Whose Game Is It?
Once upon a time, not all that long ago, the editors of the big city newspaper at which I was toiling as a reporter assigned me to blow the lid off a story. They sent me out to a rodeo, with instructions to document the cruelty to animals.
The editors had heard about how humans were mistreating the animals, and they sent me well in advance of the rodeo, so that I could watch the cowboys and cowgirls at their brutal best.
I quietly followed an SPCA team around one day, interviewing them quietly about the rodeo. And I spent a lot of time just slipping around - watching and making notes.
After two days I returned to the newsroom, and sat down with my editor. “Well,” I said, “it’s like this. It’s pretty damn rough out there.....for the cowboys.” I saw cowboys thrown 10 feet in the air. I saw cowboys kicked. I saw cowboys crushed against fence rails, and gored by enraged bulls.
I also saw people herding steers by whacking them on the haunches with a two by four, when they threatened to stampede.
My editor wanted to know, “but wouldn’t the animals prefer to be somewhere else?” This was the animals-as-prisoners-of-war argument, and I thought about it for a minute. I thought about the wild cattle ranges I’d crossed on fishing trips, where I’d seen scavengers feeding on steer carcasses.
“Like, maybe being chased down by a wolf pack?” I asked. “I can’t speak for the animals, but I honestly believe they were as much into the rodeo as the cowboys were.I think it’s just as much their game, as it is the cowboys.”
So the expose never got written.
But that hasn’t stopped organizations over the years attacking rodeos as cruel and inhumane. The same people now believe catch and release fishing is inhumane - and should be outlawed. You’ll be hearing more from them in the near future.
But I won’t have to go out and research the fishing issue, having been out there for the better part of 30 years, interacting with the fish.
I caught and released myself once, and can tell you honestly - it wasn’t that bad. I hooked myself in the back of the neck, with a barbed hook. My choice was simple: cut the line and go home, or get the damn hook out and keep fishing.
I traced the line with a pair of forceps, locked onto the hook shaft - and ripped it out. It didn’t come easy. There was some blood on the back of my fishing jacket. But then I saw a big fish roll and forgot about it.
I have often fished on rivers where I’ve caught the same fish, sometimes just hours later. Once I hooked, fought and broke off on a big pike. I retied my lure, cast again to the same snag. And got the fish again. The first lure was still dangling from its jaw.
You can’t tell me those fish were suffering.They were into the game as much as I was.
And part of me, thinking back to that rodeo, suspects that the fish got more out of it than any animal rights activist will ever imagine.
What do you think? Visit our online discussion area and post your views. 
Letters can be sent via e-mail to: letters@ariverneversleeps.com
Best Answer To Animal Rights Activism:
Lots and Lots Of Anglers Out Fishing
The Editors:
Harvey Thommasen's article, 'Catch & Release - We Need More Regs' (October 2001) appears well-researched, and I agree with his first point - that anglers should quit fishing early to limit the number of fish they catch-and-release (C&R) on days of extremely good fishing. But I don't agree that more C&R regulations are the way to ensure a future for angling.
In my view, the two most significant dangers to future angling are: (1) loss of fish habitat and access to fishing opportunities, and (2) animal rights activism. In order to combat these issues, it is essential that we maintain a very high percentage of anglers in the general public. This will maintain pressure on governments to protect fish habitat and fishing access in the face of development pressure, and also ensure that extremists do not succeed in advancing their agenda. If angler numbers decrease (as is currently the case in most Canadian provinces), the economic value of fishing decreases, and we have diminished political clout to lobby for habitat protection and contend with anti-use groups.
More C&R regulations work against us in two ways. First, they may reduce the number of anglers in the long term. Although C&R sections receive high angling use by many of the most ardent anglers, you will be hard pressed to find anyone who started out as a C&R fisher. I love flyfishing and have fished popular C&R sections in both British Columbia and Ontario. But I have yet to see a single child on them, fishing either alone or with an adult. The majority of people who buy a fishing licence (particularly potential new recruits) do not fish them. Second, C&R is difficult to defend from an animal rights argument. My non-angling relatives cannot understand catch-and-release fishing, and therefore it provides a point of sympathy for animals rights activists to gain a hearing with people who don't fish. Why would we want to give them this easy foothold?
