Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
Many others, in Lake Babine Nation and beyond, share Charlie’s concern. The Babine River is an integral tributary for Skeena sockeye, which is a major sockeye run in B.C., second only to the Fraser River. Skeena sockeye are central to Lake Babine Nation health and economy. Every bad year has future ramifications. If fewer salmon return to spawn one year, it can mean a lower return four or five years down the line — the length of the sockeye life cycle.
Biologists are lending a helping hand to salmon in the B.C. interior that are struggling to make it to their spawning grounds due to severe drought conditions. Jason Hwang, vice-president of salmon with the Pacific Salmon Foundation, has joined Sarah Ostoforoff, a habitat restoration biologist with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, at Kamloops Lake to reconnect it with Tranquille Creek so pink salmon currently trapped in the lake can start their spawning journey.
Yukon River chinook and chum salmon in the Old Crow region of the territory are being hit with the perfect storm — not only are this year's runs expected to be dismal, but the life cycle of the salmon is being broken. Over the last several years, lower numbers of chinook and chum salmon have made the long journey from the ocean to creeks and streams at the mouth of the Porcupine River, spawned, and then died. The small fry would then make their way back to the Bering Sea in spring. But now many of the fertilized eggs left behind in the rivers are dying because large stretches of river are drying up in the early spring — and it's not exactly clear why.
University of B.C. researchers are embarking on a five-year study to find out whether road salt is contributing to salmon mortality in B.C. streams. The team, led by Patricia Schulte, Chris Wood and Colin Brauner, also involves dozens of volunteer stream-keepers at 30 streams or creeks. Schulte, a professor in the Department of Zoology at UBC, said as the ice melts on the roads, it runs down into freshwater streams or can seep into the groundwater. Researchers know the salt can harm baby salmon or trout but what they don’t know yet is how much of the salt is winding up in the water.
Mother Nature is about to throw another wet and windy punch our way this weekend, with “continuous and significant rainfall” and strong winds forecast from Victoria to Port Hardy starting Saturday morning or afternoon, depending on where you live. Rainfall, which is expected to last until Monday in some areas, will be heavier than the season’s initial atmospheric river on Thursday that knocked out power to more than 18,000 homes and caused dangerous driving conditions.
More than 65,000 salmon have died before they could spawn in just one Canadian stream. The die-off of two species, mostly pink and some chum salmon, hints at a potentially devastating season for the fish, local people, and the wider ecosystem throughout the region. Researchers from Simon Fraser University came upon the mass fish calamity in the Neekas river in British Columbia’s remote Central Coast on September 29. The waterway is near the community of Bella Bella, within Indigenous Heiltsuk Nation Territory. The full video shows a 360 degree view of the carnage.
After three parched months, much of B.C. is experiencing drought and ongoing hot weather has left streams running dry, leaving no way for some salmon to return to their spawning grounds, killing hundreds in a mass die-off on the province's central coast. The situation has scientists and salmon watchers concerned. The Pacific Salmon Commission initially projected a return of 9.8 million fish to the Fraser River this year. By August, predictions were reduced to 5.5 million. This was readjusted again, on Sept. 28, to 6.8 million. There were record-low rainfalls in September, and dry weather and heat has continued into October, a month known for rain. For some migrating salmon, that lack of moisture is proving deadly.
After years of protest, a pesticide has been released in the Miramichi watershed as part of a project to eradicate the invasive smallmouth bass. Salmon conservation groups confirm Sept. 8 marked the first application of Noxfish II, a chemical that includes rotenone. It was released in Lake Brook and approximately 15 kilometres of the Southwest Miramichi River.
A sweltering heat wave in much of Western Canada in the last week of June had cascading effects on sea life, experts say. Scott Hinch, director of the Pacific salmon ecology and conservation laboratory at the University of British Columbia, said juvenile salmon such as sockeye, coho and chinook in fresh water would have been most affected by recent heat waves. “They’re going to be living in fresh water for one to two years and it’s that life history stage, that this particular heat wave and just climate change in fresh water in particular, is going to have some of its greatest effects,” he said in an interview.
Gary Griffin chokes up as he describes seeing water flowing freely for the first time under a bridge replacing part of the Petitcodiac River causeway. For decades, Griffin publicly pushed for restoration of tidal flow on the river. Now he smiles as he looks out at the water from a park in Riverview. "That was the greatest feeling in the world," Griffin said of watching the water. "You don't know how good that feels after 50 years of trying to fix it." The sports fisherman came to Moncton in the late 1960s. At the time, a 20-year study of salmon populations completed in 1966 estimated salmon runs at 8,000 to 10,000 fish, the Times & Transcript reported.
When Chief Francis Laceese was seven years old he went fishing with his father at one of the traditional Tsilhqot’in fishing sites along the Fraser River and, during a break, scooped up a bucket of water to make tea over the fire. Today, no one would feel safe making tea from river water because of effluent flowing directly into the river from the Gibraltar mine, Laceese, 61, told The Narwhal. As Tl’esqox chief, Laceese is among the Tsilhqot’in leaders fighting against a provincial permit that grants the Taseko-owned Gibraltar mine permission to increase by 50 per cent the amount of untreated tailings pond water being piped into the river from the mine site 60 kilometres north of Williams Lake. The Gibraltar mine was first built in 1972 and is Canada’s second-largest open-pit copper mine.
The Columbia River Treaty, an international agreement governing the flow of water between British Columbia and six U.S. states, will be 55 years old this year. It has not aged well. The river springs from the Columbia Icefield in the Rocky Mountains of B.C. and winds 1,930 kilometres through the Northwestern United States – Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Nevada and Wyoming. No other river in North America spills more water into the Pacific Ocean.
“Far too often, governments in Canada have demonstrated that they place little value on the health and well-being of Indigenous peoples and the revitalization of their cultures and traditions,” Tara Scurr, business and human rights campaigner with Amnesty International Canada, said in a statement Thursday.
