Q and As – May

Salmon Steward, PSF: I have some copies of the Pacific Salmon Foundation’s current Salmon Steward magazine and if you would like one, send me your address, and I’ll shoot you a copy.

One of their large, interesting projects is figuring out why the ‘Salish Sea’ coho and chinook numbers nose-dived in the ‘90s and not come back. These days juvenile salmon can have implanted tags that can be read by acoustic arrays, hand held wands and even seal ‘beanies’ making it a reality that they can be found anywhere from stream to open ocean and back again – without killing the fish, and thus getting time series data for the same fish thousands of miles apart.

If you want to be part of the citizen science program conducting oceanographic sampling, get in touch with the PSF. Also see: www.marinesurvivalproject.com. 

It appears that algal blooms that cause increased levels of toxins kill juvenile salmonids. It has also been demonstrated that smolts have more microbes than in the past, the source of which is at this time unknown.

You may know that other research, by Sean Godwin from SFU has demonstrated that sea lice, even in small numbers, affect sockeye fry ability to consume food and thus survive. This year the lice load in the Broughton Archipelago from fish farms is far higher than it has been. In fact, globally, sea lice are the worst problem reported by industry. Last year, Alf Helge Aarskog, CEO of Marine Harvest, said that anyone with a solution should get in touch. They have 90 scientific studies going world wide to solve the issue of lice being resistant to all the chemicals they use.

BC Federation of Drift Fishers, Rod Clapton, President: “The proponent, Aevitis is withdrawing its proposal for a hazardous waste facility on the Fraser River in Chilliwack. Over the past 18 months the combined efforts of many is responsible for this decision & demonstrates that when a potential threat of this magnitude rears its ugly head ALL sectors can work together.”

“Galvanizing the sport fishery, First Nations and environmental sectors shows that local, province-wide and international support has ‘protected the world’s number 1 salmon river.”

Sport Fishing Institute: The CTAG challenge for experienced guides will take place on May 20, 2015. This is free and a useful certification and training credit along with other industry benefits. Guides who want to participate need to submit an application ahead of time: http://www.sportfishing.bc.ca/docs/tag_challenge_application.pdf.

If you are looking to become a member of the SFI, the following link lists the benefits to your business: http://www.sportfishing.bc.ca/resident/sportmemberbenefits.htm.

Fishers are also asked to comply with requirements for accurate catch data in creel and guide log-books. “Providing fisheries managers with quality data can provide a strong argument against detractors who may claim that our fisheries are not adequately monitored. Over a number of years, and by the review of a number of test programs, DFO has determined that guide logbooks are a valuable component of recreational fisheries data and are working to increase their use particularly in areas where creel survey data is limited.”

South Vancouver Island Anglers Coalition: Just in is an economic evaluation for the PSF, in GDP terms, of sport and other fishing on the BC economy. See: http://ethink.ca/Melissa/ECONOMIC%20DIMENSIONS%20of%20PACIFIC%20SALMON%20FINAL%20REPORT%20Counterpoint%202014%2006%2027.pdf

This is a useful document to refer to when gross domestic product economic figures are needed. Do note that the figures I put together for salmon/fishing revenue – not GDP stats – came in far in excess of the Billion dollars that we commonly refer to for sport fresh- and salt-water. Revenue is $2.72Billion, so don’t forget to use this figure. Last week’s post gave the references. See: www.onfishingdcreid.blogspot.com.

Chinook Corridors – DFO: In areas 18 and 19, (Race Rocks to Active Pass) to protect Fraser early summer chinook, DFO has introduced protection methods that will include chinook corridors.

May 4 until 23:59 June 12, the daily limit is two chinook of which only one may be greater than 67 cm. In 19-5 and Sidney waters, the minimum size is 62 cm, not the 48 that prevails in area 19.

DFO is expecting less than 45,000 chinook 5(2)s at the Fraser estuary. Further action should be expected and will be out in early June, and likely continue after June 13.

Do remember to send in those chinook heads from fin-clipped fish, as they provide critical information for coast-wide stock assessment. Contact the Salmon Sport Head Recovery Program at (866) 483-9994 for info.

Pacific Salmon Foundation (PSF) – Editorial – DC Reid

The PSF asked me to do an editorial on the value of salmon/fishing to BC and what needs to be done to bring salmon back. Below is the text that ran in the Salmon Steward on April 6, 2015. You can get a PDF for the entire document from Elayne Sun, esun@PSF.CA.

Below the text is backup for revenue and salmon numbers.

