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[spoiler]

If our Chinook stocks are in as bad a shape as what DFO is saying then there should be zero retention for all parties involved. Not even incidental by-catch while FN Sockeye fishing. Which based on projections for this year should also be shut down. I have fond memories of fishing for early Chinook at the mouth of the Vedder in April and May in the 1970's but due to a range of factors including over-fishing those days are gone. It's sad that my son and grandson will probably never get to experience that fishery again. I'm just grateful my son did get to experience some of the fabulous bar fishing the Fraser once offered, but sadly I think that's finished too.

[wildmanyeah]

WTF happened? Sockeye happened... What do you expect when you have an allowable 55% exploitation rate for sockeye salmon throughout August and September?

Absolutely Rod this is how the South Thompson Chinook was down to just 2 thousand spawners in the 1980. When sockeye gill net fishing started to see a bunch of restrictions it rebounded up to over 100 thousand spawners.  Now the gill net fleet  has been hitting them hard since 2010 and now their numbers are down to less then 50k.

Sockeye seems too be the only thing they care about because it means big money to commercial fishermen and it's the prefered food of First Nations.

[wildmanyeah]

Yeah I get it, one fish per day in the rec sector is not going to make a dent in the populations, our impacts are insignificant. If they're going to net, we gotta pressure for openings too. Conservation is always priority though, lets make that very clear....

This is what I suffer with, I am all for the conservation measures but if your going to completely ignore one group then are they really conservation measures or just measure to make sure that other group can carry out their fishery and get their quota.  Will more spawners actually make it to the spawning grounds under any of these options?


ER on Dome Ck (Upper Fraser)


Fishery ER


ISBM SBC Terminal (Fraser R) First Nations 41.2%

ISBM SBC JDF (Victoria) Sport 7.2%

ISBM Troll (S + N) South/North 6.4%

AABM North BC Troll 5.1%

ISBM SBC Terminal (Fraser R) Sport 3.3%

AABM WCVI Spring Troll 2.7%

ISBM GST (SOG) Sport 1.2%

AABM WCVI Sport 0.9%

ISBM SBC JST (unknown) Sport 0.1%

[RalphH]

The responses here seem to forget the saltwater harvest - mostly recreational and commercial troll, take a significant number of Fraser bound chinook. Likewise chinook populations outside the Fraser systems & it's sockeye net fisheries, are also in a critical state according to the Cosewic assessments.

WMY looking at the graph you supplied I also couldn't help noticing the situation for Summer (4) chinook the situation was worse and sustainably worse from 1975 to'95 from which the stocks recovered.

Perhaps not so 'hopeless'.

[RalphH]

some other perspectives from:

SCIENCE INFORMATION TO SUPPORT CONSULTATIONS ON BC CHINOOK SALMON FISHERY MANAGEMENT MEASURES IN 2018 of the Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat (pgs 2 &3 )

Dorner et al. (2017) associated the broad pattern of declines in Chinook Salmon productivity, from Alaska to Oregon, with unfavourable large-scale climatic change in the North Pacific Gyre Oscillation and the North Pacific Current, as well as increased frequency of large scale events such as El Niño, and in 2014-15, the persistence of warm ocean waters in ‘the blob’. Other researchers such as Ohlberger et al. (2018) suggest that the biological mechanisms behind the decline in productivity also include changes in population demographics, such as younger age at maturity, reduced size-at-age, and reduced fecundity of female spawners. Some of these demographic effects are now being observed in BC Chinook Salmon populations (Table 2, Figure 3a,b). Selective exploitation of large Chinook Salmon is likely a contributing factor to the decline in body size (Ohlgerger et al. 2018) and other demographic changes, as is predation by seals, sea lions, killer whales, and salmon sharks (Ford et al. 2009; Trites and Rosen 2018; Chasco et al. 2016; Nagasawa 1998). In addition, degradation of freshwater spawning and rearing habitat may contribute to the longer term declines in productivity observed in many BC management units ( summarized in Riddell et al. 2013).

emphasis added by me.

http://waves-vagues.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/Library/40715619.pdf

[BBarley]

Startling to see the combined exploitation rate for those Upper Fraser fish at 68%. In a day and age when these fish face such extreme habitat degradation and declining ocean survival rates, how can fisheries management think this is even remotely sustainable.

Even if you completely removed the sport take (salt and fresh), you're still over a 50% exploitation rate. 

[dobrolub]

Well, the forecast for 2019 say "Low Abundance".

Low.

But Abundance.

OK to fish then!

I can't understand how an oxymoron such as "Low Abundance" can be used to describe the prospects and / or returns.

Am I supposed to be concerned when I see Low Abundance in the forecast? Or is that still Abundant? Ridiculous choice of words, IMO.

[Rodney]

The term abundance is used to refer to the number of specimen in resource management, it doesn't imply that there are lots of them.

[Hike_and_fish]

I know one thing. I'll be selling the jet in a few years that's for sure. The trend is downward.

[Wiseguy]

I know one thing. I'll be selling the jet in a few years that's for sure. The trend is downward.

Whos going to buy it?

[Hike_and_fish]

Whos going to buy it?

Good point.

Maybe I'll build a fridge in the deck to keep beers cold and sell it to the only people allowed to fish.

I'll leave that open to interpretation.

[Wiseguy]

Good point.

Maybe I'll build a fridge in the deck to keep beers cold and sell it to the only people allowed to fish.

I'll leave that open to interpretation.

😃

[poper]

Good point.

Maybe I'll build a fridge in the deck to keep beers cold and sell it to the only people allowed to fish.

I'll leave that open to interpretation.

Oh hey, make sure you paint it black to, good selling the feature.

[wildmanyeah]

WTF happened? Sockeye happened... What do you expect when you have an allowable 55% exploitation rate for sockeye salmon throughout August and September?

“This year the panel, which is largely made up of harvesting interests and U.S. and Canadian government representatives, exceeded their planned ‘allowable exploitation rate’ of over 58 percent on late-run sockeye, with a final rate of 63 percent,” he says. “

Shuswap late-run sockeye drop by 700,000

https://www.saobserver.net/news/shu...Qn2t33hgxjG8Y8yhTe8Wk0vzwd35garACgCRAfA4HEGkU

[Dave]

Jeeez, when are we going to stop over harvesting these fish???






Yeah, when they're gone.