Up next in 10
Can Striped Bass Survive These New Regulations? | Outdoor Journal Radio ep. 129
69 views
Apr 15, 2025
This week on Outdoor Journal Radio, Angelo is flying solo to talk to Dr. Trevor Avery about a new Striped Bass regulation that could devastate one of the most exciting fisheries in the country. First, however, some housekeeping was in order. Topics discussed included: staying anonymous; whether moon phases matter in freshwater fisheries; the salmon lobby; and whether snap swivels are losing you fish. With those matters out of the way, Dr. Avery joins the show! Topics discussed included: the transparency of fishery data; unknown fish mortality; losing our Striper fishery; whether the Striped Bass is invasive to New Brunswick; why Stripers are poor recruiters; what is causing the Striped Bass decline; citizen science; warnings from the Cod fishery; why the quota increase is happening; and much more! To never miss an episode of Outdoor Journal Radio, be sure to like, subscribe, and leave a review on your favourite podcast app!
View Video Transcript
0:00
and now another exciting episode in The Adventures of Outdoor Journal
0:06
radio well hello there thank you for joining us Outdoor Journal radio the podcast I'm Angela Biola flying solo my
0:14
co-pilot is off vacationing reaping that's right folks he's reaping the
0:19
benefits of all his hard work vacationing who the hell gets vacations in the middle of the busiest time of
0:26
year um I don't know we'll have to figure out uh filling in sort of uh
0:32
along with me our producer Dean Taylor come on now give me a hell yeah yeah
0:38
baby along with vaa behind the camera as per usual and Nick when he comes and in and out he just kind of flirts around
0:44
FLIR come on now yeah a wonderful program um we we really wanted to get
0:49
this one off the ground early early meaning in this uh particular week
0:55
because this just hit the uh the airway
1:00
recently and later on today we're going to be joined by a gentleman that you probably didn't know of until the last
1:08
week or so when you started reading his name in the uh articles that have been
1:13
appearing throughout social media regarding the Mir Machi and it stripe bass and the new DFO allocations for
1:19
that fishery and the whole world is going to come tumbling down the sky as falling my God what's going to happen to
1:25
all of us well we're going to discuss this with him uh he is Prof Professor uh Trevor Avery Dr Avery will be joining us
1:33
from uh Acadia University and uh his opinion is that uh what just took place
1:39
this week is going to be the beginning of the end of that wonderful fishery in that species called strip bass we will
1:46
get to that in just a moment uh Dean what do you think of that by the way just off the topic just what do you think of that whole hubub do you think
1:52
it's just over played a little bit Overkill I don't know it's hard to tell with like news articles that you see cuz
1:58
the headlines are always is trying to like they're trying to get attention right right so it'll be interesting to hear from him you know what he actually
2:08
thinks about the whole thing well he's science right I mean he's just numbers I think you always have to
2:15
ER on the side of science I don't care what anybody says if you have a tough decision to make one is based on science
2:21
and one is based on gut you got to go with the science mhm I think but a lot of the like the science that they have
2:28
I'm sure comes from People Like Us who are out there right like they're not out there every day and the Anglers are so
2:34
yeah we'll talk about it what happened in a moment let me just uh get through um this part of the show where I remind
2:42
all the good people out there that we do have things other than a podcast one of
2:48
them is a television show that airs on global television network and also airs everywhere else in the world uh
2:55
Sportsman's Chanel by the way Dean yeah I saw for the very first time I was
3:00
watching the Sportsman Channel late the other night and look who popped up it
3:06
was us I was thrilled to I'd never seen it on Sportsman Channel before I know we play there like four times a week but
3:11
I'd never seen it so I think Pete watches it there every week does he yeah it's cool uh anyways uh Sportsman's
3:18
channel of course for you folks South of the Border wfn the World Fishing Network come on now uh is home for the fishing
3:25
Canada show and has been going this is our 38th season give me hell yeah two
3:32
more to go and I'm out of here that's my contract and then that's it I don't know what I'm going to do I think I'm going
3:38
to be a fishing guide that'd be a good fishing guide I think that'd be a great be at that I think I'd be wonderful as a
3:45
fishing guide but but I'd be one of those fishing guides where I got everything set I might even hire like an assistant fishing guide to work with me
3:52
yeah right and he'd do all like the dirty stuff and I just want to sit in the back and I want to sort of
3:57
orchestrate things and and me also want to meet people Captain I want to be the captain that's it that's a good career
4:04
and and and mingle with people have fun with people and maybe you know participate in the AE fishing activities
4:10
after uh we get off the lake and stuff that sounds nice I think it'd be great if you think that'd be a good idea let
4:15
me know because I'll uh put it out there for people to book me uh but now that I'm here I have to do
4:23
what earns me money and that is let you know that the fishing Canada store is up and running and doing well
4:31
we've got all kinds of new products in there Midsummer products uh although you'd never know it by the image that
4:37
Dean just put up behind me because those are the hoodies yes the new beautifully
4:42
embroidered uh hoodies with the latest uh iteration of the fish in Canada brand
4:49
and they are doing extremely well uh we have uh three different species as you can clearly tell by this image um but
4:56
more coming very soon we might even have the stripe bass on there at some point because we want to and you know what
5:03
we'll do Dean we'll put the striper on there we'll put stripe bass on there and then we sell them for for you know help
5:10
the stripe bass survive kind of a motif that'd be a good one right yeah I I
5:15
think I'd buy that one I'd buy that one myself but anyways uh that's all happening at the store fishing
5:20
canada.com the store or you can go to store or shop uh in shop. fishing
5:27
canada.com it'll get you there as well all kinds of good things uh participate enjoy while you're there can they also
5:34
do the contest uh from there is this something not shop. fishing canada.com yeah at.com they can and we
5:41
have we have a we have a bunch going right now yeah anytime you got anything uh you want to kill some time is a good place to hang out you might also want to
5:48
go there to to see where you can ask questions uh that we might answer for you here on the show such as did Stephen
5:56
from Wisconsin he uh is part of theist listener feedback for this episode he
6:01
went uh somewhere online and asked a question and here it is uh he says you
6:07
guys should revisit the whole moon phases discussion now we've what he's
6:12
referring to we did a couple of television episodes uh I did a an
6:17
article on Doc about it we have interviewed various scientists and
6:24
doctors on it so we we we have dabbled with it quite a bit and I personally
6:29
love the subject because although I believe that it does
6:36
affect fish I'm talking the Moon's phase this I think the Solunar phase is even
6:42
more important that is the moon as it relates to the Sun as it relates to the Earth as opposed to just the Moon's
6:49
phase but regardless this is not my question it's St from Wisconsin asking
6:55
this he's saying you guys should revisit the whole moon phase discussion especially concerning walleye and
7:03
musky he says Dr Cook's study about the moon affecting bass is silly to me and
7:10
for those of you who who aren't familiar with that uh we had Dr Cook on here of
7:15
course on fish talk with the doc and we talked about his studies and how the
7:22
moon phase affected bass and he kind of poo pooed it a little bit on us he said
7:29
n H it's not really anything to concern yourself with but regardless uh step
7:36
says that bass will eat all day or Ste Stephen cook said that bass will eat all
7:42
day uh every day and or not affected by the moon now Stephen from Wisconsin goes
7:48
on to say there's a publication out of uh escaba is that is that correct that
7:54
seems correct es Cabana yeah uh Lake Fisheries research station in Wisconsin that
8:01
proves that moon phase does in fact affect angler success with musky and
8:08
walleye especially he goes on to say I'd like to remain semi semi-anonymous obviously that ship is sailed Steve from
8:16
Wisconsin uh just think it's a topic that deserves its merits properly represented is all and we thank you for
8:23
that because I agree with you 100% I remember when uh Dr Cook came on and
8:30
said nah it's not really a big deal I didn't sleep that night it was like telling me that there was no Santa Claus
8:36
so I agree Moon does affect fish I personally have witnessed it having said that though I will tell you
8:43
this I have never knowingly not gone on a fishing trip because it was not the
8:50
perfect moon phase so and as much as I believe in it I don't build my fishing
