Limiting effort, updating regulations, and implementing real-time compliance monitoring are three things we can do now to maintain the long-term benefits of our South Coast recreational salmon fisheries.

B.C.’s valuable South Coast marine recreational salmon fisheries are having yet another banner year. Our growing and increasingly affluent population is driving an increase in salmon licence purchases and supporting a growing fleet of charter operators fishing for chinook and coho. This increase in fishing effort is producing record catches and releases, making the recreational salmon fishery one of the largest in B.C. But a darker picture lies behind social media boasts of record catches: rising effort paired with unwise regulations and gear — driven by mark-selective recreational fishing policy and commercial sportfishing culture — is resulting in the needless waste of several hundred thousand valuable chinook and coho, which die after being discarded as per Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) regulations. DFO remains unwilling to collect the population-level data needed to assess the true impact of a fishery that now has the distinction of killing more salmon as bycatch than any other Canadian salmon fishery.

Fisheries advisor and recreational fisherman David Mills

This unmeasured toll is setting the stage for allocation conflicts, as freshwater recreational and many Indigenous fisheries targeting the very same stocks remain closed. Meanwhile, countless posts on social media, comments on my previous posts¹ and my angling friends who love fishing, love salmon, and love harvesting salmon for food tell me they are increasingly sickened by the needless waste built into these marine catch-and-release fisheries.

However, three management strategies that have been successfully applied to other popular, high-value freshwater recreational fisheries could be used to put this fishery back on a more sustainable footing:

1. Regulations and gear which are clearly driving up release mortality should be eliminated – quickly.
2. Participation in the fishery should be limited, and charter operators acting as fishing guides should be licensed and regulated by DFO.
3. Real-time catch monitoring and sampling should be implemented so that marine recreational fisheries intercepting salmon from closed freshwater fisheries, or in excess of Canada/USA treaty limits, can be shut down immediately.

Each of these strategies is already used in adjacent freshwater recreational salmon or steelhead fisheries, or in Washington State, so they should be familiar to marine recreational fishery managers. Implementing them now would send the signal to the public and the commercial sport fishing industry that this fishery will be managed for the long-term benefit of all British Columbians. By failing to measure the impacts of recreational catch-and-release fisheries, DFO is prioritizing the interests of commercial sport fishers and harvesting over good management.

Chinook bycatch mortality is rising with no end in sight

In the waters off southern B.C.’s most popular sport-fishing destinations, DFO created expansive recreational catch-and-release (DFO uses the term ‘mark-select’) chinook fisheries that they proposed could operate safely with low impact on wild populations. Most of these fisheries require anglers to release unmarked fish, immature fish, and very large fish to rebuild a previously over-exploited age class. These fisheries have the highest participation rates, and are among the largest fisheries in B.C. retaining on average over 150,000 and releasing 300,000 chinook per year over the past five years.

Mark-select fisheries exist because the commercial sport fishing industry lobbied for substantial public investments in the Salmon Enhancement Program to create hatchery chinook to supplement populations of wild chinook, many of which have declined. An average of 32 million of these were released from south coast hatcheries annually between 2019 and 2024.

With ocean survival rates ranging from 0.01% to 2.0% depending on the fish’s development stage at release², there are between 70,000–570,000 hatchery-origin adults returning each year — mixing with local wild populations, transiting wild populations, and hatchery-origin salmon bound for Washington or Oregon.

Source: DFO South Coast Assessment Bulletin, Creel Survey Updates (annual reports, 2019-2025)

These catch-and-release fisheries now sit at the root of contentious allocation battles between Indigenous, commercial, and recreational sectors, and between tidal and freshwater fisheries. DFO presumed (without verifying) that a mortality rate of 15% for wild adult chinook encountered and released in these fisheries would be an acceptable impact. However, in practice the fishery is mostly releasing smaller chinook, of indeterminate origin, which suffer significantly higher release mortality (~36%) compared to larger fish (>80 cm), which have a mortality rate of only 4–12%³. Applying those rates to last year’s release volume, we estimate that close to 100,000 chinook were killed — just because anglers were forced to discard them. When roughly 25,000 chinook were killed as by-catch by B.C. trawlers it made headlines across the country.

