The Pacific Balanced Pinniped Society has had over 600K views on it's Facebook page in the past 2 months. They are fast becoming the most powerful lobby group for the Sportsfishing and Commercial fishing sectors that this Province has ever seen. They will make a game changing difference to the way that our fisheries are being managed in the years ahead. Check them out.
The PBPS Group is on track to forever change our fishery for the better.
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The PBPS has really done their homework on this issue and they have mountains of facts and figures and prominent leaders in our industry to back up what they are talking about. They are not advocating an all out Seal Cull. I think that after you have had a chance to read about this group's mission you will support them. If you would like to talk to the main man who is spearheading this movement his name is Ken Pearce and his email address is kpearce1@telus.net. This movement is the most positive thing to ever happen to the future of our fishery in the past 50 or more years if not ever.
Agreed, the only way to win this war is with sound science and a fact based argument.
Derby
Crew Member
I can just see the front pages of the News papers now.... BC culls seals & Sea lions transient whales are starving to death.
.... Problematic animals both seals & seal lions most certainly.... An all out cull nope .. Trites info is certainly the best science we have available to us right now....
.... Problematic animals both seals & seal lions most certainly.... An all out cull nope .. Trites info is certainly the best science we have available to us right now....If we continue down the path that we are now headed and nothing is done to try and bring our Seal and Sea Lion population into some kind of a manageable balance, we won't have to worry about what the headlines in the newspapers say. If a well managed seal cull is not at least a big part of the answer to this massive problem than what is the answer? There are a lot of very smart, well informed, motivated people now working on trying to solve this problem. Stay tuned.
wildmanyeah
Crew Member
IronNoggin
Well-Known Member
Yes, it will.
At this point a number of seals and sea lions have been collected for contaminant sampling / loading analysis.
The last of that will be taking place very soon.
Progress has been made with the Department, and the IFMP is expected soon.
Backing from senior science (not just the department), the FN's, commercial sector and to an extent the recreational sector (appears to be some foot-dragging there) is in place.
Expect more news on this project shortly.
Cheers,
Nog
Derby
Crew Member
we'll i know of 5 problem seals up the Cowichan river that would be consider problematic .. . and some of the other area estuary seals ... the data shows the off shore seals not so much... more of our friends...sea lions a different beast.... they are looking at it..... As you can see down in the states they are addressing the problematic seal lions... haven't seen everything on this but they are slowly removing some animals and seeing what the results are..... I would believe that not t o far in the future we will being doing some selected harvesting to... the work Cull just isn't the word to use in this day and time.. selected harvesting or wildlife manage program perhaps...
The thing that I find so really puzzling and disappointing about this whole messy issue, is that there are a lot of well informed people and stakeholders who should be supporting the efforts of the folks at PBPS that are sitting on the sidelines? The SFI is one group that comes to mind? Why have they not stepped up to the plate and thrown their support behind the PBPS?
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I asked Ken Pearce who is one of the co founders of PBPS what studies they thought were the best on this subject and here is what he said. " The studies that we have at hand are the best in the Pacific Northwest. Chasco et all is # 1, Several of Carl Walters recent studies, The Salish Sea Marine Survival Project done by Ben Nelson, PHD student of Andrew Trites and a study by Christopher Dunnagan and the list goes on". If you would like more information on any of these studies I would suggest that you email Ken. His email address is kpearce1@telus.net.
GLG
Well-Known Member
Please share your results with Peter Ross over at the Vancouver Aquarium. He use to be head of Canada's Marine Mammal Toxicology at DFO until his department was shut down during the purge. He has continued his research there and probably has a database with a very long time series with many locations.
IronNoggin
Well-Known Member
Thanks. Will do.
In addition to the data analysis from Health Canada & DFO, I have three senior (2 retired) marine contaminants specialists online and awaiting the data.
It will be interesting to compare the notes.
If you have contact info for Peter, please pm that at your convenience.
Thanks!
Matt
Derby
Crew Member
Why is it so important to you in particalar that SFI support PBPS ?
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Derby
Crew Member
So when you are saying recreational sector can u explain this ?
here is the Standing Committee recommendations on Recovery of Endangered Whales.
http://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/42-1/FOPO/report-18/page-72#16
There are pieces here on consultation, enhancement, predator control, and evaluating economic impacts....
wildmanyeah
Crew Member
Wow some heavily lifting there by Martin and Owen
David Bain added that specific groups of seals will “park at river mouths and eat smolts that are going out to sea. That's encouraged to some degree by humans, because we'll do hatchery releases that bring large numbers of smolts into a small area at the same time.”[88] Therefore, Martin Paish called for a “targeted, science-based predator control program” as an immediate measure to improve prey availability which goes beyond fishery restrictions.[89]
Considering the above evidence, the committee recommends:
Recommendation 15
That Fisheries and Oceans Canada increase the availability of preferred prey through the establishment of a science and local/traditional knowledge-based, targeted predator control program to reduce the pinniped predation around estuary and river environments, and other impacted systems.