8:57
day around it it's always like a bonus yeah like when you get there like oh wait or the day after say hey look at
9:04
that I was fishing on the perfect moood but any anyways uh podcast Network
9:10
highlights is something else we feature all over the place especially on fishing canada.com uh this week we are
9:17
highlighting Under The Canopy with our good friend uh Mr wette previous
9:22
minister of Natural Resources by the way Jerry wette in case you were wondering uh episode 52 is being highlight Ed
9:29
right now on account of it is the oneyear anniversary oneyear anniversary of Mr
9:35
wette on our Network and he has a very special guest on that episode 52 it's
9:42
it's a bunch of it's not a bunch of Dean it's Mah it's Mah for God's sakes anyways great episode we
9:49
had a lot of fun love talking Jerry both on and off the mic fascinating gentlemen and a wonderful product that you don't
9:56
want to miss a single episode of so check it out it's called Under The Canopy on the Outdoor Journal Radio
10:02
podcast Network wherever you consume your podcasts all right now in the news this
10:10
is the big story this is the biggie in the news um Gulf of St Lawrence stripe
10:17
bass quota tripold is the headline and this took me by surprise our good friend
10:22
Jeff Wilson from the East Coast uh sent this to us cuz I wasn't aware of it
10:29
before we were down at icast when he sent it to us we were at all pumped up about it yeah by the way you all settled
10:35
in from icast you're feeling better I'm feeling great now yeah I still haven't recovered yet I'm still a little no no
10:41
uh it was great time by the way great time down there was wonderful we were we almost did a podcast from down there
10:48
yeah nothing went right the entire trip nothing went right including somebody
10:54
for getting their passport at the rental house rental when we got to the report I
11:00
won't mention I don't know who that was but we survived at all anyways uh
11:07
the big news Gulf of St lawence strip bass quota tripled now on its own on the
11:12
surface it might just sort of blend in with the background another news story from you know a fishery organization but
11:21
this one has a tremendous amount of impact because the the epicenter for this new
11:31
regulation is going to take place on arguably the best strip Bass River on
11:36
the planet now which is the miror mchi in New Brunswick and um the federal fisheries
11:44
Minister Diana leot uh I hope I pronounce that correct is that you're you're you you're
11:51
linguistic I'm linguistic yeah that's correct yeah uh leier uh announced that she's more than
11:59
tripling the size of the Southern Gulf of St Lawrence indigenous commercial
12:04
stripe bass fishery at the same time increasing the catch limits for
12:10
recreational Anglers um for retention of bass so like
12:15
it's all happening all at once like normally in these cases little trickles
12:21
here and there to try and figure out what works and what doesn't work fisheries management people are
12:28
reluctant to make big changes unless it's to close down fishery like a
12:33
moratorium and even then there's so much consultation that takes place leading up
12:38
to those closures it takes months if not years this came out of left
12:44
field nobody was expecting this especially the people on the Mir machine
12:50
the locals this came completely other left field and when it's such a huge
12:56
change there's going to be question and if if you if you were on uh Facebook
13:01
this past week you know exactly what I mean there has been so much on this on social
13:07
media most of it negative because the question is why are we increasing it
13:13
almost by four I can see maybe if there's a need to increase it if there's
13:19
a need and by the way are you aware of any need Dean when we're out there you
13:24
don't find it in restaurants you don't people don't even seem to eat it they don't even eat fish down there well they
13:29
don't eat this fish I don't know where the demand is and as far as the
13:35
commercial fishery I don't think that's the blame here either because when we're down there and we've been down there
13:41
every single one of the Four Seasons we have been on that River and I got to tell you there's only been one time that
13:48
I saw those Nets you know the the Nets on the bank of the mirror machine there's only one time that I saw those Nets even
13:54
working you know yeah they've been out of commission every time I've seen D we go so so I
14:01
don't get it and that's why we um we have this guest coming up here shortly
14:06
that might shed a little bit of light on the situation because it doesn't make sense to me even from an angling
14:13
standpoint I don't think I heard one angler saying yeah well you know I wish I could keep four of these
14:18
fish and eat them yeah no they just catch and release they go there and have fun maybe they take one or two home I
14:25
don't know even if that's even the case but regardless um an additional quota of 125,000 fish
14:33
is to be assigned to First Nations in the southern Gulf on top of the quota of
14:39
50,000 which they already have and like I just said I haven't seen them taken
14:45
that quot once yet I haven't seen them out there fishing so I I don't know what this is all about but now it's going to
14:52
be raised [Music] um it uh it leaves room for a lot of
15:00
questioning and one of the big questions is surrounding the Atlantic sammon
15:07
Federation which apparently came out and praised DFO when this announcement was
15:13
made yeah they're all over social media too like there's actually a lot of support for it from that side well yeah
15:19
yeah yeah but they actually praised um the DFO for for doing this
15:27
there's no scientific information that would lead anybody to believe that the striper bass is in any way connected to
15:35
the demise of the Atlantic salmon totally untrue but but they become the salmon the the
15:43
uh stripe bass has become The Whipping Boy for the Atlantic Salon Federation and so they've taken all kinds of steps
15:50
and measures not to mention all kinds of dollars have been spent in um in the
15:55
marketing Machinery to let people know that the striper bass and to some extent
16:01
the smallmouth bass too now is being accused of um the demise of the Atlantic
16:08
salon fishering and once again there's nothing to prove it personally uh we've
16:13
spent enough time in the water in that area talking to
16:19
folks to tell you that I don't think there is even a percentage point that
16:26
can be attributed to the uh strip for the Atlantic salmon demise it's
16:32
happening all over the world there's something going on with the Atlantic salmon it's not just freshwater it's
16:37
saltwater but even freshwater salmon anywhere where there's Atlantic salmon there's controversy right now globally
16:43
speaking in the in the Scandinavian countries they've got their own issues with Atlantic salmon the problem is over
16:50
harvesting we're just eating the crap out of them and we just don't realize that
16:56
it's it's fine you know it's fine when when you've got a billion people on the
17:01
planet and you're harvesting the oceans for Atlantic salmon and feeding those billion people and Salon that's that's
17:09
all well and good but what we don't realize that as that population grows and doubles in triples and
17:16
quadruples and gets up to 7 billion people that some resources are not self-
17:24
sustaining and I think the Atlantic salmon is one of them it's it's
17:29
just the way it is it's reality and they seem particularly unable to survive like
17:35
hot years and stuff like that which we have more of and they're just pretty sensitive I think that's a big issue
17:40
huge issue huge huge issue they do not they're not adapting well to this new
17:47
world that we live in both in terms of more population with more need and you
17:55
just mentioned climate anybody said climate holy Ma we all know that we've lost a degree or
18:01
two in all of our Northern Waters well guess where these fish spawn in the cool fresh at up River where where that cool
18:08
water is well if that water is a degree or two warmer every year it just affects their ability to reproduce but anyways
18:17
regardless the Atlantic s Federation Praises DFO for this new found gift to
18:24
the commercial fishery and apparently to the recreational Anglers that want to kill four fish a day it's a daily
18:31
possession limit that's the part that's scary it's not even a total it's not a possession limit you're allowed four a
18:37
day so that to me reeks of somebody wanting to get rid of a fish that's what
18:44
to me this is but what do I know we'll uh we'll find out from the people who
18:50
are in the know here shortly on the program um what else do I
18:56
have I think we'll cover most of the rest of the history and stuff later on yeah I think so yeah we'll let the
19:02
experts handle that all right let's go to um oh my goodness there it is Terry
19:10
mirik from Saskatchewan on fan question of the week before we move along comes
19:17
to us from Saskatchewan uh by the way submit your fan questions to info fishing
19:23
canada.com or on Facebook Instagram any place it doesn't really matter I don't even know why they tell me to tell you
19:30
that because I know for a fact that Dean will take questions on the back of a napkin yeah and and it you know slid it