Coho release mortality is out of control

The unexpected resurgence in south coast wild coho adds further complications to catch-and-release fisheries. We don’t yet fully understand why there are now so many coho, but we do know that hatchery production cannot explain the abundance. An average of 6.1 million coho were released annually from South Coast/Lower Fraser hatcheries between brood years 2020–2023.⁴ By applying current ocean survival rates to that figure, it’s likely that 140,000–251,000 of the coho swimming around the south coast last year were possibly hatchery-origin. With marking rates near 100%, and recreational encounters approaching 450,000 fish in 2025⁵, a defensible estimate is that 65–70%⁶ of the population out there is wild. What we are more certain about is what happens when any coho encounters recreational anglers.

Source: DFO South Coast Assessment Bulletin, Creel Survey Updates (annual reports, 2019-2025)

Research by Lunzmann-Cooke et al. (2024) demonstrates that an initial 31.5% mortality rate at 3.3 days post-release escalates to 56% by day 9, reaching 77.4% by a median of 13.4 days as fish approach the lower Fraser River⁷. In DFO management documents, the standard release mortality rate ascribed to recreationally caught coho salmon is just 10%.⁸  In DFO’s estimate, roughly 30,830 coho mortalities would have been ascribed to anglers releasing fish in 2025. However, if we apply the updated mortality curves, the real figure is likely somewhere between 97,114 and 238,624 fish killed. The vast majority are wild. This is a staggering policy failure. 

The regulator is aware of—yet choosing not to implement—the very science it helped fund. In a recent conversation, an angler noted that seven or eight out of every ten fish brought to the boat are wild, adding that he can often spot a wild fish before even seeing whether or not it has a clipped fin, just by how beaten up it looks—suggesting many are hooked repeatedly. Mandatory release regulations are a staggering policy failure causing anglers to kill more wild coho last year than the hatchery coho they retained.

Catch-and-release culture

Social media stories abound with tales of the number of unmarked fish anglers must go through to find their hatchery fish. I am a recreational angler. I have spoken to dozens of others like me who hate these regulations. We don’t want to waste the fish; we want to reach sustainable catch limits with the opportunities we have, and we’re happy to stop fishing when we do. Everyday anglers don’t need a math lesson to recognize that if they were allowed to keep wild fish as part of their limit and then stop, far more wild fish would be on their way to the spawning grounds, which, by the way, is how this fishery continues its recovery into the future.

However, for some guides (at least those posting regularly on social media), releasing dozens of fish each day in catch-and-release fisheries designed to be recharged by taxpayer-funded hatchery production is how they grow their brand and clientele. However, as we have learned, releasing fish does not lead to the happy outcomes portrayed to clients.

This chinook is bleeding from a large hook, has been exposed to air and has fin damage from netting—all factors that reduce its likelihood of surviving release.

Whether the chinook pictured above, which is about to be thrown back, comes from a population healthy enough to sustain this type of angling pressure isn’t known. But it is bleeding (too large a hook), air-exposed (poor handling), fin-damaged (netted rather than released in-water), and is now far less likely to survive this encounter. The charter operator isn’t breaking any rules; however, if he is not aware of the best handling practices and gear types that minimize mortality in recreational fisheries, which have been described extensively for several years, he is willfully ignorant.

It’s time to license guides and accept limits

The reality is that there is only so much natural salmon habitat, and all salmon face challenging ocean conditions, commercial fishing pressure, and climate change. While recreational fishing for hatchery chinook has been strong for several years, hatcheries will not lead to wild salmon recovery, or replace wild salmon over the long term.⁹ Fishing pressure cannot grow indefinitely.

The chart below shows the post-pandemic rebound in participation in the south coast recreational fishery. We’ve had some great returns that have made the experience feel like the days of old — though that success is not evenly distributed. Recreational anglers still cannot retain chinook on the Fraser, our biggest salmon river.¹⁰ The sky is not falling, but neither is it blue.