Examining the massive impact B.C. salmon have on Canada’s economy

BY DC REID

DC Reid is a B.C. poet, novelist and angling  writer

British Columbia’s calendar begins when salmon come back, and resident and non-residents alike eagerly take to the waters. Salmon are more than just fish to British Columbians. They compose a socio-economic backbone for aboriginal and non-aboriginals alike. Even BC vegetation responds. Fifteen percent of carbon in cedar trees 1000 years old comes from salmon toted into the woods by bears, wolves and eagles. With almost a million square kilometres, less than a tenth of the country, British Columbia has 99.8% of the salmon (that’s 42,900% more than the rest of Canada). In turn, we issue 300,000 freshwater licenses, 300,000 salt-water licences, and 200 First Nations licenses, comprising almost a third of all Canadian licenses.

Expenditures on salmon capture and freshwater fishing topped $1.716 Billion in 2014. If we add the commercial and processing sectors, the value is: $2.52 billion. We need to protect our fish because, for example, in the Strait of Georgia, there has been no commercial fishery for more than 20 years, and the sport fleet is a spectre of what it once was. Fixing the Salish Sea’s Georgia Strait could add $200 million in additional revenue, more than $2.72 billion in total, and that is only part of our 25,000 km shoreline. Salmon are that important.

Need for Change

But there are problems to solve on the way to prosperity. We need to accelerate the use of land-based fish farms. The Namgis First Nations are proving that closed-containment land-based aquaculture can be an economically viable option through their Kuterra farmed salmon brand. Additionally, our science must adapt to climate change which results in dry hot water in summer and floods in winter. We need to know the genetics of fish that can stand extremes.

A century’s logging damage must be addressed along with 77,000 culverts that prevent fish movement and spawning. Habitat work costs millions. Passing the responsibility to B.C. from Ottawa could help strengthen support for provincial salmon needs.— Last year Ottawa’s total B.C. program was $0.9 million, when one clay bank project on the Cowichan cost at $1.5 million a few years ago. Not enough.

The $25 million Salmon Enhancement Program needs to be taken out of the Conservation and Protection standard object — where it is whittled down as a freebie for the West — and placed in its own budget along with the new announcement of $4 million for salmon enhancement in the east.

A drastic interim need is widespread netpens for sterilized Chinook to address food needs for imperiled killer whale populations that now only consist of 78 individuals, with the residual adding to winter fisheries and adult returnees. There is little genetic issue with fish that cannot reproduce and there is little competition for food with wild fish, because there are so few wild Salish Sea Chinook. Ending the herring roe harvest would improve salmon numbers, too, allowing us to slowly replace netpens with wild Pacific Chinook in Georgia Strait.

Salmon Need Habitat and Money

The Pacific Salmon Foundation has a vital role in bringing back wild Pacific salmon. The most important role is improving habitat for salmon. Additionally, the Freshwater Fisheries Society that puts out 8 million freshwater trout, and has a well-developed marketing program that could be adapted to salt water, too.

In terms of funding, the $1.8 Million Salmon Conservation Stamp revenue was dedicated to the Foundation recently. I think the Salmon Conservation Stamp should quadruple to $24 per licence, making the amount $7.2 million per year. At the same time, the federal and B.C. governments could make matching contributions making available $21.6 million for habitat reconstruction. This annual amount would comprise a sound base given the community groups that the Foundation funds ability to leverage dollars some seven-times, through donations and in-kind contributions in for work and equipment used. Let’s bring them back one at a time and let’s do it in British Columbia.

                                                                        ***

Now, let me show you how I derived the financial figures and fish number figures.

1.      Revenue

The financial numbers were derived from several reports. We normally say it is a billion for angling, but when I looked deeper into the reports, and accounted for processing and commercial, updated for inflation, found separate figures for fresh and salt angling, the figure came in much higher. Note that my purpose was saying what the total value of salmon/fishing is to BC, not simply sport revenue.

My estimate should be conservative, as I made no inflation adjustment for the BCFFSBC figure, and used $200 M for Salish Sea potential, rather than the high end of $400M or higher.

1.      BC Stats Report: $344.8M Commercial + 427.5M Processing  = $772.3 for Commercial and Processing = $806.4M updated for inflation.

(See my site for the table and link to the BC Stats report: http://fishfarmnews.blogspot.ca/2013/02/sport-fishing-how-we-tack-up-feb-6-2013.html).

2.      The BC Freshwater Fishing Society document says freshwater alone is: $957M.

(Freshwater Angling and the B.C. Economy –  Megan Bailey (Environmental Policy Group, Wageningen, UR) and U. Rashid Sumaila (Fisheries Centre, UBC), 2012). I made no adjustment for CPI.

3.      From a DFO report I found for tidal waters direct sport expenditures on investments: $706.0M, updated for inflation = $758.7M.

(See: http://sportfishing.bc.ca/docs/110_-_national_recreational_fishing_survey_-_bc_tidal.pdf).