19:36
under the front door he'll read it anyway you can get him anywhere you can get him so he's hard up for these things
19:42
so don't make it make him feel like you know you're you must know no it doesn't matter just reach out to him he'll take
19:48
it uh I don't know whether Terry put it on the back of a napkin from Saskatchewan but Terry nonetheless got
19:54
drawn out of the famous 45 gallon drum that all of these request go into
19:59
there's a bunch of oh here we go again with I'm going to start I'm going to cut you off of that uh Terry
20:04
wants to know how much of an effort effect if I could read properly we'd get
20:09
this right how much of an effect do you think a snap swivel a snap
20:15
swivel uh has on walleye I like using them to make changing baits easier but
20:22
do you think I am catching less fish because of them so great question by the way because
20:29
I think you're going to get a divided opinion on this if Pete was here with me
20:35
he'd probably disagree with me because I catch him using snaps all the time and I
20:41
say what the hell are you doing but in my opinion and I know I
20:47
know they make your changing baits easier right it's simple just snap put a
20:53
new bait on and off you go so if I go out fishing for the convenience of being
20:58
a able to switch baits quicker I probably wouldn't go out fishing at all cuz there's a lot
21:04
more things that are inconveniencing me when I go fishing than just changing my lure if I got rid of all those things I
21:11
wouldn't be out fishing so to me changing your lure tying a proper knot on each because different lures call for
21:18
different knots tying the proper knot on on each bait is uh is all part of the
21:24
game to me and anytime that you I even I get paranoid
21:31
about the profile of a knot the size of a knot that bothers me it's it's always
21:36
looming big in my head am I affecting the action on this
21:43
bait with it so my answer is no do not
21:49
do not use any metal components of any kind between your line and your
21:56
bait now I know you must mus Anglers are going to say are you out of your
22:01
mind no I'm not out of my mind cuz I was going to say with the one exception
22:07
perhaps if you're Musky fishing then you do need some kind of
22:12
metal between you and the fish because that fish will tear you apart there's no question about it although I just want
22:20
to throw this out there the world's biggest musky was
22:25
caught without a leader just want to throw it out there it was caught on a little rap lure it was a it was a
22:31
incidental catch they landed it in the whole bit with just monofilament Lin so
22:37
I'm throwing it out there Dean what do you think of that I don't trust them at all I never used themed even when we
22:42
were up we were up on the mckeny and those fish like the pike we were catching up there they don't care about
22:49
anything no but we had a snap open up and I don't think you'll ever have like a nod on like an 80 lb lader break well
22:57
the argument there though is uh could they bite through an 80 lb lader I don't
23:04
know like I would trust so the fish that I caught which hopefully will be on the show next year that was on just a knot
23:12
that I tied perfect and that was you know a 40 iner or whatever it was so you
23:17
know if that can hold then I I'd rather trust my knot over a manufactured snap
23:23
because I've had those open up and break so many times and it's just totally out of your hands no
23:29
good quality heavy duty snaps do exist right yeah but these like what were we fishing up there yeah I know that was
23:35
wasn't that the Peter the Peter leader the Peter leader they were like like they were made for like sharks or something and they were opening so I
23:43
don't know I I don't trust them at all that's a good point that's right too cuz I had one go on me too so but uh no as a
23:51
rule uh Terry from Saskatchewan as a rule I'm going to say
23:56
95 96 6% of the time that you see me uh throwing baits out there they are tied
24:04
directly onto my line without question and I and I highly suggest people listening unless you're
24:11
an Ardent musky angler and and and you're using you know a bait that weighs
24:17
3 and2 lbs and costs $182 unless you doing that I don't think
24:23
you need it you know it's going to affect especially smaller baits that's where it really and that be that just
24:30
aggravates me when I see Anglers using them on jigs that's crazy to me yeah you know what I mean yeah so uh Terry
24:39
definitely no [Music]
24:51
no we interrupt this program to bring you the much anticipated bonus code for the latest fishing Canada giveaways
24:58
this week's code is striper that's striper s t r i p e r all uppercase and
25:07
no forget that's one p just type that in the bonus code section of the contest and receive 100 free entries towards all
25:15
our current giveaways for those who haven't entered yet what the heck are you waiting for head on over to fishing
25:22
canada.com while you listen to the rest of this episode click contest and sign up for all the latest fishing candidate
25:29
giveaways and now back to the show all right as I said before uh this
25:34
is going to be a great interview I've been looking forward to it ever since I heard that uh Dr Trevor Avery was going
25:40
to be joining us on the program to talk about uh a very I think um moving
25:48
forward a very difficult issue that we're all going to have to deal with both as as Anglers and as a naturalist
25:55
conservationist uh commercial fisherman every everybody involved it's going to be a tough one uh thank you for joining
26:01
us doctor appreciate you coming on the show thank you for having me so
26:07
obviously uh let's take it right back from the beginning uh it was um about 3
26:13
weeks ago that we first heard about it about this new ruling that has been handed down by a DFO I would imagine I
26:20
know the Atlantic s Federation has got fingerprints all over it and people are talking about them but really this is a
26:26
DFO thing and uh they basically said that they were going to increase the
26:34
catches catch limits on strap bass in the mirami to the point where you know
26:40
and this happens all over the country as you know uh doctor I mean creel senses tell us that things change from time to
26:48
time and therefore you know uh fish managers have to make changes as well so
26:53
it's not really a shock I think the real shock is the quantities that they're Chang changing and in some cases well
27:00
they've doubled the angler uh quotas so angler that was keeping two stripers now
27:06
has got the right to take four and so that's double and the uh commercial
27:12
fishing um which is primarily the indigenous communities on or community
27:17
on the Mirchi uh it's four times their normal quota and I think that's probably
27:23
the shocking part you were pretty vocal on this uh right from the GetGo so I'm going going to uh open it up to you
27:29
first of all uh tell us what the impact will be and when we can expect to really
27:35
feel the impact of this drastic move oh those are big questions uh just
27:41
a couple points off the top it's the the recreational fishery went from three to four so it was three last year it's it's
27:48
four now uh so there's a slight increase there um and the commercial one 25%
27:56
increase yeah and commercial one is uh has gone up not not quite quadrupled
28:02
because it's 175 from 50 uh in total 75,000 individuals well
28:09
then let me ask you this if we're if we're uh if we're looking at the details how good of a handle do we have
28:16
on the existing commercial fishery quota anyways I mean is this is this document
28:22
is it in stone do we know for a fact that that that number is real or is it just maybe
28:28
we kind of hope that that's what it was there's um well the the current one
28:35
or the previous one I guess now was 50 50,000 individuals right but there's
28:40
there's no um the only reports that we have uh that I've been able to get U and
28:45
my colleagues is is that they have they haven't fished uh that number yet so
28:51
that 50,000 hasn't been attained um and
28:56
U presumably because there's not uh necessarily A a viable buyer for the
29:03
straight B so you know what's the market um that sort of thing but but that's I I
29:08
don't have any confirmation on any of that um except that we don't know what
29:13
the actual number is um in the uh documents from from DFO um not the
29:20
recent announcement but some of the papers leading up to this uh Publications leading up to this um where
29:27
they've looked at the reference limits Etc um in there it does state that that
29:32
the the actual number on the catch will be a a privacy uh issue so you know that
29:38
we don't we don't know what that reporting is unless it's reported a privacy issue can you can you explain
29:43
that for us if you could I I can't explain it I just that's what it says
29:48
just what it is says in the document a privy issue yeah well it it's you know
29:54
it's an agreement between two parties and and uh you know they they've got the code up to 50,000 but who they're
30:02
reporting to on that is um probably going to be DFO but then it would be
30:08
it's not necessar going to be public knowledge I mean there's lots of things that DFO gets uh reported to them that's
30:14