David Bain added that specific groups of seals will “park at river mouths and eat smolts that are going out to sea. That's encouraged to some degree by humans, because we'll do hatchery releases that bring large numbers of smolts into a small area at the same time.”[88] Therefore, Martin Paish called for a “targeted, science-based predator control program” as an immediate measure to improve prey availability which goes beyond fishery restrictions.[89]
Considering the above evidence, the committee recommends:
Recommendation 15
That Fisheries and Oceans Canada increase the availability of preferred prey through the establishment of a science and local/traditional knowledge-based, targeted predator control program to reduce the pinniped predation around estuary and river environments, and other impacted systems.
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wildmanyeah
Crew Member
I just read through a bunch of the evidence from prior days, Looks like they heard from many that said a cull is needed including First Nations.
"
Mr. Ken Hardie:
As a commentary, some of the things that we've heard so far would include the health and size of the fish coming out of DFO-sponsored hatcheries versus others. In particular, there's one on the west coast of B.C., and they claim to have a much greater success rate. It would be worth casting your net as wide as possible to make sure that as you try to rebuild those stocks, you're doing it in a way that produces the results we need, which are big fish, which is what the orcas like to eat.
On seals, we have heard a couple of times from a couple of people on a couple of different issues in this story that, “Well, we just don't want to do something because we don't know enough yet. We don't have enough data.” We heard that on vessel speed. We've heard it from you today on measures dealing with seals and sea lions. I guess the question becomes, when does the precautionary principle kick into gear?
Let's face it: It's pretty common knowledge, if you ask the indigenous people and the people who live close to some of those chinook-rearing streams, etc., that there are at least a small number of seals lying about with their mouths open, right? All we've heard is that there's a choice between a full-fledged cull, which some of the first nations talked about this morning, or at least targeted harassment to get rid of the ones that are causing the majority of the damage.
Is there a point at which you would apply the precautionary principle in the absence of the concrete or total surety of scientific data, which is always impossible to get? When would you do that? When would you make a move to do something about the seals?"
However it looks like they never used it as evidence for any recommendations in the final report.
"
Mr. Ken Hardie:
As a commentary, some of the things that we've heard so far would include the health and size of the fish coming out of DFO-sponsored hatcheries versus others. In particular, there's one on the west coast of B.C., and they claim to have a much greater success rate. It would be worth casting your net as wide as possible to make sure that as you try to rebuild those stocks, you're doing it in a way that produces the results we need, which are big fish, which is what the orcas like to eat.
On seals, we have heard a couple of times from a couple of people on a couple of different issues in this story that, “Well, we just don't want to do something because we don't know enough yet. We don't have enough data.” We heard that on vessel speed. We've heard it from you today on measures dealing with seals and sea lions. I guess the question becomes, when does the precautionary principle kick into gear?
Let's face it: It's pretty common knowledge, if you ask the indigenous people and the people who live close to some of those chinook-rearing streams, etc., that there are at least a small number of seals lying about with their mouths open, right? All we've heard is that there's a choice between a full-fledged cull, which some of the first nations talked about this morning, or at least targeted harassment to get rid of the ones that are causing the majority of the damage.
Is there a point at which you would apply the precautionary principle in the absence of the concrete or total surety of scientific data, which is always impossible to get? When would you do that? When would you make a move to do something about the seals?"
However it looks like they never used it as evidence for any recommendations in the final report.
wildmanyeah
Crew Member
Conservative Party of Canada anyone on? HAHA this Robert Sopuck guy gets my vote
Mr. Robert Sopuck (Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, CPC):
Thanks.
My main concern is the seal issue. I think what I'm seeing here is kind of an orgy of political correctness and an unwillingness to.... That's not just to our visitors and guests; it's fairly ubiquitous.
It seems to me that's the elephant in the room, and I didn't mean the elephant seal in the room. I'm going to quote a study that was done in British Columbia by Peter Olesiuk.
He talked about the Puntledge River on Vancouver Island, where three dozen seals—that's 36 seals—killed 10,000 adult chum salmon in the fall spawning run. He was quoted as saying, “They take 60 to 70 chum fry per minute, per seal.”
Twenty or 25 years ago, the harbour seal population off the west coast was some 10,000 individuals when there was an active cull going on. Now it's at 105,000. As a biologist myself, I know we always want to say we need more data and we need more information, but at some point, given how critical the status of the chinook salmon is in some of the salmon runs and given some of the southern killer whale populations, this at least needs to be tried. I'm a big fan of adaptive management. You try something, and if it doesn't work, chances are the situation will revert to the original condition.
The seals have exploded both on the east coast and the west coast to levels we've never seen before. It's not just a coincidence that the Atlantic salmon haven't recovered and the cod haven't recovered, and now we're seeing these issues on the west coast.
Mr. Bain, I'd like you to comment on the seal issue and why we're not tackling it head-on.
