Who Are You Going to Call? by Bob Hooton
Who Are You Going to Call?
Events of the past couple of weeks with respect to Skeena steelhead prompt this question. A bit of a pictorial essay might help describe circumstances that evidence the complete absence of any connection, much less co-ordination, between the various interests affecting Skeena salmon and steelhead. I’ll focus on the latter for the simple reason I think I understand that species better than, for example, chinook and sockeye, although much of what I have to say pertains to those species as well.
A good starting point is the declaration from two high ranking First Nations spokespersons. This was the third iteration of the same declaration over a two-month period. The first two were widely disseminated by the same Gitxsan Huwilp Government but did not include names such as appeared on the third iteration below.
As far as I can determine there has never been a response to this message. The reference to this being the fifth year of such a ban is instructive.
The closest thing to any ban on recreational fishing was the water temperature related closure of the Kispiox River for two weeks this past August. That was the ultimate in playing the science card when it made no sense to do so. River discharge, not water temperature, would have been the dominant influence on steelhead behavior at the time. The Kispiox was so low (5 cubic meters per second) its fish would remain in the Skeena until the Kispiox water level increased significantly. That was hardly a secret for anyone familiar with the area and the fishery or those in a decision-making capacity who could easily have done a bit of homework. So, the fish supposedly saved by the angling closure would continue to be vulnerable in waters immediately adjacent to and downstream from the Kispiox confluence. Those would be the waters members of the organizations responsible for the above letter that collect daily fees from anglers willing to pay to fish. Ultimately, then, it’s quite alright to play with the Gitxsan food as long as you pay them to do so. It’s also quite alright for Gitxsan members who live in the immediate vicinity to use indiscriminate gill nets to harvest unlimited numbers of whatever species they desire (how many undesired pink salmon are discarded in the process?) but anglers and their single barbless hooks and artificial lures fishing on a strictly catch and release basis are a greater threat to conservation and food security.
Next, consider the formal notice issued by DFO on August 13. Look it up on the DFO Fisheries Notices web site. FN0809-ABORIGINAL – Salmon: Economic Opportunities – Sockeye – Region 6 – Opening August 13, 2024. Here’s the essential ingredient.
“Commercial Salmon Allocation Framework (CSAF) Demonstration Fishery opportunity for Gitksan Watershed Authorities of the Gitksan First Nation. Opening August 13, 2024 from 00:00 hours and closing August 19, 2024 at 23:59 hours in the Skeena River. The target species in this fishery is Sockeye Salmon.
This fishery is being conducted using selective gear methods only. All non-target species must be released immediately. A designation is required to participate in demonstration fisheries. Designations are provided by the licence holder/Nation noted above. See the issued licence for further details regarding allowable locations, gear, and allocation.”
A further notice (FN0835) was issued on August 19 extending that in-river fishery until August 26. How is anyone outside the Gitxsan Watershed Authority supposed to know those further details regarding allowable locations, gear and allocations? Who is responsible for keeping track of what is caught? When and where will that information be available? Remember, the Gitxsan territory includes the Skeena from Legate Creek, about 40 km east of Terrace, to its headwaters. However, I think it’s a safe assumption the area that might be subject to these economic opportunity fisheries is downstream from the Skeena/Bulkley confluence.
But, what about all the other First Nations fishing activity that doesn’t come under whatever rules might be associated with the economic opportunity option? Here’s some recent illustrations in that respect.
These pictures were taken on September 5 at the boat launch adjacent to the Kitwanga River confluence. The photographer, a veteran steelhead angler intimately familiar with the area, reported he counted 42 steelhead heads that day. Another observer present over the same time period, also a veteran angler with long experience fishing the Skeena in the Kitwanga area provided similar pictures and observations. Both anglers reported there were more heads similarly discarded on other days, although those involved figured out they shouldn’t discard them where they were quite so obvious. The primary offending boat and vehicle is shown below.
Daily fishing excursions by this vessel and its operators are anything but insignificant. Those totes speak volumes.
This isn’t the only drift netting operation in the same vicinity. Here’s a September 5 illustration of another frequent flier.
The Kitwanga/Skeena confluence area has always been a hot spot for drift net fishing. I witnessed that personally on numerous occasions in the late 1980s and 1990s. The difference today is the aggressiveness and hostility of the fishers when anyone dares engage them in any conversation touching on numbers of fish they are catching or what they do with them? The occasional recreational fisher who shows up and launches a boat right there below the highway bridge crossing is forced to park at the gas station parking lot on the opposite side of the river lest his rig be vandalized.