 Total: $806.4M + $957M + $758.7 = $2.52Billion.

4.    Then I added the mid-range value from the stats on the Salish Sea derived for the PSF: $200M 

Grand total: $2.52B + $.2B = $2.72 Billion

                                                                        ***

2.      Fish Numbers

A.    Atlantic Salmon

I was simply stunned to find out that all Atlantic salmon, in six provinces, half the country (and you can add Maine in, too) was only 170,000 adult salmon at sea. I think that this alone explains why DFO in Ottawa does not get BC.

See the graph in this document: http://0801.nccdn.net/1_5/039/0bf/290/nasco-background2014v4.pdf. You will note that the numbers of Atlantics has been below the lowest threshold for fisheries of 213,000 for more than 20 years.

B.     Wild BC Salmon

As for wild BC salmon, I looked over five DFO and PFRCC reports and settled on three for most of the data:

Riddell on northern BC: https://www.psf.ca/sites/default/files/SalmonResources-North_2004_0_Complete.pdf. QC Sound to Portland Canal.

Mark Johannes: http://www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/Library/347505.pdf. Transboundary rivers in North BC

Marc Labelle, PFRCC Doc, 2009 for southern BC: Can be found on the PSF site.

There were problems with data and methods: data holes, differing methods, for ex, aerial survey versus on foot, flood years, methodological differences, estimated figures, graphs with trends but no current figure, different models and so on. I spent three full days figuring out the numbers of fish from all systems in BC.

Where needed, I made assumptions of what seemed the most reasonable fish figures in comparable years. For escapement in an average year, meaning in-river after all fisheries, the wild BC salmon number is 38.62 million salmon. The number of salmon in the ocean before all fisheries is about twice that size or 72.65 million salmon. To figure out a mega-year in-ocean number of salmon before fisheries, I scoured the documents for peak year numbers, for example, in the Fraser, add 15M for extra sockeye, and 20M for pinks, and this came out to 128.05M wild salmon in BC.

Now, BC’s percent of all Canadian salmon, in an average year, is: 72.65M / .17M + 72.65M = 99.8% of all the salmon in Canada. The six eastern provinces have only .2% of all salmon.

Similarly, BC has 72.82M / .17M = 42,835% more salmon than the rest of Canada.

Herring Roe Fishing and Aboriginal Historical Tonnage

Most sport anglers would like to see the herring roe fishery that DFO authorizes be curtailed so that there is more food for salmon – buy the licences back. I was recently sent a very interesting exchange on the subject between David Ellis and Billy Griffith. The stories they tell are so interesting, instead of homogenizing it down to a news column, I give you their unmodified emails. Of great interest is the aboriginal history, and the existence of herring bones in middens from millennia ago. Who’d thunk they’d last so long?

From David Ellis

To: Hal Michaels [and an extensive cc list]

Subject: Nanaimo herring/DFO data base only back to 1951 so far/ancient Orca populations/private funds to buy out the roe herring fleet/CC: Mr. Glen D. Clark, President, The Jim Pattison Group, Vancouver, BC

 Dead on Hal, B.C. herring DFO catch data go only as far back now as 1951, on somewhat dubious older data as Billy notes (but a great effort and I thank the DFO folks that put that together so greatly, all on the WEB now). Nanaimo was a huge early herring fishery for salted herring before that, but no data as "sales slips' not a requirement then. I believe that the Nanaimo areas was wacked then and has never been allowed to recover (Bill Ricker told me of roe herring openings in Departure Bay, which he watched)

Archeologist Dana Lepofsky and colleagues have moved the Salish Sea 'Herring graph'  date back several 1000 years. I don't know how much published yet. Herring bones stay around quite awhile. Very very exciting work. Now to get the DFO and Jimmy Pattison guys (HIAB) (herring advisory board) to agree to use this new empirical data in the DFO models. It will indeed mean less fishing and cash in his pocket for a few years as herring stock rebuild.

And now we have the UBC and other bird researchers coming up with much historic data, all back-calculable to the ancient herring biomass. There is a whole industry in that rebuilt bird biomass too, as we discussed.

For the period of first contact till 1951 I look to the ethnographic archivists to fill in that gap. There are great archives in UBC, Vancouver, Victoria and Nanaimo but Feds shut down the huge archive at Indian Affairs in Vancouver, whoever decided to do that, let they be judged by future generations.

Then we have the huge need for ethnographic interview as with the late Edward Seymour of Stz'uminus First Nation, he was a cracker jack at putting out branches at the last Salish Sea herring roe fishery.

Of course quantifying all of this will give us a much better idea of the ancient biomasses available for the First Nation roe-on-branch fishery and also the ancient Orca populations and your Puget Chinook, etc. I don't see any great problem in coming up with a new "ancient biomass" number. Just a bit of politics in the way.

