In the past two years the Public Fishery has been fighting for its very survival, a struggle that is only worsened in 2020 by the COVID-19 pandemic. Certain Fraser River Chinook salmon, especially those stream-type fish that spend 18 months in the river rearing from alevins to smolts, continue to experience an unprecedented decline.  With Chinook salmon being the most important species to BC’s angling communities, there is real fear of what the future holds. So far, government experiments with Chinook non-retention measures have been a failure for the fishery.  Catch-and-release Chinook fishing just doesn’t cut it for the Public.

Go forward, the billion dollar question is: Can DFO rapidly implement meaningful measures that allow for the Fraser Chinook stocks of concern to recover, while simultaneously fostering the Public Salmon Fishery in Southern British Columbia?

SVIAC president, Christopher Bos, weighs in and lays out a solution for the Chinook and the survival of the Public Fishery in the briefing paper in the link HERE