Source: Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Pacific Region recreational fishing license statistics

In the 1990s, in response to growing pressure in freshwater fisheries, managers, with the full participation of stakeholders, implemented lotteries for out-of-province anglers, restricted gear, and capped guided rod days when they built the Classified Waters management system. While not perfect, this system maintains opportunity while managing angling pressure, providing predictability to business owners who introduce people from around the world to our wild steelhead rivers. The time has come to do the same for saltwater salmon guides.

A provincial Angling Guide Licence is required for guiding on all non-tidal (freshwater) bodies of water in British Columbia. To obtain it, an applicant must pass the Angling Guide Exam with a minimum 80% grade, demonstrating working knowledge of the Wildlife Act and Regulations, and must carry no less than $2,000,000 in public liability insurance and pay an annual licence fee of $400 plus a $50 Habitat Conservation Trust Fund surcharge.¹¹ All a saltwater fishing guide has to prove is that they have met the requirements to operate a charter boat. Once they hold the same angling licence you and I are required to buy, they can guide anglers so long as those anglers have purchased a licence, too.

A 2008 study found that Skeena River sport salmon and steelhead fisheries generated $52.8 million in economic impact¹²

The management of B.C.’s classified waters — like the Dean, Bulkley, and Skeena — also offers a roadmap for managing effort. The system caps the number of “rod-days” available to angling guides on these specific waters to manage crowding. On the Dean River, non-resident anglers wanting to fish without a guide have to win an annual lottery draw to purchase a licence. Any non-resident fishing a classified water while guided must be tied to their guide’s allocation. The Dean also has a major gear restriction: it is “fly only” from July 15 to September 30.

What Classified Waters actually gave freshwater guides wasn’t restriction. It was a business asset: a capped number of licences, built with guide input rather than imposed on them, with real, durable value. Thirty years later, it’s still working.

In DFO’s 2024 “Recreational salmon fishing economic contribution and profile” report, total GDP from the recreational salmon fishery was $250 million, of which marine chinook and coho combined generated approximately $192 million.¹³ With their economic clout, commercial sport fishers likely have the social licence to build a licensing and cap system in the spirit of Classified Waters, should they choose to direct it accordingly. The experience of their freshwater counterparts suggests that doing so would lead to predictable bookings, a defensible reputation, and a market that can’t be flooded by anyone with a Small Vessel Operator Proficiency certificate and the cash required to operate a boat.

Instead, commercial sport fishers claim gear restrictions, reductions in daily limits, and closures to protect endangered chinook or Southern Resident Killer Whales harm their industry and threaten jobs. Every job matters these days, no doubt, but the experience of the freshwater fishing economy suggests that loosening regulations may work against you. Given that salmon have demonstrated extremely high per-fish value in the freshwater guiding economy, it may be unwise for an industry that killed over 200,000 as by-catch before they even got close to their rivers of origin, to fight the regulatory changes required to rein that waste in.

If Washington State can monitor recreational fisheries in real time, so can we

Limiting the effort, to preserve the quality of the angling experience and conserve the resource, is a commonsense solution that has already been applied to adjacent fisheries in B.C. And, eliminating bad regulations will reduce the number of salmon that die when released. Together, those two strategies would re-orient an unsustainable fishery onto a more sustainable path. But, how will we measure this? We still need to understand which salmon the fisheries are encountering so the fishery can actually be managed to avoid threatened populations.

Washington’s Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) does this well. They track catch against each area’s quota through the season and can close an area the moment it’s reached. Anglers there must record any retained fish immediately, now increasingly through an app that reports straight to WDFW. In some fisheries, they also voluntarily log every fish encountered — kept or released, marked or unmarked. Those logs are verified by “fish checkers” stationed at high-use boat launches and marinas.

DFO uses some of these tools. It tracks retained catch during the season, and the voluntary FishingBC app lets anglers log catch in real time. They’ve also periodically run a handful of “reference fisheries” (more aptly called ‘test fisheries.’) Reference fisheries independently verify reported fish releases and collect vital stock DNA by operating similarly to regular recreational boats. However, due to a lack of funding, this program has been halted in B.C., leaving a critical gap with no way to verify annual chinook and coho releases.