A selective harvest philosophy is far superior to advocating all out C&R. I believe selective harvest regulations (species-specific and/or size-specific depending on the given water body) can accomplish virtually everything that C&R regulations do, while allowing use by a wider range of anglers and avoiding the need to defend the ethics of strict C&R. For example, if current C&R sections on East Kootenay Rivers were changed to a trout minimum size limit of 40 or 45 cm, there would be little change in either catch rates
or average size of fish. A few older fish would be harvested before dying of natural causes.
Finally, I would be interested in the sources for the mortality rates mentioned in the article - they sound way high! The problem with most scientific studies of this sort is that they either use captive (non-wild) fish, or they have additional stress factors to monitor wild fish after release. Fish in laboratories are usually kept in relatively small tanks with little water flow. The only exercise they get is to roll to the surface a few times a day to ingest high energy food pellets. Trying to use these fish to predict mortality rates of wild fish is like trying to force human 'couch potatoes' to run a marathon and then using the results to predict the outcomes for highly conditioned athletes. You can't make a direct comparison; they are two different animals. Also, in some of these studies blood samples are taken periodically during the recovery process - another significant added stress.
When wild fish are used, they are generally held captive after "release" to monitor their recovery, or else have a tracking device implanted or attached externally to monitor subsequent movement. In the first case, the fish is not able to return to it's preferred habitat where water pressure (which affects bleeding), temperature, and surroundings are ideal. In the second,
there is additional handling and the effect of the transmitter itself.
These considerations mean that we cannot use mortality rates from most scientific studies to apply to real fishing situations because they are almost certainly going to overestimate the losses. However, we can still learn general principles to maximize survival likelihood for released fish, such as minimizing the length of time taken to bring it to hand, and the time out of water.
In my limited experience with fish tracking studies, mortality rates of angled fish have been very low even with the added effects of anesthetization and surgery to implant a transmitter.
Sincerely,
Steve Arndt
Nelson, BC, Canada
jarndt@telus.net
Hi Steve:
I agree with most of your comments. The Catch and Release article was originally written four or five years ago when I was researching Mark Hume's River of the Angry Moon book. There may be more recent data on impact of catch and release. The main point I wanted to get across is that catch-and-release may under certain circumstances also contribute to more fish mortality than we currently believe --- especially with "fat" resident trout in lakes or streams late in the summer months. In my mind Catch and Release is still the way to go; but I agree there are other more important issues as you mentioned ---- habitat protection, etc. As a general principle I do not support regulations which restrict angler access to fishing. The references were obtained from Woodward Library Search at the University of British Columbia. I am sorry but I threw the articles out a few years ago. I am sure a literature review there could bring some of them back "on-line" for you to review.
- Cheers
Harvey Thommasen
Jet Boat Hell, Part I
Dear editors,
Your Petition, "memo to Government: Get a handle on jet boat hatch please!
I would like to bring to your attention that Pitt River is a general term, In
my opinion the Lower Pitt River is suitable for running jet boats. I have also
noticed that Dan Garret, owner of Pitt River lodge advertises on your web site.
This is a petition, but a petition with undertones of advertisement and serves
in the best interests of Mr. Garret's company Pitt River Lodge alone. I have
e-mailed the Government on this shrewed tactic of Mr. Garret's ploy to grasp a
personal monopoly on the upper Pitt River.
Keep in touch,
Sincerely, Darren Smith
Pitt Meadows, B.C.
P.S. I enjoy your web site!
gysmith@home.com
Hi Darren:
I agree fully on the lower Pitt being suitable for jet boats. However, if you have seen the Upper Pitt, you will know that it is a narrow river. The jet boats can't avoid the wading anglers. And they shouldn't be allowed to run them there.
The Pitt River Lodge does advertise on our site, and I'm glad they do. They are one of the few BC outfits that supports our site. More will in the future, I hope.
I can assure you, however, that the Pitt Lodge does not spend enough money to buy our opinion.
We made up our own minds about the jet boats, and you are welcome to do the same.
As for Danny Gerak trying to establish a monopoly on the Pitt, I would say the evidence points to just the opposite. He provides transportation to the river, across Pitt Lake, and transportation up the logging roads.
