>> Looking for the latest on B.C. salmon fisheries? Read Greg Taylor’s 2020 Salmon Returns Overview.
Evidence of a Changing Climate
It was 1993. I was in the passenger seat of a Cessna 185, bouncing not far above the waves off the NW tip of Haida Gwaii, looking for sliders. Fishermen often call sockeye ‘sliders’ for the way they seem to slide over the top of the water.
Suddenly, right below us, a large white blob materialized just under the surface. The pilot put the Cessna up on one wing as we tightly circled again and again over a large, sluggishly-swimming fish. We had never seen anything like it.
Back in Prince Rupert, I identified the fish as a sunfish, typically found in temperate and tropical waters. Looking back in my logbooks, I now realize this was my first evidence of the climate change that would ravage salmon abundance over the next twenty-five years.
Then and Now
In 1993, the commercial fishery caught almost 35 million salmon, and most systems were fully seeded with millions more returning adults. This year, seven salmon life cycles later, the total salmon catch by all fisheries (First Nations, recreational, and commercial) is unlikely to reach 1 million, less than 3% of the 1993 commercial harvest. And in 2019, most salmon populations did not even see sufficient spawners to meet their minimum biological objectives.
Largest fisheries of 2019
The largest fishery this year was the north coast hook and line fishery for chinook and coho. Commercial trollers and the guide outfitters/lodge industry caught about 130,000 chinook and 210,000 coho. About 40% of the chinooks were released, but DFO has no accurate estimate of how many of these discarded fish survived to spawn.
The second largest northern fishery was the Area 8 mixed stock chum fishery, near Bella Coola. Gillnets and seines harvested almost 140,000 chum salmon. Most significant wild chum streams in Area 8 came nowhere close to achieving their minimum escapement targets.
The third largest northern fishery was the Area 3 mixed stock fishery, off the mouth of the Nass River, where fishers caught 21,000 sockeye, 56,000 pinks, and 21,000 chum salmon, however none of these species achieved their escapement targets (the minimum number of required spawners).
North and Central Coast
Other significant populations on the north and central coast were also very depressed. The Skeena sockeye return was one of the poorest since the Babine slide in 1951. The Skeena’s once abundant pink salmon continued its steep downward trend. Skeena chinook, while better than 2018, was again poor. And Skeena steelhead was below escapement objectives.
South Coast
Major south coast species were also at historically low levels of abundance. The Fraser River, once the world’s largest sockeye producer, had the lowest sockeye return ever recorded.
South coast chum salmon, both wild and enhanced, are returning at very low levels. Many south coast chinook populations will not achieve their escapement objectives. Thompson steelhead remains at critically low levels.
The small surplus of Fraser pink salmon was harvested in a non-selective, poorly monitored, fisheries when threatened Fraser coho and endangered Thompson steelhead were present.
The largest fishery on the south coast was the guide outfitter/recreational chinook and coho fishery. Catch and discard numbers will not be released until later this year.
Big Bar Slide
The largest story for many in B.C. was the Big Bar slide that threatened Upper and middle Fraser sockeye and chinook populations. While some fish passage was achieved late in the season, research from the 1951 Babine slide suggests spawning success of those that made it through the slide area will be compromised.
The most important takeaway from the slide is that we need to manage salmon populations for resilience, not harvest. Past and current DFO management priorities have reduced many Upper Fraser salmon runs to a fraction of their historical abundance, robbing them of the resilience needed to handle a natural disaster like the Big Bar slide. Recovery will be difficult and take years, maybe decades and will only be successful if governments make recovery, not harvest, the priority.
Salmon in a Changing Climate
Yes, 1993 was a good year. And yes, 2019 is the worst year on record. But what is of more concern is the evident correlation between steadily increasing global temperatures and steadily decreasing salmon abundance.
Salmon have what it takes to survive the changing climate. They are remarkably resilient, with the ability to adapt to a wide range of conditions and habitats, providing we increase abundance by reducing fishing related mortality, defend their habitats, and preserve their genetic diversity.
Cowichan chinook are bucking the trend with another good return in 2019, thanks to the recovery actions were led by the Cowichan Stewardship Roundtable. Their success speaks to the benefits of rebuilding habitat, limiting harvest impacts, and collaboration, efforts we need to replicate across the province.
Greg Taylor, Watershed Watch’s fisheries advisor, has worked in the B.C. seafood industry for over 30 years.
