Look Who it Was Random video

AUGUST 30, 2016 Disturbing the Peace #3

108 views · Published 1 September 2016 · 13:15 · Indexed 9 October 2026

Channel: Sea lion Defense Brigade · 2016 · Education

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***Previously unreleased, SLDB video ( August 30, 2016) *** 

The Buoy 10 fishery is just the start of the fall fishery.  Back in 2015 catch rates that year were 30 percent higher than in 2013, the previous record-setting year(CB).
 
And on August 28, 2015 and with four fishing days yet to be counted, the Compact said, harvest this year has already exceeded the 2014 catch by 6,000 fish.  The preseason expectation was for a catch of 34,900 chinook, which is likely to be exceeded.

According to the Columbian Bulletin on August 28, 2015 the preseason expectation was for a catch of 41,900 chinook, 120 percent of the allocation and 129 percent of the Buoy 10 impacts allocated to the ESA-listed tules.
 
“If we don’t take this action now, we put the remaining upstream sport fishery at risk,” said Chris Kern, ODFW Fish Division deputy administrator. (August 28,2015)

 If the Buoy 10 fishery exceeds its allowable impacts, the upriver sport fishery must reduce its allowed retention of chinook, which could reduce already limited opportunities in that section of the river(1).

On the other hand on August 25, 2016  according to ODFW’s web sight this Labor Day weekend salmon fishermen will be allowed to keep both clipped and unclipped Chinook salmon on Sunday and Monday, Sept. 4-5 from the Columbia River mouth at Buoy 10 upstream to Tongue Point, under rule changes adopted today by fishery managers from Oregon and Washington.

 According to ODFW with the rule change, Buoy 10 anglers are on track to harvest 44,000 Chinook, about 4,500 fish less than the pre-season expectation(2).  Despite the concern that Chris Kern had back in 2015 in regards to the over harvest of Chinook salmon the 2016 allocation for Buoy 10 fishery has increased by 3,100 fish.   

“My number one priority is making sure the fall fisheries remain within their conservation objectives and that they get through the dates we planned preseason,” said Tucker Jones, ODFW’s Ocean Salmon and Columbia River Program Manager, “But it seems like we can accomplish those goals and offer a couple of additional any Chinook retention days.”


Although that is a 3,100 increase in Chinook retention for the Buoy 10 fishery from 2015 and while the last three years ODFW , WDFW , ACOE and CRITFC have  boasted about record returns of Chinook salmon returning to pass over the Bonneville Dam(3) proving that the sea lions impacts on salmon are minimal.  At the same time NMFS is reporting that for the last four years that thousands of California sea lions are stranding and dying from starvation and suffering from domoic acid poisoning along west coast(4).   


In addition on August 25, 2016  ODFW allocated more endangered species for humans to kill for sport while they unjustly, continue to scapegoat California sea lions; trap and kill them for consuming as little as one hatchery Chinook salmon in five years out of the Columbia River in the spring at the Bonneville Dam.    

Last spring 59 California sea lions were trapped, and killed for consuming one salmon in five years out of the Columbia River at the Bonneville Dam. Fifty California sea lions were trapped and hot iron branded at the Dam from April - May 2016. 

The empirical evidence proves that the sea lion's impacts on salmon in the Columbia River are minimal compared to the Dams, warm water , drought, water exports for big agriculture, clear cuts, hatchery fish, the harvest, habitat loss, endocrine disrupting chemicals such as PCB’s, PAH’s, pesticides, herbicides and heavy metals such as Mercury, Copper, and we can not forget pharmaceuticals, household cleaners, oil, and toxic road run off , and the thousands of blocked fish passages and unscreened culverts and water diversions that remain across Oregon and Washington State.  

In the end it is the sea lion that has the ancient relationship with the wild salmon that spans back for thousands of years on the Columbia River that the Dams, warm water , drought, toxics, habitat loss and the ever increasing harvest does not.      

Therefore it is time for Oregon, Washington and Idaho to stop scapegoating sea lions and the wild Chinook by placing profit and sport above the protection of threatened and endangered species and their habitat on the Columbia River(5).  Humans have many other food and habitat choices that the sea lions and wild salmon do not.  


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Source:

1.  http://www.cbbulletin.com/434827.aspx

2.    http://www.dfw.state.or.us/news/2016/08_aug/082516b.asp  

3. http://www.seattletimes.com/sports/columbia-river-chinook-returns-shattering-records-and-is-second-largest-run-since-construction-of-bonneville-dam-in-1938/

4. http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/pr/health/mmume/californiasealions2013.htm 

5. http://www.cbbulletin.com/436210.aspx

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