He charges a fair price. He’d even take you up there!
Without him there, almost nobody would be up there....except the jet boaters, roaring around to their heart's content.
The fact is, jet boats just don't belong on small rivers.
-Mark Hume
Jet Boat Hell, Part II
The Editors:
tjhose who know how to operate a jetboat properly do not damage
the watershed. As for being pissed off because you are on the shore and not in
abot , weel some people have more money than others. i also have been a guest
of of dan's at the lodge and saw jet boats while fishing, it only gave me
incentive to get my own. (I havn't yet though)
- Sean,
Salmon Arm, B.C.
flyingbows@hotmail.com
Dear Sean:
Yeah, and dirt bikes are great for back country trails.
But, and I'm sure you would have loved this, I must tell you that I once saw a guy with a Jet Ski on Tunkwa Lake.
If the government hadn't stopped guys from roaring around Tunkwa in their power sleds,by banning anything over 5 hp, the place would now be known as a great water skiing lake!
Similarly, I think the government is going to have to step in and protect the Pitt River from becoming Jet Boat Hell.
People don’t travel all the way from London, Paris and New York to share small rivers with guys in jet boats. The Pitt is a fantastic natural resource, and needs to be protected. It’s an easy river to walk and wade. The boats can be left at the lower logging bridge, which then gives anglers foot access to as much river as they are willing to hike.
Get a jet boat, by all means. Just don't run it up any small rivers where fly fishermen are trying to enjoy the peace and quiet. I mean, what’s next? Jet sledding the Adam’s River during spawning?
-Mark Hume
Promising Results Tracking Smolts At Sea
Hi everyone:
I just got back from a rather long 3 days up at the Keogh River. We have had two major successes.
The first is that we got all of the acoustic equipment back that we had deployed in the ocean. Both the long line of 14 receivers deployed 10 kms north of the Keogh River mouth and the two independently moored instruments deployed in rather high current conditions south of the River in the channel off Malcolm Island popped up to the surface exactly where we had deployed them. All were recovered without problems, thanks to the excellent boat handling and advice provided by our skipper, Bob Charlie of Port Hardy.
The second success is that he have indeed tracked the fish into the ocean. The tagged steelhead smolts (14-18 cms long) were detected leaving the river for the ocean by a receiver deployed at the mouth of the river. We have also detected multiple fish on the detection line north of the river, and have also detected one smolt that went south.
So we have had some great successes in using the gear, thanks to our expert technical help from Reg Bigham (a retired oceanographic technician from IOS) and skipper Bob Charlie & company -- plus all of the people on this email who participated in the work either on the river or out at sea deploying the gear.We have also had success in detecting smolts out at sea. This helps to demonstrate "proof of principle" for the acoustic technology, and to provide the basic data that the scientific group will need this fall as we plan the work for the future.
At this point I don't know what proportion of the smolts have been
detected, or their speed of movement from the mouth of the river to the listening lines, and can't say anything about the detection range of the acoustic gear in the Pacific. However, we clearly have detected multiple smolts in the ocean, and had the gear (& people!) work smoothly and well.
I am on a plane for Norway on Sunday, so will probably be working on this data while on the flight. Before I left, though, I wanted to let everyone know that the experiment was a success, and to thank everyone for their contributions so far.
If there is someone that I have left off this email who should know about the work, please pass on the general information. However, please use some caution-- we do not want to oversell this initial work, and still need to fully analyze the results before we should start talking about the details. However, I am comfortable stating that we have met all of the goals that we set ourselves in this initial pilot effort, and am very pleased with the results so far.
Best wishes & many thanks
David W. Welch, Ph.D.
Program Head, High Seas Salmon Research &
PICES-GLOBEC Co-Chair,
Climate Change & Carrying Capacity Implementation Plan
Fisheries & Oceans Canada
Ocean Sciences & Productivity Division
Pacific Biological Station
Nanaimo, British Columbia
CANADA V9R 5K6
Tel: (250) 756-7218
Fax: (250) 756-7053
welchd@pac.dfo-mpo.gc.ca
{E-mail letters may be edited for clarity, taste and brevity. It is understood they express the opinions of the writers, not the editors.}