Making the FishingBC reporting mandatory for licence holders, and expanding reference fisheries could help managers close a specific fishery if it starts intercepting threatened stocks, rather than write a report about it the following year.

Rethinking marine recreational salmon fishery management

The South Coast marine recreational fishery is a genuinely important part of our culture and economy. However, in killing several hundred thousand chinook and coho each year that should be returning to rivers across Southern B.C., it takes opportunity from equally important inland fisheries, and has become fundamentally unethical. It’s also worth considering how many Washington State salmon are killed. In a year where Pacific Salmon Treaty talks are moving beyond the preliminary phase, it’s clear that Washington State is paying attention.

As our population continues to grow, so will the number of people fishing. It’s clear that we must begin to limit effort in order to keep impacts at a sustainable level. Fortunately, British Columbians are familiar with lotteries, bag limits, classified waters, rod days, gear restrictions, and other routine aspects of fish and wildlife management that are designed to do just that. We should follow the example set by the freshwater sector and license salmon fishing guides, and limit participation in the fishery.

Given their current abundance, regulations requiring the release of wild coho should be abandoned. In their place, anglers should be required to cease fishing once they reach their limit. The same should apply to undersized chinook, which should count towards the daily and seasonal limit. Large chinook (which survive encounters better than other salmon species, if handled correctly, and angled for with the appropriate gear) should continue to be released. 

Speaking of gear, it is in the interest of both the commercial sport fishers, and the angling public to work cooperatively to lower release mortality by changing how we fish. The data showing the benefits already exist, and all sectors who participate in the Integrated Fisheries Management Process are aware of what they are. There is no excuse for delaying them.

Finally, DFO needs to implement real-time monitoring and verification. It’s the only way to collect the information we need to sustainably manage one of this country’s highest-impact salmon fisheries. Doing so would ensure it can continue long into the future without taking more than its share from neighbouring freshwater fisheries or from the stocks of wild chinook and coho that our ecosystems and the next generation of anglers depend on.

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¹ Challenging our assumptions about catch and release | Watershed Watch Salmon Society and The Growing Toll of Catch and Release Casts a Shadow Over Recreational Salmon Fisheries

² Samantha E. James, Beau Doherty, Sean P. Cox, Isobel A. Pearsall, and Brian Riddell. 2023. Size and timing of hatchery releases influence juvenile-to-adult survival rates of British Columbia Chinook (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) and coho (Oncorhynchus kisutch) salmon. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences

³ Fisheries and Oceans Canada. 2026. Southern B.C. Salmon Integrated Fisheries Management Plan.

⁴ DFO Post-Season Production Reports, Salmonid Enhancement Program

⁵ DFO South Coast Assessment Bulletin — 2025 Creel Survey Update

⁶ Based on the kept/released split from the same South Coast Assessment Bulletin creel data, with the caveat that this describes the fish anglers encountered, not the full in-water population.

⁷ Lunzmann-Cooke et al. (2024).

⁸ Fisheries and Oceans Canada. 2026. Southern B.C. Salmon Integrated Fisheries Management Plan.

⁹ Riddell, B.E., Pearsall, I., and Rosenberger, A. (2024). Review of Pacific Salmon Hatcheries in British Columbia and Interactions with Natural Populations. Pacific Salmon Foundation. marinescience.psf.ca

¹⁰ DFO Fishery Notices, Fraser River Chinook management measures (recent seasons have used defined non-retention windows, e.g., April 1–July 14, in specific management areas). notices.dfo-mpo.gc.ca

¹¹ Province of British Columbia, Apply for an angling guide licence, portalext.nrs.gov.bc.ca; Angling and Scientific Collection Regulation, s.9, bclaws.gov.bc.ca

¹² Babine River Foundation, citing a 2008 economic impact study of Skeena salmon and steelhead sport fisheries. babineriverfoundation.com

¹³ Fisheries and Oceans Canada, Recreational salmon fishing economic contribution and profile in 2024, Pacific Region. pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca: Tidal chinook $119M + tidal coho $73M = $192M

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