Stock up on the "Betty's" and stand your ground at Peg Leg, should be the mother of all gong shows this summer.
Sunday » February 26 » 2006
Millions of sockeye don't mean riches for fishery
CONSERVATION I Low Cultus Lake run mixed with more stable Fraser stocks
Larry Pynn
Vancouver Sun
Saturday, February 25, 2006
THE REGION I A strong return of 17.4 million sockeye salmon to the Fraser River predicted for this year won't translate into a windfall commercial fishery, according to a federal fisheries department official.
Alan Cass, chairman of the Pacific scientific advice review committee, cautioned in an interview Friday that 22 separate sockeye runs make up the Fraser River pre-season forecast and the two biggest, Quesnel Lake and Shuswap Lake, overlap to varying degrees with the depressed Cultus Lake stocks.
An estimated 6.6 million sockeye are destined for the Shuswap system and 4.6 million for the Quesnel system.
Only 5,800 sockeye are projected to return this summer to Cultus Lake, a stock that is listed as endangered by the federal Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada, and is managed for a maximum harvest of 10 to 12 per cent.
COSEWIC blames the plight of the Cultus Lake sockeye on overfishing and high pre-spawn mortality since 1995, when the fish started entering the Fraser River early and fell victim to parasites. It describes the stock as a "genetically unique population . . . at risk of extinction."
About one half of the Cultus Lake sockeye's life is spent in Cultus Lake, and the other half in the northern Pacific Ocean off Alaska. About 1.5 million people per year visit Cultus Lake.
When Cultus Lake sockeye are moving up the Fraser River with larger runs, fisheries managers are obliged to reduce commercial fishing pressure as a conservation measure. Last year managers allowed no commercial fishing on Fraser-bound sockeye.
"Cultus Lake is the problem child," Cass said from his Nanaimo office.
Paul Kershaw, spokesman for Johnstone Strait gillnetters, said he expects Canadian commercial fishermen to harvest 2.5 to four million sockeye this year, which compares with a harvest of eight to 10 million sockeye on a run of similar size 15 or so years ago.
"We're constrained by the weaker stocks," he confirmed.
Sockeye have a four-year life cycle, with the mean run size for this particular cycle 12.8 million fish. The 17.4 million predicted for 2006 exceeds the mean by more than 4.5 million fish, with the odds 50-50 of the actual runs coming in higher or lower than the forecast.
The Fraser sockeye runs begin in July and continue through October. More accurate assessments will follow later in the year from test fisheries and a hydroacoustic fish-counting station at Mission.
Cass noted that warmer waters in the Pacific could affect the final returns.
As well, the Quesnel run could be lower than predicted based on record small fry sampled in Quesnel Lake from this same cycle. The reason for their small size could be growing numbers of fish on the spawning beds, forcing fry to compete for a limited food source, he said.
Over the past few years, the Fraser fishery has been beset by charges of mismanagement by Ottawa and illegal fishing by native bands such as the Cheam in the lower Fraser.
lpynn@png.canwest.comFraser sockeye run estimates
Preliminary 2006 estimates for sockeye salmon returns for 22 Fraser River stocks for this summer.
Mean Run Size
Sockeye stock/timing group 1970-2004 2006 cycle
Early Stuart 362,000 129,000
Early Summer 492,000 586,000
Bowron 35,000 21,000
Fennell 25,000 13,000
Gates 58,000 21,000
Nadina 82,000 24,000
Pitt 67,000 56,000
Raft 29,000 14,000
Scotch 49,000 119,000
Seymour 147,000 318,000
Misc 1,553,630 854,554
Summer 4,669,000 3,943,000
Chilko 1,636,000 1,597,000
Late Stuart 686,000 305,000
Quesnel 1,824,000 1,538,000
Stellako 523,000 503,000
Late 3,196,000 8,143,000
Cultus 28,000 28,000
Harrison 35,000 45,000
Late Shuswap 2,206,000 6,745,000
Portage 52,000 80,000
Weaver 384,000 594,000
Birkenhead 491,000 651,000
TOTAL 8,719,000 12,801,000
© The Vancouver Sun 2006
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