Reprinted from another Forum (with permission of course):
Summer Steel's response to the query: Maybe someone can explain how they got an increase indicator for 57000 Chinooks from 47000 and how we only have less than 2000 now?
Easy, it's called PFS, political fish science. At 47,000, there is simply no commercial TAC under this years plan to place more naturally spawning fish on the grounds. Since DFO can't go against their own numbers, they need to find a way to increase the run size, at least on paper, to justify an opening. This is done by taking scale samples from the commercial openings in Nootka Sound. Amazingly, they find that there are significantly more Conuma chinook than first thought, ergo there MUST be more Somass chinook as well. Plus the scale samples from DEAD Somass fish they have just harvested MUST mean the run is bigger than they first said it was. Sounds like solid science to up the return by 10,000
, coincidentely, just enough to allow a 7000 piece commercial harvest. This, together with the FN "food" & economic opportunity fisheries taking at least another 7000 fish, ( most likely more due to some slick counting methods at the processors ), leads to the early part of the return being devastated. Why try so hard to justify a commercial opening?? Follow the money. The fishing industry is comprised of three components, harvest, process, & sale. Any person involved in just one of these components can no longer make a living doing it. Ask IronNoggin how much any of the area G trollers made this year, how many of them need a second job just to make ends meet nowadays. Talk to a seasonal fish plant worker & see how their retirement package is shaping up, or go see a part time grocery clerk & ask them if they worked more than 20 hours this week. Now, find the guy who has his fingers in all three pies. He is getting a cut from every part of the business, so life is good for him.The only thing he needs is for there to be enough fish to justify the openings. Whether those fish exist or not is besides the point, as long as there can be some harvest, there will be money to be made. Now, you can bet your last salmon that these decisions are coming from back east. The lobbyists are in place to remind the Gov. officials of where their campaign funds came from & what is expected in return.Until this entire backroom process is dragged out into the light, perhaps under a Judicial review, nothing is going to change. Lets face it, no reasonable people would make the types of decisions we are seeing now unless there was another agenda in play. Managing a fishery isn't rocket science. You look at the best available science, wait until the fish actually show up, put numbers on the spawning grounds FIRST, & always, always err on the side of the fish. It can't possibly be continuously done so poorly year after year without anyone ever losing their jobs unless there was something else at work.
Now if we do the math, that is roughly 14,000 fish gone, so where are the other 43,000 fish?? ( That is supposing that those 10,000 "extra" fish existed in the first place ) Well, if you listen to our friends at DFO, 31,000 fish have been caught by sport anglers so far this year on the WCVI. While that number may indeed be somewhat accurate, what it fails to mention is, that is the TOTAL chinook catch so far this year, NOT the Somass fish we are talking about here. That number includes ALL the chinook caught from May until present, with most of those being offshore southbound fish ( Thanks Yanks ) The Somass chinook don't start showing up inshore in any numbers in Barclay Sound until August. I highly doubt the sports fishery with its one over one under rule made that much of an impact on these fish. So, that begs the questions: Where are they? Where did they go? Are they still coming? Were they ever there? Only time will give us some of the answers, lets just hope they are the answers we are looking for.
One last note, as others have already expressed here, please try not to harvest any chinooks right now, especially the big ones. I know it is open & it's legal, but please, if you feel you absolutely HAVE to kill one, please consider taking one of the many, many 3-6lb jacks that are everywhere right now. These fish are rather easy to catch with roe & IMHO are much better eating than the big ones anyways.
MOST Excellent synopsis of this year's situation I've seen yet.
Cheers,
Nog
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Topic: Stamp Springs (Read 7654 times)