not public knowledge you have to go through their chanels to get that really I did not know that I thought everything
30:20
was out uh in the open it was transparent if we if I wanted to find out how many smallmouth bass are being
30:25
harvested in uh Lake X I can some if I'm willing to make the effort to dig that
30:32
this was all available to me you're telling me that's not necessarily the case no it depends on what information
30:40
um you're looking for I mean for example the commercial Lobster fishery you can't
30:46
get the information of a specific vessel of how much a specific vessel is catching you can get an aggregate
30:52
information if you apply got to get the the reported information so that's that's a standard okay in DFO it's it's
30:59
a protection measure and that's you know I'm not disagreeing with it at all um if I haven't mentioned it already uh Dr
31:06
Avery is an expert uh in biology mathematics and statistics so uh when he
31:12
talks about numbers uh I think he knows a thing or two and you've been working on strip bass primarily for some time
31:20
tell us a little bit about the background uh with that uh yeah probably since about uh
31:27
2004 2005 I've been working on strip bass as one of my primary species of of
31:34
uh of research areas at at Cadia University and I'm in the biology
31:39
department but recently I'm also Crossing Point into the math and stats Department primarily to teach statistics
31:45
to undergraduates and um so I do have expertise in that area as well so um
31:52
I've been working on strip bass mainly from the recreational Fisheries perspective
31:58
so how do we get citizen scientists stewards um in that are catching strip
32:07
bass to help us uh with the fishery help us inform numbers catches size of fish
32:14
all those sorts of metrics that are really difficult to get uh from a
32:19
broadscale fishery that's primarily a recreational fishery except for this the
32:25
small commercial fishery on year machine um and small in comparison to historical
32:31
Comm Fisheries um is uh difficult to get the the rest of the information and so
32:38
I've spent you know nearly 20 years trying to figure out approaches to getting those sorts of pieces of
32:45
information and I've tried all sorts of different things to to get it you say that the uh commercial fishery is small
32:51
in comparison to the recreational fishery on the river no I I don't know that
32:58
um I don't think anybody knows that okay um there's a lot of fish caught in the recreational fishery it's about it's
33:05
about retention and um as well just because retention is mortality right uh
33:10
but it's also about Fisheries related mortality mortality that we uh we can't
33:17
estimate easily which is you know what happens at a catch and release fishery
33:22
um there there is mortality associated with Catch and Release um whether that's you know hooked uh fish or fish that
33:30
swallow a hook or uh get tangled in line there's all sorts of things that can happen to to cause mortalities in Catch
33:36
and Release fishery so it's it's not it's not a zero mortality piater we don't know what that number is um we and
33:43
we don't know what the number of retention uh the retention fishery is either do we have a handle on the number
33:50
of people fishing for this species recreationally do we do we know that you
33:56
know annually there's um 100,000 people on the river how is there a number that you go by at all there is no known
34:03
number no known number because it's a coastal fishery it doesn't require license right um and so
34:11
I'm Sorry by the way I'm sorry to to laugh at that I I apologize but but it's to me it seems kind of absurd to be
34:17
honest with you that you know we have such a spectacular fishery on the mirror Mach for bass that we don't have a
34:24
handle on the numbers if it was mine if I own that fishery man I would know
34:29
everything about that everything yeah so there's a bit of a backstory to that
34:35
it's uh it's not something that that um U hasn't been thought of before I mean
34:40
it's it's a it is a um trying to figure out how many Coastal saltwater Anglers
34:47
there are in maritimes has has been proposed a number of times um some time
34:53
ago and I can't remember the the dates of let's say pre-o quite a bit um there
35:00
was a an attempt to try and get a saltwater uh license uh part of the
35:05
issue there is that saltwater Anglers um don't want to pay for a license um and
35:11
then it was proposed that maybe we make that license free just so we could track the number of people it's it's a very
35:18
difficult uh thing to do is to track people that are fishing in coastal
35:24
Fisheries regardless of what it is sp fast mackerel smell if you don't know
35:30
how many people are doing it and on top of that you don't know how how
35:36
successful they are at catching things and you don't know what that fishing effort is so one person saying I have a
35:44
license and oh okay that's a that's a one we have one person has a license and they go up once a year what's their
35:50
impact on the fishery well it could be zero they might not catch anything um but if you have 100,000 as you suggested
35:57
out on the fishery uh every year and everybody's catching 100 fish and 10% of
36:02
those even with Catch and Release are uh dying because you know they to get foul
36:08
hooked or something um uh there's consequences to catch and
36:14
release is my point and um you know that that number adds up right oh for sure
36:19
without question and you know we we talk about it on this show quite a bit the value of having licenses and having to
36:26
be licensed to fish in various jurisdictions to to experience this wonderful thing we have in this country
36:33
called fishing the value is really um on the all that information you just said
36:38
is being lost without having a license because if you don't have license Anglers how do we Garner how can we you
36:45
know get all that valuable information to manage the fishery properly and that's that's going to be an issue with
36:50
stripers I think on that River until the license issue gets resolved I know
36:55
people don't want to hear that but it's it's necessary whether it's free or
37:00
whether there's a small fee associated with it it's kind of irrelevant but we need to know who's doing what to who to
37:08
have a handle because um you said some pretty alarming
37:14
things uh after this this new story broke and that was that you believe that
37:19
based on current information uh we could totally decimate that fishery within 3 years if we going
37:26
keep going in this direction Direction so all the more reason why we need the information we need the data people like
37:32
you have to have a shell full of numbers that you can push around so that you can
37:38
help us maintain it and and use it properly right how serious how serious are you
37:45
about that comment it's uh it's a little bit out of context um as you know wa a 40 minute
37:52
interview with with CBC and they take half a dozen CS um quotes quotes from
37:58
you um I'm used to that I've done this a lot um there nothing to get upset about
38:03
um but the there's a few qualifications on this this
38:09
175,000 is the number that minister is allowing in the commercial fishery if you take
38:17
175,000 of your uh spawning stock on that River that's presumably where the
38:23
catch is going to happen during the during the spawn or just after the spawn um on that river system because that's
38:29
when you get the high a aggregation of strip bass in the area um then and right
38:36
now we know that the number of Spawners the estimate of the number of spawners from 2022 is about 450,000 fish let's
38:44
say um the numbers are all published in um DFO reports there will be an
38:51
estimate for 2023 which I'm eagerly awaiting uh because that estimate if it
38:57
if it can continues to go down from the The Hive that we saw a couple years ago where there was around 950,000 spawners
39:04
on the river then the trajectory for the population is already trending uh downwards so so it's not necessarily
39:12
stable but that's that's the nature of Fisheries that's a separate thing and we
39:18
can talk about that if you'd like but that's separate thing but if you take too many uh spawners out of the system
39:25
uh for successive years then you end up not having spawners there to replenish
39:31
the um juveniles that you know the spawn EGS and replenish the juveniles and
39:37
that's called recruitment so you have to be able to recruit new spawners to the
39:42
fishery so those would be fish that are three four or five years old um there's
39:47
various estimates on when females and males become mature but you're going to need enough females enough males of the
39:54
right age and the um that that recruitment picture if you
40:00
take out too many of your spawning spawners in a short period then you're
40:06
going to probably um highly likely uh reduce those that recruitment the
40:13
problem is you're not going to see the problem for some years because it's going to take uh three years uh at a
40:20
minimum to see a fish recruit to the fishery that can spawn uh and then uh
40:26
there are uh other fish out in the fishery as well um that are of larger
40:32
size that are older and these strip BS can live up to let's say 30 years some estimates is 35 and maybe on average
40:39
it's more like 20 but we don't necessarily know that um there's some
40:44
