Cancellation of the 2025 Chinook Enhancement Initiative
Open Letter to South Vancouver Island Anglers Coalition (SVIAC) Members, Sponsors, Volunteers and FriendsIn late November last year, we received notification from DFO – Nitinat Hatchery that they would not be able to provide smolts for our Sooke Chinook Enhancement Initiative in 2025. Apparently, due to a lower than expected Chinook egg take at the Nitinat Hatchery last fall, they will be unable to produce enough smolts to supply our project in 2025. This information, coupled with some other DFO data related to lower than desirable returns to the Sooke River, has resulted in the cancellation of our project this year.
While we are very concerned about the cancellation of our project in 2025 and future interruption to returning Chinook salmon to the Sooke River in 4 years, we remain optimistic that we will be able to restart the project again in spring 2026 with the support from DFO and the Nitinat Hatchery, that we have depended on since 2017.
Since 2021 when the first Chinook returns from our 2017 Net Pen project started showing up, local anglers and fishing charter operators in the Sooke area have benefited from almost 5 million smolts released into the Sooke Basin, and the increased number of Chinook salmon returning to the Sooke area. And the increase in returning Chinook salmon has been also benefited the Southern Resident Killer Whales in the Sooke area, as DFO has identified a key salmon foraging area off Otter Point as part of it’s 2024 / 2025 SRKW Recovery Plan.
We are currently in the early stages of planning to engage with DFO and the Sooke community to commence discussions related to continuance of our project in 2026. We will provide you with updates on our progress as meetings are held and decisions are made.
In the meantime, we are continuing our fundraising efforts through local fishing derbies in 2026, on the assumption that we will have a net pen project in 2026 … and will continue to plan for upgrades to our Sea Pen infrastructure, including nets, the framework and floats, new pipes, pumps and other infrastructure components to support our project in 2026.
We are also planning to engage with DFO, and the Sooke Chinook Enhancement Society to remove the current escapement net from the upper estuary on the river and provide a proper salmon counting fence and cameras to be able to get a more accurate count of the returning Chinook salmon and avoid a lot of the predation from seals and sea lions that is significantly impacting the returning Chinook numbers to the Sooke River.
We will also be continuing our advocacy efforts to push back on further DFO restrictions on Chinook retention in the South Vancouver Island region.
Further information and updates will be published in newsletters, with the next one planned for February this year.
Thanks in advance for your continuing support!
Bill Campbell
Director – SVIAC