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Wild salmon face an upstream battle
October 20, 2016
Wild salmon have a long, difficult journey through the oceans and rivers to reach their spawning grounds. Humans are only making it harder for them to survive the trip, but it's crucial that they do.
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Conflict grows between fish farms and First Nations
September 8, 2016
Conflict is growing between Cermaq Canada and the Musgamagw Dzawada’enuxw and Ahousaht First Nations. There have been four arrests of First Nation peaceful protestors, and the activists have handed eviction notices to the fishfarms on their territories.
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Salish Sea’s salmon
August 11, 2016
Adam Olsen tells the story of the importance of salmon to the Salish Sea, and talks of the challenges that face them.
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Salmon: the telling relationship between infection PVR and disease HSMI
July 14, 2016
Ray Grigg explains the connection between the HIV-like PVR and AIDS-like HSMI. It poses an unacknowledged danger to wild salmon, easy to ignore as it poses less threat to farmed salmon.
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Sea lice reported out of control
January 14, 2016
Farmed salmon are reported to have up to 20 sea lice each, instead of the 3 permitted. SLICE, apparently, no longer effective in treating lice. New ‘cocktail’ drug toxic to shrimp and prawns. Local fishermen object to new open pen license.
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Herring and Heiltsuk
April 16, 2015
The Heiltsuk made a stand and Fisheries an Oceans closed the commercial herring fishery in Area 7, in the Great Bear Rainforest.
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Deep Bay/Bowser residents take action against beach destruction
October 2, 2014
Residents of Deep Bay and Bowser have taken matters into their own hands, planting gardens and building benches in an effort to block seaweed harvesting machines.
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Herring roe fishery disputes settled for this year
April 17, 2014
This year’s fishery areas for the roe herring fishery have finally been settled by a precedent-setting court action, followed by negotiations between commercial fishers and First Nations. The three fisheries in dispute were West Coast Vancouver Island, Haida Gwaii, and the Central Coast.
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Geoduck (gooeyduck) lease openings
April 3, 2014
DFO plans to open BCs coast to geoduck aquaculture. This invasive aquatic farming could have enormous impacts on the Salish Sea’s island shores. Denman Island Marine Stewards and Gulf Islands Alliance are advocating a ban on geoduck aquaculture in the Islands Trust Area.
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The Red Herring of the Dismantling of DFO
Nov 21, 2013
Loys Maingon says that the dismantling of DFO is not the root of the problem. DFO formation, supplanting the Fisheries Research Board in 1973, was the first step in trivializing world-class fisheries science. Now that job is done, DFO can go too.
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Another early warning on salmon
Aug 1, 2013
Fish biologist Alexandra Morton of Sointula has identified another virus which appears to be endemic among farmed salmon on the BC coast and could possibly infect wild salmon.
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Lab finds virus, delisted at government request
July 18, 2013 | Patrick Brown
University lab loses internatioanl certification and its samples after detecting ISA virus in west coast salmon.
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Movie review of Salmon Confidential
May 9, 2013
Ray Griggs gives a vivid account of Twyla Roscovitch’s movie currently touring halls and cinemas on the coast. The only thing better would be to see it.
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Wild salmon economy
April 25, 2013
Creator of movie, Salmon Confidential, Twyla Roscovitch tells it like it is for the natural capital of wild salmon, money figures and all. The problem of farmed salmon infecting BC’s lifeblood wild salmon is so easy to fix.
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Islanders leading seafood traceability initiative
April 19, 2012
New ‘Thisfish’ coded label allows consumers to track seafood back to the fisher.
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Winter herring quota could be 'catastrophic'
November 17, 2011
This year's Strait of Georgia herring fishery opened on November 7 with a quota of 6,000 tons, a massive increase on last year's 283 tons. Raincoast Conservation Foundation is asking for a moratorium on the herring fishery until stocks have recovered, especially in light of the recent announcement of the proposed National Marine Conservation Area.
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Government tests for salmon virus come up negative
November 17, 2011
Retesting of westcoast samples has turned up negative results for infectious salmon anemia but the debate goes on.
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New wrinkle in the salmon debate
November 3, 2011 | Sara Miles
Despite DFO's claims to the contrary, infectious salmon anemia is confirmed in wild salmon on BC's west coast. Government will delay for further tests, instead of taking precautionary action.
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Alexandra Morton reads between the lines at the Cohen Commission
September 22, 2011
Reviewing the evidence at the Commission brings out correlations between farmed salmon disease and collapse and recovery of wildstocks — although the Commission has wound up, the problem is far from over.
