The effects of historical high marine mammal populations on fish.

[Rockfish]

http://www.timescolonist.com/opinio...biggest+threat+fish+stocks/6499320/story.html

This is interesting with the seal and sea lion populations through the roof. There are few transient Killer Whales and the First Nations are not interested in them for food and clothing anymore. Too bad, they are the only ones who could reduce the population and restore the balance of nature, saving the fish.

 

[Foxsea]

http://www.timescolonist.com/opinio...biggest+threat+fish+stocks/6499320/story.html
This is interesting with the seal and sea lion populations through the roof. There are few transient Killer Whales and the First Nations are not interested in them for food and clothing anymore. Too bad, they are the only ones who could reduce the population and restore the balance of nature, saving the fish.

We could help. 50 years ago, when I was a kid, fishermen helped control the seal / sea lion populations. We never saw them - not cause they weren't there but when boats showed up, they took off. They are smart animals. Now they associate us with easy pickin's and have no fear. Again last year, we had several salmon taken by seals right at the boat. You guys around Courtenay know the trouble they cause at the Puntledge and same down here at Finlayson Arm / Goldstream. The water is red near Hall's Boathouse as California sea lions tear through the returning salmon, ripping out the bellies and leaving the rest. DFO, once again, has proven incompetent to properly manage the fish stocks.

I've seen transients around Race Rocks but there aren't enough inside to control the seal population. If we could get a few more coming inside, I'd really like to see if we could train them to target the feedlots, as well. Easy pickin's and no recourse at the WTO.

 

[Deewar25]

and this guys comments hits exactly the big problem I have always pointed out over the last few years...

http://www.timescolonist.com/opinio...biggest+threat+fish+stocks/6499320/story.htmlLargest population in historic records and basically no transients to manage them in south island, big surprise our south pod are hurting, these buggers consume 630 million pounds of fish/year, around 30-50 million pounds of salmon from what I see researched. You think that has no impact??

 

[profisher]

Seals, sea lions and whales all eat fish. So do we and there are over 7 billion of us, with no end in sight. Bringing this up in a public forum, like the editorial section of a newspaper is not going to win us any respect. Perception is going to be similar to farmers who want to kill all the wolves, coyotes, eagles etc to protect their animals. It's a loosing tactic that will never help us bring back salmon populations. Unless seals start slipping into peoples homes in the middle of the night and sneak off with their kids, they're protected status will remain. Fighting it is a waste of time and energy.

 

[beemer]

Well Rockfish, Mother Nature "restores the balance of nature" not humans. We have shown through our incredible arrogance toward nature that we are incapable of managing nature. If we can't outsmart a seal or sealion without putting a bullet in their heads that says a great deal about tha present state of humanity.

beemer

 

[Deewar25]

Well Rockfish, Mother Nature "restores the balance of nature" not humans. We have shown through our incredible arrogance toward nature that we are incapable of managing nature. If we can't outsmart a seal or sealion without putting a bullet in their heads that says a great deal about tha present state of humanity.

beemer

yet for 130 years +, humans had been the ones controlling the seal population...until recently - so that comment doesn't really apply here! While maybe it was meant to be a mother nature thing all these years, it hasn't been until now, thus, historic high in population with essentially no predators except a few measly transients up north.

I'm not saying something is going to be done, but I'm just saying, the population and lack of control is going to be a considerable factor. Just coming back from Australia was quite eye opening actually - they screw with nature imbalance all the time. One population gets beyond historic norms, they take care of it, end of story. Not here. Those days are well past.

As profisher says though, definitely not an argument we can win in today's society, so move on and let them help wipe out the stocks.

 

[profisher]

Deewar....130 years is nothing. Seals, salmon, whales have been here for tens of thousands of years. That is one of the human races problems when trying to manage mother nature...we can't think far enough out. Nature often runs on cycles over thousands of years, we have a hard time managing anything for more than a decade. Governments change, policies change, public opinions change...things that don't happen in nature. We would be much better off to just live under her rules. BTW fish farmers could apply the same logic to wild salmon. I'm sure they would love a cull on wild salmon for the same reason land based farmers want to kill any wolves, coyotes, eagles hanging around their lands. They are considered a nuisance...where do you draw the line?