Earlier this year the First Nations lobbied the provincial government to close the recreational fishery on the Skeena in the Kitwanga vicinity. That was billed as a conservation measure to protect threatened Kitwanga sockeye in particular but also chinook. Chinook angling opportunity was forbidden by DFO years ago. Sockeye fishing has only occurred in years of high abundance of the aggregate Skeena sockeye stock, dominated by Babine spawning channel production. The number of sockeye accounted for by anglers in the waters of concern wouldn’t amount to the harvest by a single day of drift netting by the first vessel depicted above, even if those anglers targeted sockeye. Can it possibly be the real reason for the push to close the entire area to recreational fishing is to eliminate the prospects for more observations and photographs by watchful eyes?
The investment in measures to accommodate management of Kitwanga fish resources, primarily sockeye, has been enormous over the past two decades and more. A full impression of those measures is readily available on the web site of the Gitanyow Fisheries Authority http://www.gitanyowfisheries.com/images/uploads/docs/KSEF_Update_7_September_3_2024.pdf That’s not all. How about the recent announcement of a $10M investment in a hatchery to save the threatened Kitwanga sockeye. https://www.nationalobserver.com/2024/08/23/news/Gitanyow-First-Nation-Kitwanga-sockeye-fishery Who decided that taxpayers should finance a sockeye conservation hatchery operated by one group of the Gitanyow First Nation while members of that same First Nation fish with indiscriminate gill nets right on top of the waters those promised enhanced sockeye frequent? (Note that sockeye in hatcheries is not a success story. That was the reason for choosing spawning channels decades ago.) Why would the Gitanyow Fisheries Authority itself choose to turn a blind eye to continuous drift netting in waters where the species and stocks it claims to be dedicated to conserving are certain to be present?
One additional observation re Kitwanga stocks and the drift net fishery. In the first link in the preceding paragraph comes the reporting of the staggering number of pink salmon counted through the fence operation as of September 2 (224,119). That means there would have been very large numbers of pinks encountered by the drift netters almost within sight of the counting fence. Yet, there is no indication of a single pink salmon showing up in any landings. What happened to those fish?
Fishing for sustenance purposes is readily acknowledged and accepted by all. But, where are the boundaries between “food, social and ceremonial fishing”, economic opportunity fisheries and easily detectable “other” fisheries. For example, how is it that First Nations people can openly advertise on social media the opportunity for all comers to buy “Skeena salmon” at a gas stop right beside the major east/west highway across central British Columbia? (Slenyah Store LP is 10 Km west of Fraser Lake.) We’re not talking small amounts of fish and it wasn’t just sockeye offered for sale. I make it three beautiful steelhead right there on top of the pile in one of the pics and others in the second cooler. That second cooler is full of fish that haven’t even been dressed. Is the situation so out of control that sale of First Nations caught fish by openly advertising on social media doesn’t even raise an eyebrow? What do the First Nations authorities themselves have to say? Never mind the boardroom talk and all the outward appearances there is such a thing as catch reporting. Put some credible action behind all that endless window dressing.
Ten days ago we had the social media posting of the Kitselas Canyon fish wheel operation justifiably embraced by all those who have been working quietly with the Kitselas First Nation on selective fishing initiatives for quite some time. That operation showed great promise in terms of its efficacy, in 2024 at least. There couldn’t have been a better year than this to be operating that wheel. Skeena flows were remarkably consistent at low levels, there were no freshet periods of significance and therefore no debris to deal with. Optimism reigns that similar circumstances will be the norm in years to come. The outstanding question, though, is how many gill nets has the wheel replaced? The ultimate goal is (should be?) to eliminate them, right? Based on a report that arrived on September 8, we’re not there yet. The report states “There is an unattended gillnet in kitsilas for 3 days full of fish.” That was followed by December 9 report of a gill net deployed under the old bridge crossing of the Skeena at Terrace. As per the Kitwanga situation, this begs the question of why one element of a First Nation would be fully engaged in selective fishing while others in the same First Nation continue to operate in isolation?
Where does all of this leave Skeena steelhead? All anyone wants to pay attention to is the DFO test fishery results that have eliminated any conservation concern. How many of the test fishery estimated number of steelhead are eliminated by the various upstream fisheries? Is this just a year when the test fishery number has anaesthetized everyone concerned about steelhead or is this the new normal? What does it take to connect the dots within and between the First Nation communities? Where are the non-indigenous government representatives we pay to manage the fish that are not the exclusive property of whatever First Nation claims we don’t belong?
Fisheries management is supposed to revolve around some understanding of the abundance of a given stock or group of stocks. The Skeena test fishery does that, whether its critics like it or not. Beyond that it is equally important to understand how many of those fish contribute to the spawning population in each of the major Skeena tributaries. Knowledge of the distribution of those fish, their sex ratio, their average fecundity (size dependent) are also important basics to establish if conservation objectives are worth the paper they’re written on. The randomness and unquantified influence of the sorts of forces described above and their collective negative influence on spawning populations is the antithesis of credible management. We may have dodged a bullet in 2024 courtesy an ocean environment that somehow favored Skeena steelhead more than anticipated, but not as a result of any management action. Are we going to roll the dice and bet on Mother Nature again or is it time for all the key players and organizations to abandon the boardroom cheap talk, recognize the reality they all contribute to and do something about it?
