'This is all optical': Sport fishers slam DFO's chinook closures

'This is all optical': Sport fishers slam DFO's chinook closures

Source: CBC News

5/1/2019

'This is all optical': Sport fishers slam DFO's chinook closures

Less than 1% of chinook caught in 2018 came from vulnerable stocks, anglers say.

Recreational fishers are criticizing Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) for its sweeping restrictions on chinook salmon fishing, claiming that less than one per cent of the chinook caught last year by sport anglers throughout the region belonged to at-risk stocks.

More than 100 protesters surrounded federal Fisheries Minister Jonathan Wilkinson's constituency office in North Vancouver on Wednesday calling the recent closures a political move that will have little impact on the overall health of chinook populations.

"The minister has made a politically motivated decision to choose the recreational fishery as a scapegoat," said David Brown, a recreational fisherman who was among those who organized the protest.

The DFO announced it was restricting chinook salmon fishing this season citing dwindling stocks due to harvesting, habitat destruction, and climate change.

According to the DFO, of the 13 wild Fraser River chinook salmon populations recently assessed in the region, only one was not at risk.