Are Bering Sea bycatch fatalities a key to Canadian stock problems?

Did 65,000 Canada destined salmon meet their demise, victims of American fishing practices in the Bering Sea? That’s the question that fishery observers are asking after DNA analysis shows that there’s a good chance that a good portion of the Bering Sea Pollock fishery by-catch were heading for Canadian waters, as a normal progression of their life cycle.

With 130,000 salmon “accidentally” caught and then thrown back dead by American fishermen as bycatch of the Bering Sea Pollock fishery, some tough questions are being asked of the Canadian government as to what they are doing about species protection of Canadian stocks.

Bulkley Valley-Skeena, NDP MP, Nathan Cullen is so enraged by what he calls the “carnage”, that he is making plans to deliver a letter on Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn’s desk, demanding answers and a call for a more effective handling of the management of the salmon stocks.

The Daily News featured the growing concern over the bycatch issue as part of a Front page story in Tuesday’s paper.

U. S. FISHERMEN’S ‘CARNAGE’ OF CHINOOK HAS MP FUMING
While Canadians were not allowed to fish for Chinook U. S. fleet took 130,000
By Leanne Ritchie
The Daily News
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Pages one and three

Damning reports last week of a record by-catch of prized Chinook salmon in U. S. waters last year has Skeena-Bulkley Valley MP Nathan Cullen demanding answers from the Harper government.

“DNA analysis shows that half the 130,000 salmon ‘accidentally’ caught by Americans in the Bering Sea Pollock fishery last year would have ended up in Canadian rivers, most of them in British Columbia,” Cullen said.

“This carnage of valuable fish is completely unacceptable when we have so many users in the Northwest unable to fish at all because of devastated stocks.

“I want to know what the Conservative government is planning on doing to protect Canadian stocks and fishing families in the coming year,”

The report in a Canadian Press story last week noted that although Canadian commercial fishermen were not allowed to take any chinook from the rivers, and First Nations pulled just 5,000 for a food fishery, Pollock fishermen threw 130,000 of the large salmon back into the ocean dead after the salmon were caught as by-catch.

It came in the same year that fish escapement levels were hardly reached in the nearby Yukon River, well known for its Chinook fishery.

The record accidental catch, or by-catch, had alarmed fisheries experts, environmentalists, government officials and even Pollock trawlers, who say a by-catch cap would devastate their fisher. DNA analysis shows about 20 per cent of the Chinook caught up in the football field-sized nets were bound for the Yukon River, which runs through both Alaska and Yukon Territory. Another 40 per cent of those salmon were destined for rivers in British Columbia and the U. S. Pacific Northwest.

Cullen said he is putting a letter on Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn’s desk this week to demand answers and to call for more effective management of salmon stocks.

He noted that the by-catch issue has been a problem for years but never before have so many Chinook been caught up in the nets as in 2007.

The failure to cut the by-catch is a failure in regulation and enforcement, he said.

“This is just ridiculous, and one more of many examples of the complete breakdown of effective fisheries management in Canada right now,” Cullen said.

Chinook, also known as king, are the giants of the salmon world and can reach weights equal to an average seven-year-old child.

Pollock are small, sedate and plentiful, and often used in fish sticks or fast food fish sandwiches.