information or data that we can pull on that but let's say it's let's say it's 30 Years be optimistic uh so they're
40:50
going to be some long live fish uh spawning in that fishery and maybe they're going to prop everything up and
40:56
that's great uh the one good thing going for the near Missy is they have a swap limit fishery for at least for the
41:02
recreational fishery and I'm not sure exactly what it would be for the commercial fishery um but if you if you put put
41:11
take a lot of those spawners out of the system quickly and there's only 450,000
41:16
every year you have to be replacing that 175,000 you're taking out the system and
41:22
you have to be pretty certain you're that that's happening and I'm not s sure the certainty is there that you be
41:29
replacing those every year and that's sort of the problem that I have with it so and and you won't see that effect for
41:36
some time which is the other other side of it a couple of things come to mind first of all what I have been led to
41:44
believe for a number of years uh from other jurisdictions that have similar
41:50
problems is that when quotas are are etched in stone the reality of the
41:55
matter is that the people pushing those numbers around and coming up with with those
42:00
quotas have got a preconceived notion as to how successful the Harvest is
42:06
actually going to be what I mean by that is if a quota is um 100,000 pieces
42:15
they're actually in their mind you know 60,000 is going to actually be
42:20
fulfilled and I guess there's a there's a bit of wiggle room for them now in
42:26
this fish they can't even be thinking that because we have never had to my knowledge
42:33
anyways you could probably straight me out on that there's never been um first of first of all the fish
42:41
is depending on who you talk to is either brand new or it's been there for a thousand years I mean you could talk
42:49
to folks and they call it invasive I know it's not because I've talked to people locals who have been fishing them
42:54
since they were kids and that would make that fish at least 80 years old so
43:01
there's some some some discussion that you know is merited with that but let's forget that for a moment so if they're
43:08
saying 175 and they
43:15
are they are aware of the fact because they gave us the numbers that there's only 450 coming into the system I'm
43:22
talking 450,000 if there's 150,000 175 five that is allowed uh by
43:29
the commercial fishery and we don't know what the number is for recreational
43:35
Anglers CU we don't know how many recreational Anglers we have on the system at any given time but we do know
43:40
now that they can take four home right they're I mean this is beyond
43:46
Russian Roulette this is beyond Insanity because I'm just putting down the numbers they're saying that they can
43:53
dispose of about 50% of their current breeding stock and still have this fish
43:58
survive according to what DFO is saying yeah and that's that's not a that's not
44:05
a a out of the realm of possibility position let's let's be
44:11
clear on that the modeling that they've done is been is very is very good uh
44:18
it's the best model they can do um on given the information that they have but
44:23
the the problem is that they don't have all the information so there are some assumptions in that model and what the
44:29
model tells us is that you can take so many fish out of the system and as long
44:35
as there's a recuit recruitment coming and which the model also predicts the recruitment is going to be good that
44:42
this is the number that you can you can pick out and I don't know if it's the 175
44:48
that's not how the model works it's basically if you have uh if if you see
44:56
the estimate of how what your abundance is between that lower and upper reference limit then whatever your quote
45:03
is is essentially working or not working you have to wait to see what what that
45:10
number does to the population after the fact not not based on the map yeah after the fact but
45:16
that's how probably 90% of the Fisheries are managed they're managed in a in a by
45:23
a a retention right The Landings so whatever The Landings are officiary you put that as the next data point and then
45:30
you adjust uh and with with some predictive capability but not not very
45:35
accurately what the next year uh Landing should be so conceivably you could
45:41
adjust this number every year and as long as there's a nice accurate assessment of how many fish are in the
45:48
how many spawners are in the system which is what they measure right now uh that number has some uncertainty to it
45:54
and the uncertainty is not small so 175,000 in my opinion if you attain that
46:01
coupled with the not knowing how many recreational angers are out there and not knowing how much retention is going
46:07
on or and as well not knowing um what our catching release mortality is right
46:14
um that that what is that number at the end of the day is it 250,000 3 we don't
46:20
know like it's it's it's hard to to say it's going to be it's going to be almost
46:25
50% of what you're predict what you think you've got an inventory by the sounds of it that's what they're this
46:32
experiment is gambling with right yeah you're you're banking that the recruitment picture is going to work
46:38
right um and that's and that's somewhat variable you've thought um and let's
46:44
contrast this with the St John River this is pretty good evidence in the St John river that there was one good spawn
46:51
in the last 15 years or so where where there was a good spawn that had lots of
46:57
young juvenile fish coming to the fishery and there and it's highly episodic in other words it doesn't occur
47:04
every year where you have very good spawn lots of eggs surviving lots of juvenile surviving and good recruitment
47:10
into your into your agees one two three fish to become spawners what would
47:17
attribute to the the recruitment levels being higher or low like it's all to do
47:23
with the the complexities of the system you're in so the food the food that's in the river
47:29
itself where where the juveniles are feeding the egg survivals prob depending
47:34
of temperature and solinity and and uh whether there's other predators eating the eggs so there's right you know those
47:41
are just a few factors so there's lots of factors that play into that survival picture um we don't I don't think we
47:48
have a very good uh handle on uh how that works uh through uh for strip bass
47:57
uh or for lots of other fish um so that population Dynamics and that's the big
48:02
the big word the population Dynamics is how is a is an uncertain science um I'm
48:10
not saying it's wrong and I'm not saying that their estimates aren't uh they're as good as they can be but the estimate
48:15
of 450,000 in the system could be a lot higher but it also could be a lot lower
48:20
that's that's that's the piure that's the the whole this thing blows my mind because we don't have those numbers
48:28
those accurate numbers that we can rely on when you throw such a big number in terms of retention at 175,000 plus
48:36
whatever that other number is for wck fishing I mean that's why I'm looking at 50% if if we're going to say that that
48:43
that the number is close to being accurate that's 50% of the inventory is coming off the shelf legally that's
48:50
legally by the way because we're not counting on the illegal catches and we all know that that happens on any body
48:56
of water where you've got game fish or at least table Fair fish like the strip
49:02
bass but it behooves me but I want to just before I forget I want to go back
49:08
to something we touched on a little bit earlier on and that is the claim that this fish is an invasive species because
49:16
I want I think it's important here that we we communicate that message
49:21
because I can't help but feel and you don't have to agree with me that this
49:27
the motivating factor here to make this drastic change was in
49:33
part due to the Atlantic salmon and it's Decline and the Atlantic salmon
49:39
Federation uh Association they want to keep that fish they want to they want to
49:44
hopefully bring it back I don't know what they want to do but they're trying everything in order to try and uh save
49:52
that fish at the cost of this fish and if this fish is in fact
49:58
invasive they may have a good point but if it's not which I don't think it is
50:05
based on my own information then you're you're kind of picking sides aren
50:12
you on this you're saying well yeah I'm I'm into Atlantic salmon fishing and I and and I'm not into bass fishing so
50:19
let's kill that one at at the behest of my well that doesn't work in today's
50:24
society does it you know there there's a lot to un fact there a lot there's a lot first of
50:31
all is it invasive or is it not can we have a definitive answer on that as in uh well that depends your
50:39
definition of invasive um invasive if you're saying is an alien alien invasive
50:45
species the answer is no it's always being here an alien invasive species is one that has uh come from somewhere else
50:53
where it's uh where it's native right um in this case since the last glacial Ice
50:59
Age uh salmon and stri Fass and and lots of other BR trout and and lots of other
51:05
things uh became naturalized if you want to put it that way and we consider those to be native fish species sure so strip
51:12
