Letter to The Editor

To the Editor:

The Board of Fish was created to protect our salmon, not just some of them, but all of them. The Stikine River fish count is in the thousands, it is what B.O.F is calling a concern. This concern has turned into an emergency closure being very restrictive in management across fisheries.

There are five streams south of the Stikine that have King Salmon returning that the B.O.F call stocks of concern. When you look at the number of fish that are returning to these five streams it is astounding.

As of Monday afternoon 2-5-2018, the Biologist finally returned my call. He could not give me any real numbers on any of the five streams. He finally told me that they are “extremely low;” one stream is less than 30. Why is the B.O.F using third grade math with their college education and not being held accountable? They are hired to protect all the fish not just some of the fish.

This to me doesn’t make them endangered. If these fish are endangered the feds will take over. No one will like what happens next. There is still what appears to be a genetic strain (big fish.) Once this genetic fish is gone it’s gone forever.

I suggest the line be moved from Maden to Point Ward across to Fools Inlet. Give these fish a chance and don’t let the feds take over.

Jim Colier