? How can we achieve this please feel free to comment.
It appears it has finally came to surface that it is not only the Classified waters that boast quality Steelhead & Salmon fishing the amount of remote rivers in the Skeena,Kitmat,Nass water sheds are endless, however it appears everyone in the world has realized that we have the Best Steelhead fishing in the world. Lets try to keep it this way for our experience while we live and our future generations.
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| One of the Many sought after fly caught fish in the world Steelhead on the Skeena,Kitimat,Nass Rivers. |
Not good news for sure…my mind went back many years to the beginning of all this quality waters turning into the classified system in 1990…the view back then was from residents who felt the guiding was getting out of control on the Bulkley…so the guides were capped or grandfathered by the honour system which some felt wasn’t so honourable…I think for the most part it was honourable with few exceptions…anyway the cap and later the escalating costs and now we still have all the other categories of angler un-capped.
Then there are the non quality waters which are really quality too but left to become more pressured as time goes on to the point where we have over crowding and perhaps some over guiding on those streams too. Sadly the Kitimat, Skeena and Nass watersheds have quickly become the last great area of wild steelhead stocks, much written about and on the internet, so the anglers are coming in great numbers for the last kick at the cat. It’s big money for the economy but big headaches for fishery management or the lack thereof.
During the QWS workshop years it was agreed that the non resident angler category needed management in order to protect the resident and guide categories. There was also concern for illegal guiding even though the legislation in support of the CO’s was and still is poor. In the recent QWS for the Skeena watershed we witnessed a huge push back by the non residents plus more recently the business community. So the original intent of the QWS to manage non residents has backfired and so we still have no caps on any category of angler except the guides…the residents were to be the last to be restricted according to the original QWS workshop sessions.
The issue of guides flocking to un-classified waters simply comes from the economic opportunities that un-classified waters represent…the classified waters are capped but the un-classified waters are not. We now see young new entrepreneurial guides trying to get into the business and they only have the un-classified waters to this purpose unless they buy into the more expensive classified waters system if there are rod day sales available. So you are right, the residents are now witnessing a new round of guided growth in areas left alone for many years.
Added to this the dangerous precedent of First Nations being able to issue their own rod day allocations outside of the Provincial QWS…even though the Nisga lands may be unique in terms of the settlement with government, does this now mean that other hereditary chiefs in other First Nation territories can now do the same? We need leadership from government on this before this can of worms gets out of control.
Sadly I don’t think government has the stomach nor leadership support from cabinet and the voters to implement and monitor effective fisheries management to address over crowding and illegal guiding…this was the central issues supported by any independent facilitated workshops of which I participated. The larger resident NGO’s like the BCWF and others were in this driver seat of supporting the QWS to maintain controls on guides plus initiate new controls on non residents. It is time that the resident NGO’s once again rise up and express their concern about over crowding on the finest steelhead streams left…if they do not, I don’t think the guides can do that as government does not support the guide view that the QWS is unfinished business worthy of a much more professional and supported effort. In the face of the recent QWS Skeena package and the record amount of money spent on it, I think government has no stomach to open it up again in order to do a much better job…they didn’t listen to the warnings given about the flaws in the renewed process, and I am not sure they are capable of listening without full cabinet support…and let’s face it, fish and wildlife as a Provincial budget priority is not on the radar screen of the people of BC and thus the government.
Even though the steelhead fishery tourism sector, both resident and non resident, is a huge economic contributor for our region, that doesn’t seem to be enough to warrant a stronger fishery management strategy that is both dynamic to change, and have directed funding. I am glad that the Province is making some gains to biologically protect steelhead and that is a great credit to our local fishery biologists, but we need a whole new category of fishery manager that has the supported tools to manage the sociology of angling which means carrying capacity or reasonable caps for all categories of anglers. I have always felt that any un-capped category would some day cause over crowding…and now we see that any un-capped steelhead bearing stream will also some day be over crowded which goes against the whole purposed of the QWS.
I guess whether it’s the Annual Allowable Cut or the Angling Management Plan…they both overstate the resource and over use the quality until there is no quality left. This is our legacy and status quo of doing business. Only if the people in large enough numbers make some real noise will we get the attention of government. Apathy rules the day for fish whether it’s the fish farm issue, so called selective gillnetting or resource extraction leading to mill and mine shut downs that leave a mess or a very depressed community. The sustainable benefits from fish and wildlife with some good industrial projects is an opportunity still waiting to be demonstrated…I still remain idealistic and hopeful that we can continue to advocate for a better status quo for the Skeena watershed. There are many good efforts pending and we still have the opportunity to do it differently.
I sure appreciate your efforts to communicate with Dana and Mark…it is appropriate to start at that level and let them articulate our concerns to the higher levels. It may also be necessary to take this whole mess once again to the Victoria levels as well. Who will stand up and be counted in this way? For some reason the business community just got the ear of cabinet so I think it is appropriate for them to make a serious effort to talk some sense in support of a sustainable economic strategy for fish and wildlife. And bottom line, the QWS must continue to move forward and not become a laughing stalk of planning like the LRMP’s are fast becoming.
Pierce
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