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By-catch deprives grizzly bears of food
September 8, 2011 | Misty Macduffee and Chris Genovali
Coastal grizzly bears cannot compete with BC's recently certified 'sustainable' commercial salmon fishery, which catches more than it can keep.
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Fishy business
August 25, 2011 | Sara Miles
Cermaq admits to mismanagement of their fish farms in Chile, as BC dives back into the Cohen Commission inquiry.
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Is salmon virus in BC?
July 14, 2011
Alexandra Morton is calling attention to the risk the ISA virus could pose to wild BC salmon.
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Another Norwegian fish farm in Clayoquot waters?
June 30, 2011
Environmental groups call on the Province to place a moratorium on fish farm expansion, as the comment period is extended for a new open net-cage salmon farm site in the Clayoquot Sound Biosphere Reserve.
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Fundamental Forage Fish
April 7, 2011
Forage fish such as herring, surf smelt, sand lance and anchovy are now getting the research and documentation they deserve.
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Past salmon studies inconclusive, says Cohen
November 11, 2010
An Interim Report on Fraser River Sockey salmon concludes that despite the studies and recommendations, no useful conclusions can yet be drawn.
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Morton applies for expired salmon feedlot licenses
September 2, 2010
Alexandra Morton acts to return feedlots to their natural state to grow wild fish.
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Sockeye salmon inquiry proliferating
September 2, 2010
The federal Cohen Commission's investigation into how to manage BC's Fraser River sockeye is requiring 12 studies into the fish and the fishery. Meanwhile eight public meetings are being held.
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Federal fish farm regulations questioned
Aug 19, 2010
Responsibility for salmon farms on the BC coast is being passed from the provincial to the federal government. The federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans have published their draft regulations, which do not improve over the provincial ones.
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Department of Justice will pursue fish farm case
April 29, 2010
The federal Cohen Commission into managing BC's Fraser River sockeye salmon is requiring 12 studies into the fish and the fishery. Meanwhile eight public meetings are being held.
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Salmon will get a judicial inquiry
December 17, 2009
The federal government has set up a Judicial Inquiry into the disastrous decline in the Fraser River sockeye run, and into the Department of Fisheries and Oceans’s role in the losses. Meanwhile, a senior DFO senior scientist resigns over Ottawa’s failure to act, fish farms in Chile are decimated by a virus, and both farmed and wild salmon in Norway are threatened by sea lice.
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Wild salmon have a future
November 19, 2009
Wild salmon champion Alexandra Morton congratulates Prime Minister Harper on the judicial inquiry into Fraser River salmon decimation and explains why the inquiry is important.
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Boiled Salmon
July 16, 2009
Approvals for new salmon farms increase the risk to viability of wild salmon.
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Marine Harvest appeals aquaculture decision
March 26, 2009
BC’s largest aquaculture company, Marine Harvest Canada Ltd, has announced that it intends to appeal the February 9, BC Supreme Court decision that the federal government, not the provincial government, has jurisdiction over aquaculture on BC’s coast.
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Sea change for salmon farms
February 26, 2009
Who’s in charge of salmon farms? For twenty years they have been under the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Lands but right at the moment, it looks as if that will end within a year.
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Salmon Research Centre Proposed
May 15, 2008
A Canadian research centre is needed to deepen our understanding of how climate affects salmon in the North Pacific, says the Pacific Fisheries Resource Conservation Council (PFRCC). The idea was floated in a report released on May 5, ‘Climate Effects On Pacific Salmon In The Ocean: Creating A Canadian Focus.’ The report reviews research on Pacific salmon from the leading research institutions and universities that conduct significant salmon /climate projects.
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Saturna salmon cycle begins again
November 29, 2007
Last week Saturna’s salmon enhancement group went up to Cowichan River to collect salmon eggs destined for Lyall Creek on Saturna.
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Liberal motion would hoist new Fisheries Act for six months
March 8, 2007
On the first day’s debate of second reading of the minority Conservative government’s proposed new Fisheries Act, Bill C- 45, the Liberal opposition introduced an amendment that would delay further parliamentary debate on the Bill by six months.
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Salmon mapping
June 29, 2006
A pioneering study of the out-migration of juvenile salmon through Heiltsuk traditional territory on BC’s central coast is underway this May and June.
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Bill 48: Sablefish Hatchery Raises Concerns
July 31, 2003
At Walker Hook on Salt Spring Island, Sablefin Hatcheries Ltd. is in the process of building a hatchery for sablefish, sometimes known as Alaska Black Cod.
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