The Fraser River sockeye run has collapsed this summer, and environmentalists blame Georgia Strait fish farms.
The Department of Fisheries and Oceans, in a July 5 post on its website, described this collapse as "migration difficulties for most populations of Fraser River sockeye salmon."
According to the blog Osprey Steelhead News, the Fraser sockeye run is a bust:
The Fraser has multiple distinct runs of Sockeye, all of which appear to be seeing lower than expected returns. With recent high temperatures, Summer Sockeye the largest component of the run will be subject to potentially lethal river temps over 20 C.
While it is impossible to blame one factor for the poor returns, development of fish farms in the Georgia Strait is likely sevely impacting outmigrant sockeye smolts and in recent years high prespawn mortality in adult sockeye has meant that many fish aren't even reaching the spawning grounds.
High prespawn mortality has been attributed to in river temperatures however some researchers believe disease may be contributing. Salmon farms along the migratory corridor may be increasing the incidence of disease among returning adults.
Meanwhile, environmentalist Alexandra Morton alerted her readers to the problem:
This week the Fraser River sockeye run was critically downgraded. This was no surprise to me as I looked at this generation of Fraser sockeye and they were infected with sea lice near the fish farms from Campbell River to eastern Johnstone Strait.
While they are bigger than pink and chum salmon when they enter the sea, they are damaged by the lice, you can see an image on the website www.adopt-a-fry.org.
The pattern keeps repeating. If they caught farm lice when they were young, they never come home. As soon as the farm salmon are removed, they do come home.
Morton went on to say:
The downgrade of the Fraser sockeye is a warning we can choose to ignore or react to. Alaska is seeing huge sockeye returns and they do not allow Atlantic salmon to be penned on their salmon migration routes.
We can make many guesses as to what happened to our sockeye, but it does not make sense to ignore the one that has been researched and published and seen worldwide. Commercial, sport and tourism operators are taking losses to protect our wild salmon and yet the fish farms just keep getting bigger and more numerous.
There is something very wrong here and if we want our wild salmon we need to speak now or forever lose our fish.
Crawford Kilian is a contributing editor of The Tyee.
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Illahie
2 years ago
Crawford, Maybe sealice cause global warming
Your statement:
"Meanwhile, environmentalist Alexandra Morton alerted her readers to the problem:"
DFO is stating that high water temperatures are causing migration problems for Sockeye.
Alexandra is blaming sealice.
So sealice must be causing the high water temperatures that is affecting the Sockeye stocks. Perhaps sealice are the cause of Global Warming
Me thinks that the heat is affecting more than the Fraser Sockeye run.
Name
2 years ago
This makes no sense...
The impact of high river temperatures on returning salmon has been documented exhaustively. Extensive lab and field studies have approached this from multiple directions & all pointed clearly and definitively to the same conclusion - returning salmon can't survive river temperatures that exceed their tolerance thresholds. Average thresholds vary but are in general very low. If the water is even remotely comfortable for swimmers, it's probably lethal for salmon, and we know this will only get worse with climate change.
The issue of early migration and high pre-spawn mortality in late-run Fraser sockeye was first noted in the mid-1990s. Since 2002, this has been the focus of an intense NSERC-funded collaborative research program led by UBC's Scott Hinch.
(For a list of peer-reviewed published studies on this topic to date, see www.psc.org/info_laterunsockeye.htm . For a current assessment of status/issues for Fraser salmon, see the SC/Fraser stock report just published by the independent Pacific Fisheries Resource Conservation Council: http://www.fish.bc.ca/)
Nothing in the published work by Hinch et al remotely points to sea lice, though some intriguing new findings are being explored by government and independent scientists. The problem also seems to be worsening, with unusually high pre-spawn mortality seen in many other Fraser sockeye stocks last year. Hinch's group is supposed to be working on a summary of findings to date/directions for further research, and I'd be very surprized to see a single reference to sea lice in it.
This past winter, Vancouver hosted the international State of the Salmon conference (organized by EcoTrust & Wild Salmon Center, with David Suzuki as opening keynote...). Scientists from around the Pacific discussed status and threats to Pacific salmon, and again, sea lice weren't on the radar in terms of serious threats to Fraser sockeye. (More at: http://www.stateofthesalmon.org/conference2009/)
Ms. Morton's earlier work drew attention to risks posed by sea lice from fish farms to juvenile pinks in the Broughton (& to DFO's failure to confront that issue). But in her blind crusade against fish farms, she's sadly undermining her credibility as a scientist. The problems for Fraser sockeye precede fish farms in Georgia Straight and work to date by credible independent scientists has pointed to a number of other very plausible threats - particularly climate change. But next she'll be claiming that sea lice are causing climate change, the economic recession and maybe even swine flu.
It's depressing that this attention-seeking behaviour is successfully diverting attention from the many very real threats to our Pacific salmon stocks, and encouraging British Columbians to identify fish farmers as the sole culprits when in truth, we - all of us - are the ones who are truly threatening our salmon stocks with extinction.
Dan the socialist
2 years ago
One only has to look at
One only has to look at Chile, Norway etc to see what sea lice has done to native stocks..
It is also no secret here what the sea lice has done to the pink salmon either.
blackie
2 years ago
Don Quixote redux
Name says:
"It's depressing that this attention-seeking behaviour is successfully diverting attention from the many very real threats to our Pacific salmon stocks, and encouraging British Columbians to identify fish farmers as the sole culprits when in truth, we - all of us - are the ones who are truly threatening our salmon stocks with extinction."
At last, someone who is prepared to apply some fact-based critical thinking to this issue. Alexandra Morton has been on a crusade against fish farms (with lots of help from Rafe of course) for years. Hers is a "don't let the facts get in the way of a good story" campaign, as her determination to blame every hit on wild salmon on lice from fish farms.
I've talked to several scientists inside and outside government on this, and their constant lament is that Morton's campaign has so warped the scientific approach to determining the real threats to salmon that they can't get attention for anything but sea lice. As a result, badly-needed research into the causes of ocean mortality goes under-funded year after year while everyone focuses on lice.
As name points out, sea-lice is quickly becoming a non-issue among scientists who don't have an agenda. They, unfortunately, don't quite have the same access to the media that Morton does because, well, they don't want to wage war against fish farms. And if they are government scientists, of course, they get muzzled.