A final point. The airwaves have been overworked with the story of Alaska’s dirty secret; the non-reporting of steelhead caught by the Southeast Alaska commercial fishing fleets. That campaign is intended to build support for measures to reduce Skeena steelhead interception in those fisheries. The steelhead interception rates thrown about by the architects of the campaign have never been the subject of any peer reviewed scientific report. There has never been the slightest acknowledgement fish not caught by Alaskans are not necessarily contributors to Skeena spawner populations. Commercial fishers in the adjacent Canadian waters will be only too happy to catch every fish Alaska doesn’t. I’m still waiting for recognition by the anti-Alaska campaigners that we have our own dirty secret, namely the well-known and wholly deliberate underreporting and non-reporting of steelhead catches DFO has turned a blind eye to since the issue of commercial fishery influence on Skeena steelhead first hit the spotlight 30 years ago. And that’s just the commercial fishery. The First Nations fisheries, even those legally sanctioned, are equally bad in that respect. Worse still are those aforementioned in-river fisheries prosecuted by First Nations operating in splendid isolation of any oversight by their own or the fisheries management agencies. How do Canadians pass the red face test when confronting Alaska about steelhead non-reporting when similar and perhaps even worse problems are so abundantly obvious in our own back yard?
While I don’t pretend to have all the answers and I believe in considering all opinions and points of view
The absolute rediculous and completely disgusting things that are occurring with the skeena and it’s fish is enough to bring anyone who cares about it’s fish to tears
I have personally wittnessed, to the point of having to reel up my flyline and step out of the river to get out of the way of the drift net and watch it be done over and over again, all of the above mentioned netting in this stretch of river and can confirm the details, all though it is anecdotal,I believe the netting has increased every year, with this year, and last, being the worst I have wittnessed and last year I personally witnessed the netting occuring into the month of October, hard to imagine there are many sockeye around in October
I have made several trips to that stretch of river starting in mid August to present and have witnessed the netting occurring every single time, also hard to imagine that it is not happening nearly every single day
Imagine if you will, the damage that could do to not only kitwanga river origin salmon,(apparently an endangered stock), but also to kitwanga River origin steelhead that may choose to hold in the skeena mainstream waters near the confluence
I am all for working with all parties involved to come up with solutions, but only one of those parties is using non selective, un monitored, un reporte, in river, gill nets, and that quite simply has to stop, how many “sockeye” does that party need??
Also, as a note, all of my trips to that area have been poor fishing, …wonder why
Also, of note is the section of the skeena river from the highway 37 bridge to the mouth of mill creek, ( the section of the skeena being referred to in this article), is completely closed for retention of salmon, actually the regs state no fishing for salmon in regards to liscence holders
So ask yourself, why is this particular section of river closed to anglers for salmon fishing?? Well, must be to conserve vulnerable stocks right???
……laughable, if only it didn’t make me want to cry
Now now you holier than thou fly fisherman. You only are here for a few days a year. There is always a bad apple or 2 in every group white or gitxsan. Not everyone follows the rules and for you fly fishers to think you are special group and to come up with these simple observations and assume it happens when you aren’t there watching them is nothing but a bias view by a group who think their way of catching fish is superior to any other group including gill netters. . We will never destroy every fish we will depleted it till every group stays home and the fish will rebound. These have been coming back for thousands of years and will continue to do so despite everyone trying to catch them. As for Bob hooton he had his crack at conserving fish and didn’t do a good job so now he continually tries to stir the pot . Usually it’s a snapshot of one little area he can exploit. He criticizes but can’t offer any solutions
I am going to allow this one, hopefully one of our readers can clue him in about a problem they prefer to sweep under the rug. Lets ignore the fact that he is talking about locals who have lived and fished here longer than he has been on this planet. The word “Assume comes to mind”
You are entitled to your opinion, and you are free to express it
No where did I mention anything about fishing methods being superior, but it’s pretty hard to defend an argument that a single barbless hook,on a fly rod or any other rod, and following the regulations imposed on liscence holders, is going to result in a lot less dead fish then a gill net
Also, you assume I am only there a “few days a year” how would you know that? I live in the valley and have done so for many years
Pretty wild to say you are going to deplete every stock so people stay away, that really says a lot and makes me sad for your close minded, short sighted selfishness, I cringe at the thought that others might share this view
I understand that many factors contribute to this, high cost of groceries and gas, high cost of living in general,
But we all share this planet, we should all try and work together, selfishness will only lead to more losses, and once it’s gone it’s gone, saying they will rebuild themselves as they have always done, in my opinion is wildly irresponsible. In case you hadn’t noticed, things are no longer ” the way they once were” steelhead and salmon stocks are teetering on the brink and have been for many years now, reckless “depleting of all the stocks” is hardly going to help
There are ways to work together and improve what we can, and I respect and understand that there are things that need to change from all parties, (even Holier then thou flyfisherman), for that to happen
No one owns the fish and the waters, they are a gift and should be treated with the respect they deserve
A good article you wrote, saying it out right, what other people are afraid to say. Many pretending they don’t know what’s going on and some just don’t care.
