by Steve Galea | February 21, 2017

Recurring issues of illegal or poor angling behaviour that include littering, alcohol in public places, and wastage of fish have caused the Municipality of Port Hope to consider implementing night fishing restrictions and a $40 Municipal Access Fishing Pass. The proposals apply to stretches of the Ganaraska River owned by the Municipality or the Ganaraska Region Conservation Authority.
These proposed resolutions will be presented to the Municipality of Port Hope Council on Feb. 21. The report recommends petitioning the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF) to revise the Ontario Fishing Regulations to “prohibit night fishing on the Ganaraska River from August 15 to September 30, from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., from the Robertson Street Bridge to the Jocelyn Street Bridge; And further, that By-law 45/2012, being a By-law to regulate, protect and govern the use of Parks, Recreation Areas and Park Facilities be amended to prohibit night fishing on the Ganaraska River from August 15 to September 30, from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m., on all Municipal properties from the Robertson Street Bridge to the Jocelyn Street Bridge…”
Another proposed resolution calls for the creation of a Municipal Access Fishing Pass, for anglers between 18 and 65. It would permit fishing in municipal and Ganaraska Region Conservation Authority properties.
The report containing the recommendations cites poor angler behaviour that includes “snagging, gaffing, and netting of fish, fishing in a sanctuary, harvesting roe, leaving remains to spoil, fishing without a valid license, and keeping more than the daily limits.”
It also asserts that much of this behaviour occurs during the night.
The report notes that the MNRF are not supportive of the Access Fishing Pass as it might restrict access to public fishing and set a precedent for other jurisdictions to follow suit.
Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters Fisheries Biologist Tom Brooke said, “We’re aware that there are issues with fishing at Port Hope and that something needs to be done, but we are hoping that the Municipality would consider options that don’t restrict access to the fishery.”
Brooke says public parking fees in the area or the licensing of food vendors who would serve anglers are two possible solutions. These would help the municipality recoup costs (which are reported to be almost $20,000) incurred from running and maintaining their fish cleaning station and porta-potties along the river.
Jim McCormack, Director of Parks, Recreation and Culture for the Municipality of Port Hope said, “We had to do something. We as a Municipality are incurring costs in order to deal with fishing issues. The numbers of anglers are overwhelming, especially on weekends in the fall, and with that comes an overwhelming number of issues.”
McCormack says the Municipality has trained members of the Port Hope Police Services to enforce fisheries regulations and have also introduced a zero-tolerance policy for violations. He says this has helped, but it is costly.
“All the tickets we write for fishing violations go to the province and we are not recovering costs, so these proposals address that and the other issues.”
He says that should the proposals be approved by council, by-laws and processes will still have to be developed. “We want to make this a smooth transition.”
Because of this, should the proposals be approved, McCormack believes the changes will not be in place until autumn 2017.
The Ganaraska River is the most-fished tributary on the north shore of Lake Ontario.
The Municipality is seeking public comment on the issue until February 26. To learn about the issue and comment visit http://www.porthope.ca/community-consultation/salmon-fishing-report.

CBC
January 10, 2016
Deadly salmon virus may be in B.C. waters, study suggestsEvidence of a deadly virus that has caused severe damage to the Atlantic salmon farming industry has been discovered in some farmed and wild B.C. salmon, according to a new study.
Biologist Alexandra Morton of the Raincoast Research Society worked with statistician Richard Routledge of Simon Fraser University and other researchers to test for the virus in more than 1,000 farmed and wild salmon of varying species.
The study published Jan. 6 in the peer-reviewed Virology Journal, found genetic matches for the European variant of the infectious salmon anaemia (ISA) virus in 79 cases.
'Pieces' of disease found
"We never found the whole virus, we just found pieces of it, but the pieces of the virus can't exist by themselves, so it's concerning, because this is a member of the influenza family," Morton told On the Coast host Stephen Quinn.
The farmed fish used in the study were collected from markets, which Morton said is a limitation.
"We couldn't actually go to the fish farms and get the weaker, more diseased fish for testing," she said.
Morton said the virus was dominant in Chile's farmed Atlantic salmon stocks for years, until a mutation appeared in 2007 and "ripped through the industry and caused over $2 billion in damages."
Morton said wild salmon on B.C.'s coast are passing through areas where salmon are heavily farmed, and she worries what the virus may do to the wild fish.
"I'm hoping this work could be an early warning .. and we can get a handle on this before it mutates and does something," she said.
Salmon farmers dispute study
ISA was previously suspected to be in the province in 2011, but at that time the Canadian Food Inspection Agency did not find any cases.
Jeremy Dunn, the executive director of the BC Salmon Farmers Association, criticized the methods used in the study published in Virology Journal, calling the results "false positives."
"The CFIA has been very definitive saying that ISA does not exist in British Columbia, and I can confirm that farm-raised salmon in British Columbia have never and are not showing any signs of sickness from this virus," he said. 


To hear the full story listen to the audio labelled: Evidence of a deadly salmon virus found in B.C. waters, study suggests

Collapse of Lake Huron salmon fishery offers lessons
Jeff Alexander | Muskegon Chronicle By Jeff Alexander | Muskegon Chronicle 
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on April 19, 2011 at 12:00 PM

The Great Lakes provide an important food source for the region and the country. As such, the productivity of the lakes depends on a variety of human and environmental factors. The food web and interlocking food chains in the lakes are complex and ever-changing. In the mid-1990s, when disease ravaged the Lake Michigan chinook salmon fishery, anglers flocked to Lake Huron .

The glory days of Lake Huron’s salmon fishery lasted roughly a decade, until a combination of factors — all driven by human activities — caused the salmon population to crash in 2003-04.

It has not recovered.

Michigan anglers who fished out of 10 Lake Huron ports last year caught 3,200 chinook salmon, a record low. That was a 95 percent drop from the average annual catch of 75,000 at those same ports between 1986 and 2003, according to state data.

“Last year ... about as low as it could get,” said Jim Johnson, a research biologist for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.

Lake Huron’s salmon crisis is a cautionary tale for Lake Michigan’s still-thriving salmon fishery: The lakes share many of the environmental factors that caused Lake Huron’s salmon fishery to collapse.

Huge numbers of foreign quagga mussels are wreaking havoc on the food chain in both lakes. The number of prey fish, the small fish that salmon and other large fish eat, has plummeted in recent years.

The fall of Lake Huron’s chinook population was quick, dramatic and painful — for the fish, anglers and coastal communities that reaped millions of dollars in economic benefits from the fishery.