bass have always been there if you look at historical um records of strip bass they're uh up and down the American
51:19
Seaboard but specifically in the maritimes there are lots of numbers there of of commercial catches to
51:25
straight pass when there was fishery um this has been documented in a few different Publications uh Sam
51:32
Andrews has published some of this and was published by DFO themselves the historical catches are um the numbers
51:40
are out there um for the commercial Fisheries so they've been around uh they went through uh decades where there was
51:48
super low numbers and Fisheries were cut off this isn't the first time that the Fisheries has been cut off um or changed
51:57
um and I'm speaking That stri Bass fishery previously was cut off recreational and everything to try and
52:03
build that stock back up again which was quite successful obviously um and so
52:09
when was that when when was that Trevor when you when did they stop the fishery
52:14
oh I can't remember the exact year but uh it was back when they had the around
52:19
5,000 estim was around 5,000 spawners in the in the population so and that went
52:25
on for about 5 years years and that um was um you know they and that and they
52:32
stopped the fishery and then over the next uh 51 it's usually quoted as 20 years so
52:39
the recovery happened over 20 years right um and that's a long time to see
52:44
something recover to the point where you can say oh let's put um a fishery back on but it took about five five six seven
52:53
years after that that 5,000 spawners to get the fishery back on so is it
52:58
invasive in that context in that context uh the word invasive sometimes is used
53:04
in invasive uh fish uh and other species biology is to mean a rapid influx of
53:11
something a rapid increase in some things that they become um they might
53:16
have some range expansion uh and we're seeing that was quite Bast they're they're up in Labrador they went up
53:23
there in 2017 and they're still there um so there is some range expansion
53:28
happened that happened right around the same time when that uh the estimate of the spawning spawning stock on the
53:36
mirror she was estimated around 950,000 fish um since that time things have have
53:44
come down but the the uh the spawn in sock estimate that is and uh but the fish stayed up in labor so there's a
53:50
range expansion there so are they considered invasive up in Labrador well
53:55
there's no living memory and there's no historical memory from the Inuit up
54:00
there of ever having strike bass in that system so so that's a that's more like
54:06
an alien invasive species than just a population increase that might be termed
54:11
invasive so the terminology is sometimes a little a little Bey you can use it to
54:16
your advantage or disadvantage depending on how you um do how you want to sensationalize your message exactly do
54:24
we have a handle on what happened uh to to drop the population by 50% from 950
54:30
to to 450 do we know what what what caused it no that's it it's uh this this is the
54:38
uncertainty that I'm talking about in population Dynamics so if it if it was 9
54:44
was that an anomaly was that year an anomaly was that year a calculation error they just happen to catch more of
54:51
their uh this estimate is done by tagging uh with um little streamer tags
54:57
essentially so visible tags in strip bass so every year gfo goes out to tag a bunch um I don't know how many but quite
55:04
a few and then they look in some pairing we and they monitor those for the rures
55:11
and and the important thing is the ones that aren't tagged so you need to have that ratio of the tagged and the
55:16
untagged in the hering and then you use those values um to uh make that estimate
55:24
that that methodology they use um is uh was developed some time ago it's a again
55:31
another very good model for what how you would go about this complicated um and uh it comes with some
55:38
uncertainty quite a bit of uncertainty but that's a common thing again in Fisheries so it's hard to it's the
55:46
uncertainty that's the problem here it's not if everything was super accurate we'd be able to say every year there's
55:52
this many fish in the system you could take this many and we know that next year there's going to be this many more coming in the problem is
55:59
is the numbers um the uncertainty of that on average over all of those years
56:06
of producing these um different models and the models I'm talking about now are
56:11
the ones for the recruitment to the fishery that are uh sort of predicting these upper and lower reference limits
56:17
uh those models uh also have uncertainty in them and if they don't the numbers at
56:23
the end of the day the predictive numbers past what we currently know uh
56:29
tend to be tend to look a little bit high if we look at some of the diagrams that they have for us so you have to you
56:36
have to bring that all into context again and you have to look at the fluctuations because populations
56:43
naturally fluctuate and straight fast populations are no different they go up they come down they go up they come down
56:50
if you did nothing else do them we as humans are now imparting so something on
56:56
those populations and so the effect of that is going to make that population go up or down probably even quicker than
57:03
what it natur does I can tell you this this is where my concern comes on a
57:08
personal level I've been fishing the Mir Machi and bass in particular for the
57:14
better part of eight years now is pre- pandemic and I can tell you I have seen
57:20
the number drop I don't know whether it dropped from 90000 to 400,000 but I can tell you from personal
57:28
experience that um the number has definitely been dropping on that
57:34
River still spectacular but but and that's the Crux
57:39
of what my research is all about that I that I've been working on for years is is trying to figure out is you hear a
57:47
lot from recreational angers you hear a lot for from professional Anglers you hear a lot from professional Fishers
57:53
commercial Fishers uh um not necessarily in stri B but in other commercial
57:59
fisheries and we need to listen to them we need to listen to what people are
58:04
saying there's um the traditional ecological knowledge that's out there is
58:10
you know unparalleled we we have to listen to that we have to figure out a way to integrate that into our knowledge
58:18
of the system and when you have uh many many recreational Anglers posting saying
58:24
oh you know last year was great this year I I already caught anything um does that have mirror and it's not because
58:31
they're using a different fishing rod or different bait or fishing in a different spot it it may just be that there are
58:37
fewer fish around so you have to have keep that open as a possibility um and
58:44
it's probably not you know an improbable possibility so so I get you I hear that
58:50
um from lots of recreational Anglers that are out there you know it's been really good it's been really bad
58:56
um and right now the the the word on the street is it's less than it was so put
59:03
some when you couple that with a good solid science then then you have to
59:08
believe that that that number is to be true and which which brings me to my next
59:16
question or or maybe statement um there's all kinds of buzz on social
59:24
media about this the minute that it broke people were spewing all kinds of things including the fact that uh DFO
59:31
was totally ignoring science and just appeasing some special
59:36
user groups uh and and giving away the farm so to speak but ignoring science do
59:42
you believe that that that could be the case here has science been used in this
59:49
in this tabulation of 175,000 will be the the the new Benchmark that we
59:55
can take out of the system and it sustains itself there's a again a little bit F
1:00:02
back there um I wouldn't say they've ignored DFO in a sense the DFO has a
1:00:10
lower reference Limit Up upper reference limit for the number of spawners in the
1:00:15
system uh but that depends on which of the underlying models we calculate that
1:00:21
um and there's there's there's two models that sort of make the most sense that that whole framework of how that
1:00:28
was done was reviewed by many scientists other than the ones that developed it at
1:00:34
DFO and they did a fantastic job and I was uh one of the one of many reviewers
1:00:40
and and um uh you know that's a very good model the the lower and upper
1:00:47
reference limits the lower reference limits around 200,000 um spawners in the
1:00:53
system um you you have to be able to monitor that at which they're doing so
1:00:59
they know how many spawners in the system every year um so and the model
1:01:04
also says that this is on average how things sort of work this is how many eggs are in the system this is uh this
1:01:11
is how many recruiters are coming to the system all of those models are pretty standard Fisheries models that have been
1:01:17
around for uh you know many many years um some of them are new iterations of an
1:01:23
old theme but they're they're pretty standard in the way this these things are calculated um they still don't account
1:01:30
for all the stochasticity all of the variability in the system um and so it's
1:01:36
all these models are an on average model on average every year just on average
1:01:42
this this is uh what what we what we can expect but it's the uncertainty that's
