I know certain members of this forum will attend the Steelhead society meeting tomorrow.
If members of FishingWithRod or individuals reading are not aware, all who wish to come and become informed and new members are welcome.
"In fairness to your surprise no one from this forum showed up at your presentation, I'm pretty sure it's been available on line for months."
While this may be true, I invited people to come to the presentation, as the producers of the video, those involved in the production, as well as some key people who appeared in the video were in attendance. This group was looking for an interactive presentation, and, as we learned at the showing, the team involved in the production was looking for feedback, and wishes to turn this into a three part production with follow up films and information.
My impression was as a younger team of youth who are not experts on the system, they were looking for input as to what could be included in future films to be informative and beneficial. I would guesstimate there may have been 40 people in attendance. As someone who is near the age of 50, I noted the majority of people in attendance were likely older than me.
While I know the Fraser and travel and fish it to a degree, I would not call myself an expert. As someone who used to visit Herrling Island a lot 25 years ago and fish various species, I was alarmed to learn the soft paper company who held this island and worked with the provincial government to have this as an "experimental island" for tree species for the purpose of pulp and paper had sold it. The new stakeholders have been cutting down the trees, with the purpose of building the bridge over to the island, diking it, and turning the island into a cranberry or blueberry producing plot of land.
They covered Herrling Island, and one other large island in the Fraser that is being explored for exploitation and resource extraction in the form of "farming". As someone who understands the Fraser and get the idea of 100 year flood cycles, with one year out of a hundred being the "major flood cycle year", where all major sand bars and islands in the Fraser are subject to erosion, destruction and disappearing, this seems like bad long term planning to me. If looking for evidence and explanation as to the potential for damage as to the flood of a 100 year flood cycle, look up the Fraser Flood of 1948. I have read some speculation that the 1948 flood is one of the two possible "50 year floods" in the flood cycle, and the big one is still yet to come. If not sure as to what this means, keep in mid that "floods in the cycle" are completely random and not predictable as to when they will occur.
As someone with limited time and eperience on the Fraser, I suggested to them they should look to do a follow up film on Nicolman Slough and the environmental degradation that has taken place on Strawberry Island. For anyone who visits this area, you would have been able to see in the past years that Strawberry Island (located east of the slough, upriver on the Fraser), had been covered in Cottonwood trees owned by Scott Paper and grown for the purpose of turning into toilet paper at their New West plant. Suddenly, within a one year period, all the Cottonwoods on the island were cut down and left in slash piles that have never been dealt with. The island was basically clear cut and the slash left behind. The reason given was the trees were infested with disease. Some research will establish that cottonwoods are resilient to disease, we are talking about toilet paper and paper towel, and the timing co-insides with a massive decrease in the value of softwood for the purpose of pulp timber. I guess the question would be if the trees were clear cut and left in giant slash piles, why has nothing been done to re-plant or re-habilitate the land which was destroyed. The team at the film seemed receptive to my feedback and said this could possibly be feedback for a future focus. Had others been in attendance with greater experience and knowledge, maybe other themes and ideas for the crew to follow up on could have been generated.
If you come out tomorrow to the Steelhead society function, check in and say hi.
Dano
Author
Topic: Decline Of Steelhead On Global Tonight. (Read 39061 times)