Wild salmon and watersheds campaign lead, Dave Mills
Last month, American and Canadian commissioners met in Portland to discuss emerging issues in the Pacific Salmon Treaty. For the first time in years, Alaska’s disproportionate harvests are being discussed out in the open. With that comes an opportunity for our commissioners to step up and address an imbalance that is threatening Canadian fish and the people and ecosystems that depend on them. This is some good news to kick off the first Alaska’s Dirty Secret campaign update for 2023.
Alaska’s Dirty Secret is a project of SkeenaWild Conservation Trust and Watershed Watch Salmon Society. We work closely with other allies in B.C. and Washington State. All of us live in communities that are in a race to conserve dwindling salmon stocks like Chinook and sockeye, and all of us are seeing a higher percentage of the catch ending up in Alaska’s nets.
Unfortunately, at the Canada/US Treaty table, transboundary alliances like ours are a little more difficult to build. Washington State and British Columbia are facing a shared threat from Alaska and honest dialogue has a habit of eroding entrenched positions. From what we heard at the Treaty talks, Alaska’s representatives aren’t yet willing to have the tough conversations that are needed, but their colleagues in Washington and Oregon might help us crack open some space for honest dialogue. As Leonard Cohen said, cracks are how the light gets in.
The second great piece of news arrived just before Christmas when a Federal Court judge in Seattle issued a landmark opinion recommending the termination of southeast Alaskan Chinook troll fisheries, which for decades harvested majority non-Alaskan Chinook “at unsustainable levels with cascading and coastwide consequences for fishing communities throughout British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington.” It’s now up to the presiding District judge to make a final ruling in the case.
After a tough 2022 when Alaska scooped up 2.1 million Canadian salmon, two pieces of good news are like wind in our sails. Here’s our 2023 plan to capitalize on that momentum.
- First, we’re going to open up dialogue directly with Alaskans. They have a new congressional representative, Mary Peltola, who is as pro-wild-salmon as
politicians get. We are pushing our provincial and federal politicians to talk with her about Alaska’s plunder of B.C. salmon. - Second, we’re going to help our representatives at the Pacific Salmon Commission keep their eye on the puck. The 1,000 letters you sent to the Fisheries Minister last year helped, and we’ve been meeting one-on-one since to make sure they have the most up-to-date information possible about Alaskan interceptions. We’ve met with Fisheries Minister Joyce Murray, DFO’s new Deputy Minister, Annette Gibbons, plus many other provincial and federal officials. We also met recently with Nathan Cullen, B.C.’s new minister responsible for fisheries, asking him to step up and defend B.C. salmon and steelhead.
- Finally, we’re going to take our case directly to the people who consume Alaska’s seafood in Canada and the lower 48 states. Alaska has coasted on their reputation as a sustainable seafood provider for too long. We already put the brand validators like OceanWise and the Marine Stewardship Council on notice. This year, if Alaska’s fishery managers aren’t willing to change their behaviour, we’re going straight to their customers. So, stay tuned. It promises to be a rollicking campaign.
Thank you for bringing this to everyone’s attention.
thanks for the update…..much appreciated….
Go Watershed Watch! We are lucky to have such good neighbors to the north and south, but we are beyond having to explain the impact of mixed-stock fishing in the science and management community. We have begun the long and hard journey here in Canada to pull back some of our most indiscriminate fisheries into areas where we can responsibly avoid less productive or endangered co-migrating stocks. Alaska its time to do your part. If not, in time you will find your own fisheries will suffer, as the rush to harvest the bonanza means fishing down your less productive stocks and the diversity and vitality they provide to withstand things like climate change. Ignore us at your own peril.
There is no doubt that Alaska intercepts many salmon spawned in BC Rivers. However, there is also no doubt that we intercept many Washington, Oregon & California chinook and coho salmon on their journey to their spawning streams. These fish are essential to the sports fishing operations and limited commercial trolling that takes place on the west coast of Vancouver Island and at Langara and down the west side of Haida Gwaii.l How should this be reconciled?
Great question Lorne.
Our Fisheries expert Greg Taylor may have more to add later, however I’ll give you my best take:
The Pacific Salmon Treaty, which was negotiated in a time of greater abundance, enables these large-scale interception fisheries – which predominantly operate in Alaska. The Treaty was supposed to ‘guard against over-fishing while providing benefits equal to the production of salmon originating in each country’s waters.’ However, it has failed to halt the decline, and we can say without reservation, that it is no longer working. Canada agrees, and has asked for a re-evaluation of Chapter 2, which covers the trans-boundary region between B.C. and Alaska.
B.C. has closed commercial fisheries on the North Coast and in Johnstone Strait and delayed the West Coast Troll to reduce harvest pressure. Alaska’s interceptions now often represent the largest percentage of the total catch for too many of our returning runs. There is no way to reconcile this, because it is no longer sustainable.
In terms of recreational interceptions of American fish, it will be up to WA and OR to raise concerns with Canada if they feel our recreational sector is endangering their Chinook. If so, then that is something we will have to address, so I would recommend that we monitor our fisheries closely to ensure our impacts are manageable. This means lots of genetic testing, and incentives for fishers to log their catch (and their releases.) Perhaps our current impact is balanced by American harvest of Fraser sockeye, however that is pure speculation on my part.
Regardless, I believe we’re past the era where tradeoffs like the ones you are referring to make sense, and I expect all of us will eventually have to move our fisheries to terminal locations and focus on our own fish.
I’m in agreement with David, in relation to the importance of managing by terminal fisheries toward protecting at risk genetic runs that swim in mixed populations. The sooner such a management system is in place up and down our shared Coast, the sooner any given river run may be monitored for health and, a sustainable catch level determined.
There could be room for a negotiated resolution as both Alaskan’s and British Columbian’s share common interests for a future with plentiful Wild Salmon Populations. Each side has a slightly different focus on the particular population involved and in this commonality a negotiated resolution could be reached though it would require cooperation from the stakeholders and the involvement of federal, provincial, and state regulators.
Concerns of British Columbians are well detailed in this article, though a primary concern for Alaskan’s could be explored and addressed. That concern is around protecting their important Salmon populations that originate from shared rivers along the Alaska/B.C. Border. Those populations face increasing threat from mining and development in Northern BC. The risk to these shared rivers is that tributaries in BC, if poisoned will wipe out natal salmon populations in rivers that empty into Alaskan waterways.
Perhaps if the BC Government took real action to hold the mining industry accountable for environmental disasters. And further, prevented such future exploitation of important watersheds. A disaster such as the Mount Polley Mine tailings pond failure would be prevented from happening again. Then perhaps, BC fishers would gain more fertile ground for negotiating a salmon treaty that ensures BC bound fish return to BC waters.