1:01:47
that's the problem here is that all these models have of a lot of uncertainty so all you can do is try
1:01:53
this and if the next year you see a a precipitous decline in the number of
1:01:59
spawners you need to make adjustments if it's two years later you see a precipitous decline you need to make
1:02:06
adjustments and then that's how you keep things with between the lower and the upper reference
1:02:12
limit I just think the number is a little high uh for if you attain it if
1:02:18
you take out 175 and you know and the estimates for
1:02:23
for how many are in in the spawning stock is a little bit delayed we're still waiting for the 203 2023 estimate
1:02:30
to come out and it's we're into almost into August of 20124 so and that's that's where what you're
1:02:38
saying kind of concerns me though because in a perfect world if we had a
1:02:44
really good handle on our inventory and we knew exactly what was sitting on the
1:02:50
shelf we knew exactly what the stock looked like I would agree with you we can make a quick adjustment and and we
1:02:56
can say hey that's that obviously was a little too much look at we've got we could see right now that that we have no
1:03:01
size 10 left on the Shelf therefore we need but you guys like there is no by
1:03:07
the sounds of it there is we have no it's all by guess by golly in terms of
1:03:12
what are the actual numbers right I mean we don't know if if you're if not you and I'm not blaming you but if DFO is
1:03:19
off by I don't know 10% on their estimates that thing will
1:03:26
this will come collapsing before your three-year prediction I'm telling you you can't take that big of a biomass out
1:03:34
of any fishery I don't care where it is it could be Lake Eerie walleye you
1:03:40
that's a big number that we're jumping to on an inventory level that we're not
1:03:46
really we're not really sure what we got it just that's and that's part of the
1:03:51
part of the problem I mean that in essence that's that encapsulates the problem if don't have a very good uh uh
1:03:59
accurate estimate of what's there and and I'm not saying that their estimate on average their median estimate their
1:04:06
mean estimate is not a good one it probably is pretty realistic the problem
1:04:12
is is that it also has high uncertainty associated with it and so if it's on the
1:04:18
low uncertainty side um then you could be having uh you know severe severity
1:04:24
deete that fishery in one go one year two years um and if you couple that with
1:04:32
the uncertainty in the recruiting picture say you had a high temperature year you didn't have good a survival um
1:04:38
you're not going to see that in the fishery for three or four years and so my caution here is that even though
1:04:44
there's a cautionary approach being applied that I think you need to be very
1:04:50
Vigilant about making sure we look at this fishery and doing our part as
1:04:56
uh recreational angers and scientists to to say keep your eye on it because this is what going to be critical to monitor
1:05:04
this over the next few years and part of the problem is there's there's really not a lot of um uh funding to be able to
1:05:12
do that vfl has limited capacity to do what they do um there's not a lot of
1:05:18
funding coming to stri fast research to be able to answer some of these fundamental questions and I'll give you
1:05:24
an example um the estimate for the facundity the number of eggs that are in
1:05:30
a strip bass of a certain size uh on the MMI River and in other places in the
1:05:37
maritimes is is not known with much accuracy some of the estimates of f are
1:05:44
taken from uh old Publications uh older data wow um in the same system some of
1:05:51
it's taken from us populations which behave very differently from pan popul ations in some respects and so that's a
1:05:59
fundamental piece of the puzzle because all those models are based on how many Cas are in the systems so if the aasman
1:06:07
is off the trickle down from that is that you're going to get a recuitment feature that's off that part of that with with with the
1:06:15
numbers that are produced from from the models that are there for that they're Bas off of is that I I reviewed them
1:06:23
before this and and I can't see where where they where they have this the the estimates for the spotting stock being
1:06:33
sort of on fire with what we're actually seeing the estimat seem to always be much higher and so I think they're being
1:06:39
a little bit optimistic about what's happening with the population and part of that is that model is based off of
1:06:46
real data and that real data uh from the
1:06:52
U the estimates that they were getting like they not having ,000 450 is now is um that produced a
1:07:03
big spike in that in that um that graphic and essentially that's going to
1:07:08
influence the model to a certain extent that's how model to take in consideration all the right so you can't
1:07:15
just ignore on so there's a little bit of lock of what's called a a sensitivity
1:07:21
analysis on that model to say what would happen if and yeah that's a way of looking at a complex model and saying
1:07:28
what would happen if this happened for five years or that happened five years and I'm not seeing uh any evidence uh of
1:07:36
that being part of the picture here to make to make the estimate of the 100
1:07:42
75,000 for the commercial fishery and that might be what happened in the background but I have no knowledge of
1:07:47
whether it did or not so from my perspective once again first of all this
1:07:53
is unprecedented I I don't think I've ever heard of a fishery going up in terms of uh
1:08:01
retention numbers like this ever in my lifetime it's always the opposite we've heard the Cod fishery the Cod the Cod
1:08:08
fishery but but but Cod fishery went the other way right it it it ret the retention uh the limits
1:08:17
for how much he could catch and the uh was uh not
1:08:23
regulated probably well enough um so the parallel is if you look at the Cod fishery it's a classic example of Old
1:08:30
Fishing your spawning stock biomass yeah um for two years in a row the Cod fishery from all estimates of the
1:08:37
spawning stock biomass that was there in the fishery over two years they took
1:08:43
2third or better of that out of the system and after two years the whole thing collaps collapsed well well
1:08:50
there's a perfect example and it's not too far from home is it I mean that's that's what and it's not that old we
1:08:56
should be able to look at that and learn something from it but I I was going to
1:09:01
say I've never heard of it going up before it's always being taken away as
1:09:06
Anglers were always complaining that you know government's taking away our
1:09:11
fishing rights right but my question on this one is the fact that it's the
1:09:18
opposite there's no cost to anybody for these this increased Harvest there's no
1:09:24
from what I can understand from this there's no economic benefit to the
1:09:30
region to the province to the federal government to anybody from this
1:09:35
increased Harvest so if I'm on the outside looking in if I'm just
1:09:41
a a casual podcast listener that just fell onto this episode by accident they
1:09:47
got to be saying to themselves what the hell is going on if there's no economic
1:09:53
benefit to any body for doing this why are we there's no this is not a case of
1:10:01
trying to curb the growth of this species then why are we doing it the
1:10:06
question is why are we doing it do does anybody have a handle on exactly what's going on why is this happening to us to
1:10:14
everybody I think there's a lot of things that happen at the top levels of of government in The Minister's office
1:10:21
uh definitely where there's more than one uh well what's the motivating what's the
1:10:28
motivating factor what is it is it is it the commercial fishery is it the recreational fishery what's the motivating factor that would cause such
1:10:34
a a drastic change from the norm in your
1:10:41
opinion I have no opinion on it that's that it wanders too far into politics
1:10:47
and uh and motivations uh for me I'm I'm a scientist I just look at the numbers I
1:10:53
look at what's going on I try to make uh rational independent uh views of things
1:11:00
that are out there I I to research for all different groups I work on salmon too sure um I work on strip bass I work
1:11:07
on lots of different things to try to figure out you know how how do we make things better how can we listen to
1:11:13
people how can we integrate knowledge uh from all different groups uh together um
1:11:18
how can we improve uh fish passage how can we conserve the species that we have here uh so that for generations to come
1:11:27
uh that people can go out and catch a strike pass or some other fish that's out there and know that it's something
1:11:33
that's good to eat um and not full of contaminants or something like that um
1:11:38
by the way it is my motivation it's exceptional I don't know I'm sure you've had strip bass but it's exceptional
1:11:46
table fair and that's one of the problems abut that's one of the problems that it has it's the same with walleye
1:11:52
one of the reasons that walleye is always on the verge right always not because it's such great table fair that
1:11:58
people just want to consume it and I and I think the stripe bass fits right into that same problem area so um yeah it's a