Mr. David Bain:
There are two aspects to the seal issue. The kinds of seals you're talking about are targeting specific runs and taking a high proportion. That's actually a small percentage of the seal population. If you addressed those seals, you would protect those runs, but it would not make a huge difference to overall abundance. A lot of the other seals are eating different things, including predatory fish that eat salmon. It's unclear how those seals do. We could go back to culling and knock the seal population back down, but then we'd be back here talking about the endangered transient population.
If we want to get an ecosystem back in balance, I would recommend harassment of seals that are taking advantage of artificial conditions such as the one you just cited, and allow the transients to increase in number and reduce the pen-fed population in the long term.
Mr. Robert Sopuck:
I like the use of your term “balance”. When one talks about predator control in any situation, basically it's humans intervening to restore a balance. For example—and I'm going to use a totally different example—in prairie Canada, the landscape has changed so much that waterfowl nesting success is down dramatically, but it has been shown conclusively that removal of nest predators increases nest success from 10% to 80%. We have the issue of the Yellowstone wolves. They were removed, and the elk exploded. As Mr. Hardie pointed out, the reintroduction of the wolves was a good thing. We have study after study that shows how working to restore the balance can work in many situations.
Having said that, one thing I'm not hearing—and I'm sorry I wasn't here for the first part—is what human beings actually want. I think there is such a desire among humans on the west coast for chinook salmon, and all the salmon species, that we should take into account what people actually want in terms of the ecosystem out there.
In the same article I'm looking at, in Scotland, for example, they took three seals out of one river and fishing success went from 1% to 17%.
We have these data points that I think are painting a fairly compelling picture that we need to do something out there, and some active seal management is probably the right thing to do. I don't mean harass them; I mean remove them—not all of them, but reduce them to a number that at least gives salmon a chance.
Could you comment on that, Mr. Bain?
Mr. Robert Sopuck (Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, CPC):
Thanks.
My main concern is the seal issue. I think what I'm seeing here is kind of an orgy of political correctness and an unwillingness to.... That's not just to our visitors and guests; it's fairly ubiquitous.
It seems to me that's the elephant in the room, and I didn't mean the elephant seal in the room. I'm going to quote a study that was done in British Columbia by Peter Olesiuk.
He talked about the Puntledge River on Vancouver Island, where three dozen seals—that's 36 seals—killed 10,000 adult chum salmon in the fall spawning run. He was quoted as saying, “They take 60 to 70 chum fry per minute, per seal.”
Twenty or 25 years ago, the harbour seal population off the west coast was some 10,000 individuals when there was an active cull going on. Now it's at 105,000. As a biologist myself, I know we always want to say we need more data and we need more information, but at some point, given how critical the status of the chinook salmon is in some of the salmon runs and given some of the southern killer whale populations, this at least needs to be tried. I'm a big fan of adaptive management. You try something, and if it doesn't work, chances are the situation will revert to the original condition.
The seals have exploded both on the east coast and the west coast to levels we've never seen before. It's not just a coincidence that the Atlantic salmon haven't recovered and the cod haven't recovered, and now we're seeing these issues on the west coast.
Mr. Bain, I'd like you to comment on the seal issue and why we're not tackling it head-on.
Mr. David Bain:
There are two aspects to the seal issue. The kinds of seals you're talking about are targeting specific runs and taking a high proportion. That's actually a small percentage of the seal population. If you addressed those seals, you would protect those runs, but it would not make a huge difference to overall abundance. A lot of the other seals are eating different things, including predatory fish that eat salmon. It's unclear how those seals do. We could go back to culling and knock the seal population back down, but then we'd be back here talking about the endangered transient population.
If we want to get an ecosystem back in balance, I would recommend harassment of seals that are taking advantage of artificial conditions such as the one you just cited, and allow the transients to increase in number and reduce the pen-fed population in the long term.
Mr. Robert Sopuck:
I like the use of your term “balance”. When one talks about predator control in any situation, basically it's humans intervening to restore a balance. For example—and I'm going to use a totally different example—in prairie Canada, the landscape has changed so much that waterfowl nesting success is down dramatically, but it has been shown conclusively that removal of nest predators increases nest success from 10% to 80%. We have the issue of the Yellowstone wolves. They were removed, and the elk exploded. As Mr. Hardie pointed out, the reintroduction of the wolves was a good thing. We have study after study that shows how working to restore the balance can work in many situations.
Having said that, one thing I'm not hearing—and I'm sorry I wasn't here for the first part—is what human beings actually want. I think there is such a desire among humans on the west coast for chinook salmon, and all the salmon species, that we should take into account what people actually want in terms of the ecosystem out there.
In the same article I'm looking at, in Scotland, for example, they took three seals out of one river and fishing success went from 1% to 17%.
We have these data points that I think are painting a fairly compelling picture that we need to do something out there, and some active seal management is probably the right thing to do. I don't mean harass them; I mean remove them—not all of them, but reduce them to a number that at least gives salmon a chance.
Could you comment on that, Mr. Bain?
OldBlackDog
Well-Known Member
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