Swimming into what I believe was a biomass of at least 100,000 tons of "young of the year" migratory herring then and what I also believe was another 200,000 tons of "resident" herring biomass, they would grow fast as did the coho.

Many older sport fishers have noted the former great abundance of "young of the year" and the "resident" herring in the summer in the Salish Sea to me, and actually these older guys and their inheriting children do have the bank bucks and tax credit needs and also dislike (that’s putting it mildly) of the roe herring fleet, to make a a total private sector buyback of the roe herring fleet entirely possible now. So we need to come up with a buyback $ number, for all of the roe herring licences, that the The Jim Pattison Group, and other licence owners, would accept.

All is coming together very fast, what a great nation we do live in.

Best

David

CC: Mr. Glen D. Clark, President, The Jim Pattison Group, Vancouver, BC

From: 15-03-15, Hal Michael

To: David Ellis

David

A question to ask DFO, and maybe you have, is the length of their data base.  If they have decided to cut off years, they need to publicly state why. WDFW regularly and routinely ignores old data. Old being a relative term, in some cases old is 5 or 6 years ago as I was arguing this specific instance a month ago.  They had something like 40-50 years of trap counts that they ignored.  It allowed them to have fishing patterns that they wanted.

When I looked at Ricker curves for some wild chum runs one thing that stood out is that as escapements increased (due to a poor market, Canada not fishing, luck) the calculated MSY escapement and production rose. The converse, which I will look at by sorting the data by escapement, is that if you evaluate only the small run sizes of a population you get a smaller MSY.

So, by finding ways to ignore data on large catches, large runs, allows one to construct a defensible (?) model to justify fishing. 

---

A PLEA FROM AN OLD HERRING FISHERMAN, TO THE MINISTER OF FISHERIES AND OCEANS GAIL SHEA

Honourable Gail Shea

Minister of Fisheries

Ottawa

   Dear Minister Shea,

                                      When we were fishing herring for reduction we used to catch about 250,000 tons a year for many years before we cleaned out the herring. We almost made them extinct. Luckily for all our fish and sea mammals we did not quite kill them all. If we let them build up to old levels before fishing them we could probably harvest 100,000 tons a year forever. But we are too greedy to do this. 

   DFO records I believe show 220,000 tons a year but there was some slippage on the scales. When we brailed the packer Challenger full ( we were still brailing, the pumps were not in use yet ) the Challenger skipper would let us fill him and pound 3 brails on top to compress them a bit but he would not allow even one herring on deck. Then he would take them to be offloaded. If he went to Steveston to BC Packers they would weigh them and report 90 tons. If he went to Prince Rupert the Co-op weighed them as 105 tons. They may have pumped out a bit of water on the way up there too. If there was 15 tons stolen on every boatload that could make a report of 220,000 tons really be about 250,000 tons for the year as most of the herring went to Steveston. 

   Why cannot we allow the herring to build up to historic levels? That would mean more salmon, cod, all other fish, more seals , sea lions, orcas, everything. The orcas mostly eat Spring Salmon as they are smellier so easier to detect and catch. Sport fishermen as well as orcas would thrive with more Springs. 

   Why cannot someone in your department wake up and act on saving the herring?

          Billy Griffith

          Fisherman

          Egmont BC

__________

Mr. Billy Griffiths is an old time commercial seine fisherman, still fishing I think, who has always taken the time to provide insider information to me on the history of the B.C. herring. As a former troller fisherman, as I was, he grew to know first hand of the very close Chinook/herring relationship, and comes up with a new insight below ("orcas mostly eat Spring Salmon as they are smellier so easier to detect and catch"). Chinook salmon have very strong and distinctive odour noticed as soon as they are taken from the water.

The fact that the roe fishers this year have had to fish so long and hard to locate and then take just 8,000 tons, when they once could take 72,000 tons from the Salish Sea, shows what little we still have left of this resource, and how important it is to stop, now, and develop a rebuilding plan. For the Orca/Chinook if not for us.

[Graph did not copy]

David Ellis

Vancouver

From DFO website: "largest catch, 72,000 t was taken in the Strait of Georgia in 1956"

B.C.COASTWIDE CATCHES 

Chinook Structure

Last week I looked at chinook and their relationship with structure. Here are a few more thoughts.

There are times when chinook are not related to structure. I mentioned open ocean fish far above the bottom, nursing, but there are circumstances closer to home. In Saanich Inlet, for instance, chinook mosey down the Bamberton shore glued to structure until they hit Sheppard Point. Conventional wisdom would have them bear right and thence to Stone Steps and McCurdy Point.