We have to come out in the open and all talk about a solution that everyone will work for.
It’s been going on for so long now, we are talking about one of the earths resources let’s not lose it please.
I was trained as a fishery biologist and have experience in data collection, data application, and how the collection and application of fisheries data influences fisheries management.
I have also been tracking Bob Hooton’s influence in the Provincial fisheries management sector for several decades. I have read his books on the Skeena and the Upper Fraser River steelhead management (or lack of it) and I have read his numerous essays and opinions regarding the critical fisheries topics of the day and what might be be done to improve the status quo
Those that insinuate he had “his crack” at conserving fish and didn’t do a good job have not been paying attention to the tireless (uncompensated) efforts he has expended over the last few decades trying to address the gross mismanagement of the BC Provincial steelhead fisheries.
He criticizes? Yes. Someone has to call out the gross mismanagement of that fishery. Case in point? When fishery managers in Victoria and Smithers over-rode the biologists in 2021 and allowed the commercial steelhead guide and lodge fishery to proceed, despite the Tyee projected steelhead counts showing a projected aggregate return of potential spawners to be between 5,000 – 6,000 fish. That 2021 Tyee projection was dramatically below the 23,000 target minimum spawning population that Provincial managers had used in the past.
In September of 2023 Mr. Hooton was not only a signatory but a prime mover in the composing and sending of a letter to Honorable Cullen and Honorable Ralston requesting the scientific data supporting the Province’s sudden and unexplained move to reduce the 23,000 figure to 8,000 fish and requesting a thorough review of how this revised figure would even remotely accommodate the precautionary principles discussed in numerous past Provincial steelhead conservation documents
Mr. Hooten has also been a consistent critic of the commercial steelhead lodge and guide fishery, demanding reviews of rod days and questioning how this industry no longer even remotely resembles the guided fishing management framework and rod day allocation that were originally contemplated by the Quality Waters management document. He has consistently pointed out that this industry is over capitalized and should be regulated with a sterner hand by the Province and he is absolutely justified in those criticisms— the guide and lodge industry is indeed over-capitalized —-too many boats and clients chasing an ever dwindling body of fish
And his pointed comments that the DFO has a dirty little secret about the true amount of steelhead by-catch in the FSC fisheries in the Skeena over the last few decades and how the Province should stop pointing fingers at Alaskan interception and pay more attention to their own steelhead by-catch in the FSC drift net fisheries? Well, by all means….don’t take his word for it. Just look at the Tyee daily counts and calculate a simple average ratio of how many steelhead you would expect to be caught (and killed) in a normal sockeye drift net fishery. You will immediately see that the number reported by the FSC fishermen to the DFO has zero bearing on reality.
It’s not a case of good apples or bad apples in those FSC fisheries. It’s a case of no apples. Don’t report anything or if you do, report the absolute minimum ….the DFO will say thanks for your hard work, enter the data without the blink of an eye, then everyone can continue pointing the finger at those terrible bad apple Alaskans
The Province manages steelhead. They’re spineless because they’re betrothed to steelhead catch and release fisheries. Ask for some kind of threshold if you want to see action mandated in other fisheries.
Do you know the post catch mortality rate in this ever so gentle “catch and release”? As 50% of Ferry Island fishers drag an unidentified fish across the rocks, bonk it, and freak out when someone points out that it’s a steelhead so pitch it back. We all have 5 fingers on our hands, pointing one is doing no good. Unless it’s for an online blog I suppose. Just as you stated with Alaska not being the ONLY problem, neither are FSC fisheries, neither are sports fishers, and ultimately, climate change/riparian logging/pollution/etc etc etc.
I thought you might find this interesting, let me quote the Gitxsan
“According to the Gitxsan chiefs, sportfishing breaks traditional laws.”
“We do not play with our fish… we’ve come to understand that catch and release will cause higher fatality,” they said in the statement.”
Then we have this photo taken by Gitanyow Hereditary Chief Wil Marsden of his son sport fishing. Is he suggesting that catch and kill has a lower fatality rate? These clowns are full of double speak.