 

[Deewar25]

well, I used that since seal numbers have been tracked for about 130 years and put the population now at the levels then. Realistically though, first nations had been managing their numbers well before that (evidence tracks as far back as 4000 years they had been hunted). That says something...heck, they almost wiped them out to extinction in 1830.

This IS something that has been modified historically long term, and no longer gets modified. So, what is the result? Guess we will find out when there are 300000 seals on the BC coast in 5 years.

 

[reelfast]

profisher is exactly correct. mankind has, and will continue, to change our environment in order to make a buck. in the process of doing that we have screwed up our environment to the point of possible no return. what we see in our oceans is the direct result of tinkering. we are absolutely clueless when it comes to so much while we pretend to understand and 'manage.' you can see this happpenning at the bonneville dam on the columbia r. sea lions eating hatchery salmon, time to sound the alarms. kill those pesky seals so the hatchery salmon can find their way into the thousands of indian gill nets above that dam. makes sense right?

now look at the historic photos of a free running columbia r. the indians out on their platforms over celilo falls with, tada, sea lions competing for those same fish. the big difference is the columbia r. used to support an uncountable number of huge chinook. so mankind now sees this natural act as a detrement to returning hatchery fish.

there is no solution to all of this only skirmishes which we all get worked up about, spend our money supporting and end up right back where we started. unless we can straighten out our environmental damage, you folks up in BC are really raping yours down to mineral soil just as we have in the past, and then stop tinkering with fish 'management' and instead shutter the hatcheries and let the DNA take over, we will simply continue standing around watching things collapse.

i spent decades fishing salmon off the central oregon coast and i saw the decline happenning right before my eyes. what we have today is a shadow of what we had. as our environment continues to be used for money making corporations, all of us should be prepared to see what little we have today disappear, maybe forever.

 

[Foxsea]

Seals, sea lions devestate W.C. salmon runs

... It's a losing tactic that will never help us bring back salmon populations. ... Fighting it is a waste of time and energy.

It's another abundance issue. Many will disagree but with most wild salmon stocks at historic low levels, conservation will be the #1 priority - efforts to that end may have to include seal culls:


Seals, sea lions devastating West Coast salmon runs - Apr 12/10
The most surprising thing about the kill was how easy and fast it was.
The seal dived into the black depths of the canyon pool in the Pitt River, flushed out a spring salmon, trailed it across the shallows and pinned the fish against a rock, killing it with a violent head jerk. The chase had taken less than a minute and had we not been rafting by at that moment, it would have gone unseen - as perhaps tens of millions of such kills do each year.

It's not known how many salmon are killed by seals and sea lions in British Columbia annually, but a few years ago Peter Olesiuk, of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, did a study of harbour seals in the Puntledge River, on Vancouver Island. He concluded that three dozen seals had killed 10,000 adult chum salmon in the fall spawning run. Find the number shocking? Well, consider this: Mr. Olesiuk also calculated how many salmon fry the seals were eating in the spring: 3.1 million. "They take 60 to 70 chum fry, per minute, per seal," he says. "They eat the young fish like popcorn." Mr. Olesiuk points out that the Puntledge is unusual because it runs under a well-lit highway bridge that allows the seals to feed at night. But the efficiency with which seals vacuum up salmon should concern everyone.Mr. Olesiuk's latest coast-wide census, to be released this week, shows B.C.'s seal and sea lion populations are at historic high levels ... the highest number since the early 1900s.

... "It's pointless to kill seals if you don't address the other problems, too. I think salmon farms and hydro projects do more damage." But removing seals from rivers can have immediate and direct impact. In Scotland, a study found that taking a single seal out of the Moriston River increased the sports salmon catch by 17 per cent. On other rivers, removing seals had varying results, with salmon catches increasing from less than 1 per cent to more than 33 per cent.
Mr. Olesiuk says that on big rivers, when salmon are abundant, seals do minimal damage. But in some places - especially where salmon runs are small - they can be devastating.

Mr. Olesiuk urges a cautious approach, saying site-specific scientific study should precede any cull. But with B.C. salmon runs at historic lows and seal populations at historic highs, it is obvious action needs to be taken.
By Mark Hume, Globe and Mail; Apr 12/10

 

[NautiGirl]

Mother nature and long timelines do work things out. Currently we (mammals) target salmon more than seals. In times of scarcity, predators switch to other food sources. If we were eating the seals and sea lions (in reasonable quantity), would we think differently on the issue? It's all about moderation.