In 2009 I published a paper in Ecology and Society titled Resilient Salmon, Resilient Fisheries for British Columbia, Canada (http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol14/iss1/art2/). At that time the sorry situation we now find ourselves in was already well into its development. Climate change is only exacerbating what we have been doing to salmon with inappropriate management policies and inadequate enforcement for decades. Ecologists and social scientists have been telling fishery manages for a long time that it was a bad idea to manage salmon as an economic commodity rather than as an ecological and cultural resource that integrates the sea, the fresh water, the forests, the wildlife, and the people in a resilient mosaic that, with proper stewardship, could continue indefinitely. For me, the jury is still out on whether salmon will persist at any meaningful level of abundance in BC as we continue to ignore the growing threat of climate change. In the immediate future, the situation will only get worse and it is possible our grandchildren will never experience the thrill of watching tens of thousands of salmon spawning in the Adams River, or of catching a coho on a fly. Indeed, we as a species are also vulnerable to the juggernaut of climate change. Right now the future does not look pretty.
Hi Michael!
The wcvi North coast and Haida gawii herring populations all continue to decline
This despite the closure of herring fishing years ago now
This has never happened before, even in times of poor marine survival
I can only see the problem as the expanding effort of the 24/7 factory trawlers
Who of course grind though or heavy stress a lot of herring
Your take?
Best
David Ellis Vancouver
No mention of how good the South coast chinook fishery? Why not?
It’s all over but the crying. TOO MANY PEOPLE !!!!!
Do you have access to the hatchery produced numbers in these river systems in 1993 and 2019?
Thanks!
Amen !
A good read Putz and I think very accurate.
Apparently there was a huge fishing season on Alaska.
My understanding is that salmon navigate their return in part by water temperature. Warm water ,(like this year), forces the fish north.
Were our fish caught in Alaska?
Are Alaskan caught fish tested to determine where they were going?
Have these questions been asked and were they ever answered?
Salmon
….Independent science has proven beyond a shadow of doubt , open pen fish farms , on the coast of BC , are destroying wild salmon , and yet our governments, provincial and federal ignore all the findings, and disregard court orders to test invasive Atlantic salmon for virus , prior to putting them in our waters. As we also had another warming trend in the pacific this year , this 4 year cycle of sockeye was dismal up and down the whole coast , and based on the numbers likely lost too many systems. Based on the warming oceans and the massive returns and harvest in Alaska , is it possible , that fish destined for BC waters were harvested in Alaska ? Is there any studies or science that tells us what percentage of Alaska’s bumper year of sockeye were BC Bound fish ? Does anyone have any answers to these questions?
What about fishfarm impacts on Fraser stocks?
Could the Japan nuclear disaster play a part in lack of salmon in the Pacific?
as you know salmon size has dropped. I think from the lack of hearing ,and feed in general, September pink salmon that were 6 to 12 pounds are now 3 to 5 pounds could this lack of feed also make for poor returns ?
Hello Greg,
Thank you for the work you are doing.
AS a Seine Fisherman in 1991. 92 and 93, it is very painful to watch the Salmon Stocks dwindle to the point where these are currently at.
It has been my initiative to work with Scripps Oceanography and Oregon State University to realize that the Ocean is changing rapidly and the oxygen depleted dead zones are goring at alarming rates which of course as the Pacific Ocean Currents move Northward in March brings up the Oxygen depleted seawater water into British Columbia which No Oxygen, No Life.
It is my hope that more people can become aware of the state of the Global Oceans and realize that if we do not react quickly to the current Dead Zone problems of the Pacific Northwest, not only the Salmon will disappear but all marine life will continue to decline which will put all of the human population next on the extinction list.
Thanks for the information! Hopefully, there is enough wisdom out there to recognize what needs to be done and that action is needed NOW! That it’s time to rebuild!
Re “largest fisheries of 2019. Watershed Watch said: “The second largest northern fishery was the Area 8 mixed stock chum fishery, near Bella Coola. Gillnets and seines harvested almost 140,000 chum salmon. Most significant wild chum streams in Area 8 came nowhere close to achieving their minimum escapement targets.”
Watershed Watch may have incorrect information, or data used out of context. Escapement target for Bella Coola / Necleetsconnay watersheds ( both flow into North Bentinck Arm inside the commercial fishing boundary ) is 40,000. Both the Fishery Managers and Hatchery reported an escapement of 40,000 to these streams and they were well distributed. I can’t comment on other Area 8 and Central coast chum ( and other species ) escapements, which DFO compiles and shares in the ‘ Post Season Review ‘ which I don’t think has been finalized yet . The fall run of chums to the Bella Coola seemed a bit better than it has been for the past few years (these are all wild chum )