When I started fishing in the ‘70s, I would turn that corner, avoiding the reef that veered out from Sheppard between the two points to try and catch your gear. Often I would see the old timers simply carry on in a straight line and cross Squally Reach aimed directly at the other side and McKenzie Bay (Saanich regulars did not go by the ‘correct’ name of McKenzie Bight).

I thought it was because they were fishing a full spread of Peetz wire-line rods and it was easier to go in a straight line, crossing the fishless deep water, and then pick up structure and fish on the McKenzie side. But I was corrected and told that chinook often simply went in a straight line there and crossed the deep water, that, in fact, they caught lots of fish ‘high’ in the water way above the 700 foot depths.

In other words, instead of following structure, the fish did not change direction and crossed deep water with no relation to structure. I did not receive a good reason, only that they did so, and so I picked it up and, yes, caught fish in mid-channel unrelated to structure.

One explanation seems reasonable to me, but there would be more. In March to early May, some years Chinook in the 16- to 22-pound range came into the Inlet and seemed to follow it, swimming around the structure from top to bottom. My SS Guppy II 24-pounder was one of those fish. After several years of our catching them and giving creel reports and heads, DFO eliminated retention for those fish in Saanich and anglers were not impressed.

It turned out these fish were from the north and south Nooksack and Samish rivers in Puget Sound, a genetic pool the Americans were trying to save – and Victoria Waterfront retention was also closed for this reason. The behaviour we saw was crossing deep water, and circling the perimeter, but not leaving.

The best explanation is that, as Jimmy Gilbert and Charlie White put it, Saanich Inlet is a giant, natural fish trap. Wain Rock to Cherry Point is the opening, and fish migrating south simply pass into what is an 18 mile long ‘trap’. Genetics made them stay deep in the inlet, milling around, and not think to migrate back 18 miles to the north to get out of the trap and off south to Puget Sound. That made them available for a long time for anglers, and it was well known that they would migrate the perimeter and each successive day’s angling was hottest ahead of yesterday’s hotspot.

The same structureless pattern often happens in September. The Cowichan chinook, and, more-so, coho, can be found in Squally at 250 feet mid-channel, particularly on blue-sky high-pressure dog days of summer. Still prevails. That is why there is a closure in the Inlet – to protect the remaining Cowichan fish.

Another example is where migrating chinook cross deep water pushed by their genes. Some years ago, a young angler in the Pink Salmon Festival received the biggest fish of his life almost out in the shipping lanes, fishing with pink hootchies for pink salmon high in the water. That fish was likely crossing Juan de Fuca to a Puget Sound river. The same pattern prevails for chinook that hit Tumbo reef off Saturna or Active Pass. There is thirty miles of deep water that must be crossed to get to the Fraser River side.

Now, the fishing in deep water would set up a fish highway that you could follow by GPS marks, provided  there was only one opening on our side of Georgia. Let’s say only Active Pass existed. It would pass all the fish, tens of thousands in a summer.

Finally, this phenomenon exists even though chinook tend to stick to shore in the last 100 miles from home. Our late chinook, the white Harrisons, are typically Island Outfitters leader board fish in September, into the forties. They are caught on the Owen Point ledge at Port Renfrew that is a stone’s throw to shore – ditto for Aldridge and Creyke points, also flood tide waters, in Sooke – even though when passing into Georgia they cross deep water unrelated to structure.

One last thing: I have often caught chinook absolutely perpendicular to a point of land. McCurdy Point and Trial Island are such examples. Tide pushes quicker passing round a horizontal point, and one would expect the fish to be swept into the downstream eddy. But darned if they aren’t in the faster water off a point. So fish past a point rather than hauling your lines and moving, on days the tide will let you pass the point; days when it won’t, don’t waste time trying to get by, just move.

Licences and Chinook Structure

Licences: 2015 saltwater licences are now available and become effective April 1.

You can pay and print your licence at: www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/sportfish.

Or you can get one at an Independent Access Provider, a list of which can be found at: http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fm-gp/rec/licence-permis/IAP-FAI-eng.pdf.

You can get the Tidal Waters Sport Fishing Guide at: http://www.pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/fm-gp/rec/index-eng.html.

Chinook Structure: Every fisher knows that chinook are always found related to structure. But there is much to ponder and many kinds of structure.

Offshore, chinook spend their open ocean phase related to feed and bottom structure may be a mile away. Feed becomes a kind of structure in this case. It also does where herring/baitfish ball together prior to spawning. In the past, that meant finding the bait in front of the Victoria Harbour in January to March. You found the fish once the bottom slipped away from 115 feet off the Ogden Point Breakwater and moved down to 200 feet.

The fish were found associated with staging bait, rather than bottom. The same can be said of offshore fishing spots. For example, at Langara HG, a couple of miles out from Lacey Island, one strips out 80- to 100-pulls (a 2 foot pull) and at 80- to 100-feet, at a slow troll, plenty of big mature chinook have been taken over the decades. This kind of instance is very unusual in that the chinook are not related to structure. They are coming in from the open ocean and have yet to line themselves up. You catch them because there are just so many of them you will encounter some, and because it is a kind of freeway for fish coming on shore at that spot.

There are few places along the coast where the Lacey pattern prevails, it happening largely because it is situated as the first structure the nursing chinook encounter. It is also true to say that migrating mature chinook are found miles off shore in many open ocean spots, but they are all on structure.

The 1.5 mile ‘highway’ at Kyuquot Sound has a lot to do with the ledges of rock deep in the water. But off Nootka Sound, the 13 mile bank – as in 13 miles offshore – is a flat pinnacle that migrating chinook preferentially pass because they are structure related, and most are bound for the States. Last year more than 1 million chinook formed the Columbia River escapement, for example.

Off Ucluelet lie many banks, from the 7.5 mile all the way out to the Rat’s Nose some 25 km out, a high spot in the bottom. Swiftsure Bank is the same. It can be accessed from Bamfield, Ucluelet and Port Renfrew, and forms a series of clover-leaf-shaped banks some 13 miles off Vancouver Island. Banks naturally attract fish for several reasons.

The bottom to the west of Swiftsure is more than a mile deep and the shallowest part of the bank is less than 200 feet deep. Swift rips occur any place where a vast amount of water is restricted in its flow, in this case it is a vertical restriction (as is the case with all banks) rather than the more usual horizontal restriction, the obvious examples occurring in rivers; the Powder Wharf on James Island is an example of a rock structure changing directions and forming a pocket in which chinook sit – a very common occurrence.

On the Swiftsure example, and whenever water is restricted, it must speed up to pass over and around bottom structure, in this case from 5,000 feet to 200 feet. Anyone who has been out there on a rough day can tell you that the house-sized chop has to be experienced to be appreciated. Boats and then their aerials just disappear from view, only to be lifted high by the next wave rolling under them.

All banks receive water from much deeper and this water brings the nutrients that start the food chain. Algae, plankton in its various forms, then krill/crustaceans, become the food for baitfish, and sockeye, coho and chum. Where there are baitfish – anchovy, sardines, pilchards, herring, anchovies, needlefish – you will find fish, salmon and other species.

In the case of the Rat’s Nose and Swiftsure, you fish the edges, or canyons for halibut which are right on the bottom. The salmon are farther up in the water column. In Constance Bank off Victoria for instance, the edges on the north side – 60 to 100-feet deep – and south east tack are better for chinook than fishing right on top of the bank. And you will often see boats anchored on the 60 foot depth and then the ebb taking the boat to present its halibut baits on the 140 foot lip that extends to the west. As a lee spot on an ebb, the lip gathers bait and halibut swept off the plateau above.

On days when there is a rip snorting tide, the speed often reduces fishing, for both halibut on the bottom, and salmon above. A fast flood on the Rat’s Nose pushes so hard to clear the 250 bank depth that it pushes the salmon and halibut as much as a mile off the bank to the south and east where the water is soon 500 feet deep, but the fish remain at 250. The bank gives up few fish on such a tide, but letting the current push you off keeps you in contact with the fish that the tide is also moving.

But as chinook become mature they tend to come on shore and migrate down the surf line rock piles and walls. Whale Channel, a Westcoast Resorts lodge, has some mighty fine walls as does Rivers Inlet. The chinook come right up to them and slowly move from pocket to pocket – meaning Vs formed by two horizontal outcroppings of rock, resulting in slower water between them; this is what makes Bamberton in Saanich Inlet so special – it has a half dozen Vs in half a mile.

Perhaps the best example, and my favourite place, is Tasu Sound on Haida Gwaii. It was a Westcoast lodge though there is none now, but is a classic full meal deal having halibut pinnacles, walls, a half mile wide opening through which wind just rips making the trees look some demented they are pushed sideways so much, along with bucktailing for coho, and surface fly casting to chum rafts, and half a dozen streams on the inside, calmer waters. If a lodge opens there, do go. It’s a treat.

The wall on the outside of Tasu is so vertical that you are trolling cutplugs so close your rod tip almost touches the wall, as in one foot. You are actually trolling right underneath the rock outcropping that rises right above your head. A small island completes the pocket. You feel very small among the big fish, many 50 pounders annually. Ditto for Rivers, and right around the corner from the Oak Bay lodge, tight to a wall that abruptly changes direction 90 degrees, the lee of flood or ebb indicating which side to fish – always on the lee.

And then there are surf line rock piles where you are cutplugging in water less than 50 feet deep while waves crash on the rocks and reflect back to where you rock in the conflicted water. It is a straight adrenaline hit simply to be there with your offering in the water. If you can’t get up for surf line fishing, it is time to hand in your licence.

At Langara, that is what makes Cohoe Point such a solid producer of big springs. You can grind as close to the rock as you dare and the chinook are again in the lee. Andrews is a more pronounced horizontal point – like Otter Point and Clover Point – where tight to the inside sit the springs.

Even after 30 years of being fished, Andrews still has black bass, as does Langara Rocks farther north. A strong flood will push the springs out of shore from McPherson – you follow the tide line. For anyone who has fished Langara, the nature of points of land attracting chinook, is clear because the long flat Egeria Bay shoreline that leads to Cohoe seldom gives up a fish. Like the Oak Bay and Ross Bay flats, and the apron from Quatsino’s Grant Bay, as well as the 150 apron off Nootka, that fishes well for winter springs until June.

In Nootka Sound, Esperanza Inlet, has a dozen rocks to do the grind the pocket thing, much like Spider Island north of Hakai Pass, and like Cape Beale in Bamfield, Guinia Point north of Massett, and even Church Island off Pedder. The best Nootka rock is Ferrer (pronounced Fair-e-er) and on any given day there may be as many as 25 boats grinding in a circle the underwater structure. When the bite comes on, there may be a dozen boats into big fish at the same time.

And then there are ledges. Port Renfrew’s Owen Point has an absolutely bench-like ledge at 40 feet and everyone wants to be on the same tack on the flood. In all these cases, it is structure that has affected the chinook passage, and the presence of bait, if it is there. It is one of the magical mysteries of salmon fishing that chinook will migrate right on shore. Typically, this is for local fish that have intentionally moved to shore, presumably scenting their natal river. This is the point at Ferrer Point, particularly in September when the Conuma chinook come home.

In the Broken Islands, the ebb on the rocks at Ecoole and Diplock also bunches up homing Robertson Creek Fish. Ditto for Brady’s Beach. And this water is very precise. At Cape Beale, at the 36 foot ledge you watch your downrigger drop as the skidding ball goes off the edge, and into the chinook.

In Quatsino its Kains Island has an open rock pile, surf line fishery. It makes a person jittery while learning the precise nature of pockets in the surf. I looked down one day, saw the bottom and before I could say anything, up came the downrigger arm signalling the loss of a ball.

Surfline fishing in rock piles takes time to learn the coordinates of the bottom depressions so that you can safely pluck out the good spots. At Nootka’s south entrance this includes Maquinna and Bajo points. Off Barkley, try Wya Point. And, Clayoquot’s Catface bar is a textbook example of a vertical eddy that extends for almost half a mile. It is a well-known spot for bucktailing coho from Weigh West in Tofino.

Add Odlum at Hakai, Cheney at Milbanke, and the to-die-for McInnes Point. It makes a guy itch to get out there.

Saanich inlet Fishing Stories – SS Guppy II

Hi everyone. I am still looking for Saanich Inlet fishing stories and history of its fishing to put an e-book together while we still have many of the people around who made the history. You can send them to dcreid@catchsalmonbc.com or to Mike Rose: mike-rose@shaw.ca. Please come forward. And, yes, Jack James, I will catch up with you. I have just been slow.

Here is a story of mine:

The SS Guppy II

My parents used to live on Coles Bay across the water from Jimmy Gilbert’s house. I came into use of my brother-in-law’s ‘whaling dory’ for fishing. It had a faded 2.5 HP Evinrude that was far more reliable than it looked.

The ‘vessel’ was designed well, but he had scaled it down so the boat was squished shorter to 9’2”, a tub far too buoyant for mere water. It floated on air. He had to mix and add two bags of cement to the inside so it would draw a few inches of water. In other respects, it was properly built with a sandwich core of fibreglass matt on wooden ribs, then glassed on top, both inside and out. Nothing could sink it, and on the plus side it couldn’t be stolen either, as it weighed at least 250 pounds.

In my crumby, rubber, hip waders, I dragged it down to the water, launched it and climbed aboard. There was one rule: the engine had to be brought up from the beach every time I used it. The unstealable SS Guppy II could be left on the beach because no one strong enough to steal it would be dumb enough to want it. A ‘sleek’ white hull with Mediterranean blue gunwhales, oar locks, a mid-ship seat and a helmsman bench. Arrgh Billy.

I cut my fishing teeth in this ‘craft’, learning the buoy off the Dyer Rocks, fishing the gully across the Bay, down past Gilbert’s house, to the Yellow House, known so because it was, well, yellow. In between was a hotspot I called ‘The Gas Station’ because it had a raised deck and cherry picker and looked like a gas station, though it was just a boat house.

One day, trolling along the Gilbert side, I bagged a nice ling cod, a chinook of five pounds, and with frost all over me and the seat, putted past several fellows in a big warm boat, who had, thus far, caught nothing. And, of course, just then, I got a big bite on the strip on the other side of a two pound lead ball.

I didn’t have a net (and still don’t really use one much) and the fish war far too big to get in the boat. So I towed the fish on the surface for half a mile trying to catch up to the Cadillac of sporting fellows, and called for their net.

My other rod still fishing, and their several tips on my side, I manoeuvred in, took the net, and pulled out to net the fish, though they offered, noting my decidedly challenged boat, the frost on my nose, and my rod with electrician taped guides. To them I looked a poor cousin, a Grapes of Wrath relative.

When I finally scooped the fish, it was far too big for the net, and with its head in the mesh, and the rest of it hanging out the back end, I lifted it, as heavy as the boat itself, and once in the boat chased it around with a rock trying to bean it a good one.

My Evinrude at max knots, I hunted down the boat full of sports, weaved in among the rod tips, handed off the net, pulled out to run alongside and say thanks. I lifted up my first big spring, one hand in each of the gill openings, and strained it high for good viewing. The mouths of all the sports dropped several inches, and it just added to the smile on my face. I casually asked how they had been doing and was told not a sniff.

So I held up the cod and five pounder, and offered it to them. They politely declined. I was as chuffed as the Michelin Tire man, and putted off across the bay, to land my first big fish – 24 pounds, in April no less. I was some impressed. But more so with my success in a boat of so little worth no one would steal it, and on the other hand, the million dollars of high-tech stuff and zero fish.

The SS Guppy II served me well for the next few years, as I got to know the Ardmore cliff, and the spine of rock that runs north from the buoy to two thirds across Coles Bay toward the Yellow House. Structure, the thing of chinook, I memorized.

One summer night, on water so calm it looked like I could have walked out there, I putted out to the spar buoy, and dropped my 40 gram black (works better than green in Coles Bay) Stingsilda from my state of the art Daiwa 275, anodyzed aluminium reel into the twinkling school of just-hatched herring, perhaps 1.5 inches long.

I looked across the water to Bamberton, that later I was to get to know well, fishing planers and wire line. On the Malahat ridge was a horizontal white line coming down the wall. A puff of wind hit my face, and I realized it was a storm blowing in. When the line hit sea level, several waterspouts disappeared up into the clouds.

At max speed, 3 knots, I knew I was in serious trouble it I stayed half a mile off shore, and with the waves building to one foot, following me, then two, then three, my hat blew off into the sea, I beetled shoreward. By the time I reached Dyer rocks, the waves coming up my stern exceeded 6 feet tall and the wind had climbed to 40 knots.

In my little boat I was some afraid, so I watched the waves crash down on me and try to steer straight out of them, without going through the wave in front of me before my stern was lifted high and over the wave coming at me, then under me. I turned to look for the beach, and directly in front, having come from nowhere, was a tugboat, straining to keep a four hundred yard long boom of logs, presumably lifted from the beach, from being dragged back onto the beach, and  perhaps the tugboat two.

This was, at that time, the scariest experience of my limited ocean captain experience. I had no choice but to turn sideways to the 7 foot seas in my nine foot boat, with 112 inches of freeboard. I really didn’t think I was going to make it all the way to out run the boom and tugboat. Each wave was a new introduction to death.

But I did finally out run the tug, and went flying by him at 3 knots, both of us eyeing one another with the wild expression of “Where the F#*$%&*@#$ did you come from?” I manoeuvred between the dock next door and the 20 foot rock on our side, and from seven feet high was dropped hard on the granite. Waist deep in foam, I yanked the boat the waves almost deposited on top of me, up on the logs thrown high by a previous storm. After several expletives, I was able to clip the line from the nose ring of the bow to the beach rock. Up to my chest in water, 25 pounds of Evinrude kept me steady, heading to the rock steps and up the bank to safety.

I left my rods, reels, tackle boxes, gas can, oars and the etceteras in the boat and retired to a  night of rain and shrieking Sitka spruce lining the seawall. In the morning, all the logs had been moved like toothpicks, and the beach was rearranged. When I got to the boat line – no boat in sight – I dragged it out of the gravel. There on its end was the ring to the bow, the screw having been pulled free. But no SS Guppy II.

I never did find the boat, only scraps of fibreglass. The boat had been pounded into nothing over night from a gargantuan 250 pounds into pieces too small to find. My tackle box had been thrown high into the cliff bushes. My rods, reels, the contents of my tackle box had disappeared, along with the oars and gas can. I found one metal dodger sticking out of the beach but that was all. Arrgh Billy.