1:12:06
good it's a good fish to eat and fantastic you know why why not uh have
1:12:11
it there so that people can go out and catch one and and eat it how many how many Fisheries are left that we have
1:12:17
where you can go out and catch uh a meal on it I mean you've got uh maybe brook
1:12:22
trout but there's a lot of stocking with Brook right you know exact they St it you catch it the next year they St it
1:12:29
again you catch it again yeah um this is a natural population that's out there it's it might be you know the numbers
1:12:35
have increased I'm you obviously they've increased there's more angles because the numbers have increased if you know
1:12:42
there's some simple metrics you can look at and uh because those numbers have increased there's more people that are
1:12:48
interested in going fish up and then that's going to bring uh a swell of of
1:12:53
retentions and so you're we're there's there's there's there's
1:12:59
things that go up and down in the fishery we do the fish but also the pressures that are on the fishery and
1:13:05
those need all be considered I know you can't take sides and I'm not asking you to take sides but and I I don't want to
1:13:11
take sides but um from my own once again personal experience in that area of
1:13:16
fishing I know that the de if there was a demand for this species uh in terms of
1:13:23
commercial value which I think there should be and this might cause that to happen maybe I don't know but right now
1:13:30
there isn't right now the commercial fishery down there for strip bass is is
1:13:36
marginal at best it's just there's no great demand you know you can't even get a feed of stripe bass anywhere on the
1:13:43
river you can't go to a local restaurant or or place and get they they don't even
1:13:49
serve it so there's no real appetite no pun intended for it on the river itself
1:13:54
I'm thinking maybe this is designed to create a market for it maybe um but I
1:14:03
don't think it is personally I don't think that's the case I don't think this is this is um a commercial fishery issue
1:14:12
I think that's kind of a an aside benefit of this new way of thinking
1:14:19
about strip bass so I'm in my world I'm taking that off the table that's not the problem
1:14:25
I have to bring in the salmon uh Atlantic salmon Federation into this
1:14:32
because they've got their fingerprints all over it um and the reason I want to
1:14:38
bring it up just before we end this show is I want to put you on the spot a little bit as a scientist do you have
1:14:46
any scientific proof that I can take home that says the stripe bass on the
1:14:54
mirror machine has caused the decline of the Atlantic salmon as a scientist do
1:15:00
you have anything you can give me it's it's a loaded question no and
1:15:06
it's it's an incomplete question okay because you're asking does it have an effect and and I can say St fast eat
1:15:14
salmon eat lots of other things too right it's whether they have an effect on the population Dynamics right of
1:15:22
Atlantic s are they the ones that are they is that the strip Bast the lever
1:15:28
that was pulled in this in the Atlantic salmon world where it caused the land
1:15:35
sent to decline precipitously and the evidence for that and the answer of that
1:15:41
question is it can be there are many many rivers that have arguably zero
1:15:48
impact from stri Fass that are also with theed so what is the what is the
1:15:56
argument what's the picture there I think there's a lot there to thread together and I don't think that you can
1:16:03
say hitting one species against another is an answer because we can't hit one
1:16:08
species against another to say that that's the problem okay so I think what you're
1:16:14
saying to me is that we have no scientific proof that on the mirror Machi the Atlantic salmon owes the strip
1:16:23
bass it's it's because that's what's going on
1:16:29
here right you know or may not know but that's what the word is out there that that the reason that the Atlantic salmon
1:16:34
fishery and and populations are at an all-time low is because the stripe bass
1:16:39
has moved the invasive species has moved in and started mucking around with with
1:16:45
the salmon and I know that's not the case but I can't help but feel that that's what's happening here and that's
1:16:51
what we are witnessing here today um with this what I think is an insane
1:16:57
increase in uh in Harvest numbers for this wonderful species and it's to me
1:17:02
it's Atlantic salmon strip bass it's just another fish it allows us people
1:17:08
like me to go out and enjoy and recreate out there we have a reason to go out to the Mirchi and and wet a line because of
1:17:15
these fish I see no difference between the two I don't distinguish a difference it's a
1:17:21
fish but I can't help but feel that this is what is going on here and I hope that
1:17:28
the demise of the Atlantic salmon on that
1:17:33
River doesn't cause the demise of the strip bass on that River because once they're both gone then you got nothing
1:17:40
left and that would be a pretty there be something else Sub sub something will move in you're right you have a lot more
1:17:46
a life yeah that's right there you go you know so it's it it's these are
1:17:52
complex systems and it's it's very difficult to uh there's no smoking done
1:17:59
this and um there's some evidence on one side there's other evidence on other side that's at greater context of all
1:18:06
the rivers in the be times there's all kinds of stuff that come to play here um
1:18:12
the the the problem here is that you have very few know one documented and
1:18:21
studied rivers of strip Fass that have spawning populations if there were
1:18:27
another 20 rivers of straight bass that that were spawning and being very productive and having lots of in
1:18:33
treatment then your argument of you know looking at one River and doing something
1:18:38
on it might hold a lot more water yeah we don't know that the strike fast there
1:18:44
suspected other spawning areas but we don't know what their contribution is to the population we do know that the N
1:18:50
machine River contributes to a massive uh
1:18:55
number of strip at bass in the entire region yeah right from Quebec all the
1:19:00
way uh around so um so we do know that that's
1:19:06
um something that is important to that to the whole population strike pass and
1:19:11
if you're going to take one spawning River of strike pass and say well we need to F them out there uh to to
1:19:18
save PL S I just think that that's not a very very good conservative approach to
1:19:25
fishing management not at all I do know I just thought of a species that will benefit probably is sitting back right
1:19:32
now just rubbing its hands saying yes it's fins pardon me smallmouth bass maybe they'll take
1:19:39
over arguably they've already taken so exactly exactly there's lots of small
1:19:45
walk fast to that's another another interesting story Jane bick's another interesting story they're they're all
1:19:51
they all have impacts on things um it's it's WEA uh the coexistence of all these is
1:19:57
effective to a high level and it's there's there's so many different ways
1:20:02
of looking at this problem uh that's the fascinating part we have to educate
1:20:08
people to look at the big picture we have to things knowledge in many
1:20:14
different ways uh to all the way up
1:20:22
to minister it all counts well one thing for sure it's got everybody's attention which
1:20:28
some folks might say is a good thing right um Trevor thank you so much for
1:20:34
joining us I've taken way too much of your time we appreciate it and hope to hope to uh as this thing unfolds and
1:20:40
progresses it's going to take a lot of different shapes and forms I'm sure uh would love the opportunity to hook up
1:20:46
with you again and see where it is at that point anytime all right thank you very much uh Dr Trevor Avery uh
1:20:54
professor at Acadia University uh biology mathematics and statistics are
1:21:00
things that he is working on with regards to stripe bass and uh I got to tell you um it's
1:21:08
turning into a mess because we have the other side of this coin of course is uh
1:21:15
the the tournament Anglers there's there's a an incredible um group of
1:21:21
folks who work really hard at having tournaments on the mirror machine for strip bass our good friend Jeff Wilson
1:21:27
being uh the leader of that group um and
1:21:32
they they're up in arms over and I and I can hardly blame them this is going to be Devastation for uh for play people
1:21:39
like that but anyways uh interesting story if you want to read up more we will have it on fishing canada.com as it
1:21:45
unfolds we broke the story um on it uh just recently but I think it's just a
1:21:52
start there's going to be a lot of backlash I'm sure in the days and weeks to come things may even change before it
1:22:00
comes to fruition it might get overruled who knows uh anyways uh thank you for
1:22:05
joining us that's the end of the show and uh we will be back next week
1:22:11
with a bright new fresh episode hopefully my co-host will be back he's out God knows where I'll find out uh
1:22:17
thanks for joining us on behalf of the entire team vola behind the camera Nick as per usual Dean Taylor our producer
1:22:24
I'm Ang Biola thanks for joining us folks catch you next time
1:22:31
[Music] [Applause]
1:22:39
[Music]
#Aquaculture
#Fishing
#Outdoors