brand.
Anna Kemp is Communications Manager for Watershed Watch Salmon Society, a science-based charity advocating for the conservation of BC’s wild salmon.
Last edited:
