UpStream

In 2021, more than 60 per cent of commercial salmon harvesters in B.C. hung up their nets due to low returns and closures issued by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. While just over the boarder in Southeast Alaska, harvesters were posting record catches, with more than 3,000 boat-days logged and nearly 800,000 sockeye salmon harvested, many of them destine for home streams in B.C. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Since the early 2000s, and now confirmed by researches and fish biologists working with SkeenaWild and Watershed Watch Salmon Society in Victoria, interception fisheries in Southeast Alaska’s District 104 on the outer coast of the panhandle – where local rivers don’t support significant salmon populations – could be contributing to recent declines in B.C. salmon and steelhead returns to the Skeena, Nass and Fraser Rivers. Harvesting tens of thousands of Canadian Chinook and coho, as well as large but unknown numbers of co-migrating Canadian pink, chum, and especially steelhead, caught as by-catch, many of which come from threatened and endangered populations. Salmon stocks in B.C. have seen some of the lowest returns in history over the past five years, even posting one of the worst steelhead returns in 2023, despite conservation efforts by the DFO and others. Alaskan fisheries are now the biggest harvesters of a growing number of depleted Canadian salmon populations. Millions of Canadian salmon are now caught in Southeast Alaska every season, as the Canadian fishing fleet dwindles year after year. Many are calling on B.C. and Canada to stand up to these destructive Alaskan fisheries before it’s too late. Lax Kw’alaams commercial harvesters Donnie Wesley and Ken Bryant have been fishing for nearly their entire lives, the better part of 50 years, however a lot has changed over those decades, it’s now harder than ever to make a living as a commercial harvester, and much of that is due to the Alaskan plunder.

At SkeenaWild we try to make sense of which mines are doing it right, and which ones are too risky for communities and the land. We also try to hold the government regulating these mines – and the companies that abandoned them – to account and ensure dangerous mines are cleaned up after they shutdown operations. But in many cases it’s difficult, largely due to poor regulations and minimal bonds required by the government to clean up the mess left behind. This is most evident with the Gitxaala Nations’ current league challenge of the Government of B.C.’s Mineral Tenures Act which allows anyone with a computer and a few dollars to claim ministerial rights to any known deposits within the province without having to notify the communities or Indigenous Nations where the claims are being staked. In April 2023, after more than a year of preparations, the Gitxaala Nation launched their much anticipated legal challenge of B.C.’s mineral tenures act in B.C. Supreme Court, which they say has impacted their territory and salmon populations, as well as other marine sustenance, which their people have relied on for several millennia. This case has huge potential to change the way minerals are claimed in B.C. and the future of mining as we know it. It could also chart a path forward when it comes to Indigenous land claims and reconciliation in this part of Canada, but there is a long road ahead. For many years now SkeenaWild has been working with various partners and Indigenous Nations to ensure mines are accountable in all respects. And to pressure governments to strengthen environmental assessment processes that approve mines, and also bonds that would be earmarked for clean up if a mine goes bankrupt, an all too familiar sight in Northwest, B.C. We also try to hold companies to account during that process. Reviewing proposals for their legitimacy and accuracy, using expert and biologists to analyse and research mine proposals to make sure their on the level, and to call out dangerous mines that plan to discharge toxic water back into the environment. Advocating for changes if a mine is going to impact sensitive habitat, wildlife or salmon and steelhead. One such mine going through the environmental review process is know as Telkwa Coal, which plans to build a large cola mine just seven kilometres from the small community of Telkwa along the Bulkley River, a major tributary of the Skeena. For nearly two years now SkeenaWild’s mining researcher, Adrienne Berchtold, has been looking into the Telkwa Coal proposal, raising concerns about the lack of information the company provided to the BC Environmental Assessment Office and the potential risks posed to local drinking water, a dwindling Caribou herd and especially salmon and steelhead.

The Babine is one of the most important tributaries of the Skeena River. It’s not only home to one of the largest sockeye runs on the Skeena, but also an important steelhead run. As fish swim up the Babine River to Lake Babine to spawn, they have to clear the Babine Fish Weir, a metal fence that spans the river near the mouth of the lake. This fence as been in place for decades and helps correlate the numbers of fish returning to the system next to the data collected at the Tyee Test Fishery near the mouth of the Skeena. Being able to confirm the number of fish entering the Babine allows fisheries managers to better understand the in-season shifts in populations, which in turn helps direct conservation measures. However, the Babine Fish Weir, also allows for one of the most sustainable sockeye fisheries to take place, the Talok fishery, run by the Lake Babine Nation and supported by North Delta Seafoods. This fishery only targets Babine sockeye and ensures no bycatch. It also employs dozens of people for local villages like Fort Babine and Tachet, communities that don’t necessarily have a lot of economic opportunities near by. For the people who work at the fence, it’s a positive experience, one they couldn’t imagine anywhere else. I had a chance to checkout the Babine Fish Weir in August 2022 during the final stages of the largest sockeye run in decades.

The Skeena Watershed is vast, encompassing dozens of communities and Indigenous nations, and more than 54,000 square kilometres of forests, rivers, lakes, mountains and wetlands. Trying to monitor and understand the ecological, cultural and economic values of this land is a constant struggle. However, Sarah Railton, SkeenaWild's land use planning and forestry lead, makes those struggles a little easier to deal with as she navigates the world of lands use planning, implements better forests practices and helps restore local salmon streams. One focus of SkeenaWilds land use planning and forestry work is restoration, in part through the Healthy Watersheds Initiative. Willow Creek, just north of Terrace, was historically a salmon stream. But road development, beaver dams and logging chocked out most of the water flow and passage ways for fish years ago. But over the past couple of season Sarah and a crew of field techs have removed obstructions, cleared passage ways and replanted thousands of tress to rehabilitate Willow Creek and hopefully, allow salmon to return.

SkeenaWild’s education program has grown by leaps and bounds over the past few years. When it first started, teachers and students were hard pressed to find local educators willing and able to teach students at multiple levels about the salmon life cycle, the importance of intact watersheds and what we as citizens, young and old, can do in our everyday lives to help salmon have a fighting chance for the future. Christine Slanz changed all that. In her time as the SkeenaWild Education Coordinator she has developed a full curriculum accessible to all teachers, workshops on stream health, salmon ecology and outdoor education camps that get kids connected to their community and surrounding environments. The program is all about interactive education, getting students and others in the community out into our local watersheds not only to learn but to take action in a variety of ways including trying to rid our local waterways of invasive plant species that can choke out water flows and make it hard for salmon to survive.

For the past couple of seasons, a Wet’suwet’en fisheries camp at Morice Lake has been developed to support the ongoing smolt trapping program to better understand salmon productivity in the lake, also known as Wedzin Bin. This project is also part of a larger effort to rebuild sockeye salmon populations within Wet’suwet’en territory, specifically Morice sockeye which have seen a dramatic drop in numbers over the last 50 years. SkeenaWild Director of Science and salmon biologist, Dr. Micheal Price as well as Brian Mitchell from Wet’suwet’en Fisheries, and Tieasha Pierre with the Natural Resources Department at the Office of the Wet’suwet’en, showed me how they conduct research and collect data from tiny sockeye smolts headed for the ocean. A meticulously executed task with fish barely the size of your finger.

During this second season we’ll speak to those on the ground working tirelessly to ensure Salmon have a bright future in the Skeena. We’ll chat with the people behind the science that are increasing our awareness and understanding of one of the last intact salmon watersheds in the world, how we can protect it for future generations and how salmon are already adapting to a warming climate and extreme heat. The Skeena is such a significant and unique environment not only for Canada but the world and we want to highlight and celebrate how Indigenous nations and local communities are pulling out all the stops to ensure our way of life and salmon have a future in the Skeena and beyond. Join us on the UpStream or check out SkeenaWild.org, or subscribe to this podcast on Apple, Spotify, SoundCloud or wherever you find podcasts and don’t forget to tell your friends. Thanks for listening.

The remoteness of many of its tributaries and the absence of dams has kept the relative pristine ecosystems of the Skeena and Nass Watersheds positioned well for salmon to have a fighting chance in the decades and centuries ahead. As some systems become less productive, due to climate change and impacts to habitat, there is mounting evidence to suggest that some systems within the Skeena and Nass Watersheds could become more productive, offering safe haven to many populations of wild Salmon and Steelhead. The Gitanyow, whose territory encompasses large sections of the Nass and Kitwanga rivers, as well as significant potion of the Upper Kispiox River, a tributary of the Skeena, have been working for more than two decades to ensure the survival of their precious sockeye. The fisheries programs, they run are critical to understanding how salmon might adapt to a rapidly changing climate and how we can provide the best possible habitat for salmon to flourish in the future. Mark Cleveland and Tara Marsden are just two of the people working with the Gitanyow to ensure salmon have a future in the Nass and Skeena Watersheds.

The Babine River is one of the most iconic rivers in Northwest BC. It isn’t a particularly long river, at just over 97 km in length, but it contains the stories of legends. It cannot be over stated how important the Babine system is to the overall health of the Skeena Watershed and especially Skeena sockeye. As mentioned, more than 90 percent of Skeena sockeye begin their life in Babine Lake, one of the largest populations of sockeye throughout the Skeena Watershed. But despite its prominence and mystic as a major salmon barring river, the Babine is under constant pressures from climate change, logging and derelict mines. Perhaps that’s why people like Donna Macintyre, a member of Lake Babine Nation and the head of the LBN Fisheries Program, and Billy Labonte, co-owner and guide of the Babine Norlakes Steelhead Lodge are dedicated to ensuring the survival and protection of one of the most celebrated salmon rivers in the Skeena Watershed.

Science and research is one of the pillars of the work SkeenaWild has embarked on over the last 15 years. Now more than ever we need good, solid, quantifiable data that will help us better understand what is happening to our plant, the environments in which we live and how a changing climate, impacts to habitat, and human interactions are affecting Skeena Salmon. One of those amazing people is Allison Oliver, she’s an aquatic ecologist with the Skeena Fisheries Commission. She’s worked extensively throughout the Skeena Watershed over the last several years and knows just how critical natural spaces and salmon are for everyone in this part of the world.