February 3rd, February 8th and 16th at 6:00 PM (PST) for the remaining presentations of the Juvenile Sturgeon Conservation Series. During these informative presentations, you will hear from expert guest speakers on the status of the white sturgeon in BC, with a focus on juvenile sturgeons and the future of this ancient species. Don’t miss out!
Dr. Marvin Rosenau has over 35-years of experience working in freshwater fisheries in the province of British Columbia and overseas. Much of his work has focused on stream and lake habitat-protection and restoration, including issues relating to gravel-removal from streams, lake fertilization and flow-augmentation for fluvial (stream) fishes. Dr. Rosenau worked extensively on lower Fraser River white sturgeon during the 1990s as a BC fisheries program biologist and as a Director and member of the Science Committee with the Fraser River Sturgeon Conservation Society. He has continued on with work on lower Fraser and Nechako river white sturgeon, including teaching a fisheries course at BCIT’s Fish Wildlife and Recreation Program, and as an expert witness in a Federal Supreme Court action on the latter stream. Other fish species that Dr. Rosenau has worked on over the years include kokanee, Salish suckers, coho and Chinook salmon, steelhead and non-salmonid fishes.
February 8th, 2022 Webinar
Presenter Sarah Stephenson, R.P. Bio, Rare & Endangered Fish Biologist, Ministry of Forest, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development. For the last 10 years as a fish biologist for BC MFLNRO Sarah has been the lead for the Kootenay White Sturgeon recovery program for BC and a member of the Upper Columbia River White Sturgeon Recovery technical working group. Juvenile studies are a large focus of both populations; programs she has led include annual population monitoring, telemetry and ageing work. Beginning this January, Sarah started in a position with BC MFLNRO as a Sturgeon Restoration Specialist, working on all White Sturgeon populations in BC and looking forward to working more on the Fraser and Nechako Rivers populations.
February 16, 2022 Webinar
Presenter: Colin Schwindt, Senior Aquatic Biologist
Brian Comey and his crew of volunteers released thousands of chum fry into MacKay Creek earlier this month in a Covid compliant event. The release was blessed by Swxwu7mesh Nation and the whole event was filmed for sharing.
“If we don’t have a place for nature in our heart, how can we expect nature to have a place for us.” ― Abhijit Naskar
So to back up a little bit, I was drawn for a 2020 LEH Roosevelt Elk draw on Vancouver Island. The odds were 115:1, so I knew (and was told by everyone I talked to) that this was going to be one of those “once in a lifetime” type hunts. I knew I had to put my all into this, everything from preparing, scouting, and “putting boots on the ground”. I figured that if I didn’t put my best foot forward, regardless if I got anything or not, it would haunt me for the rest of my life. As famously said by Hunter S. Thompson – “anything worth doing, is worth doing right”.
As such, during the summer I spent time at the range practicing my “long range” shots at 200 yards +, scouring google maps for every possible drainage and mountain side that may hold elk, reading B.C. elk biology reports, and finally making trips out to Vancouver Island (I might add that I had just started a new full-time job and had only two weeks of vacation to use). The first trip, I got totally skunked and didn’t see a single elk (until on the car ride home on the side of the highway). However, on second trip out in September during the rut, I met up with some friends, and was able to put glass on some bulls.
Fast forward to October, opening day is on Saturday. My buddy and I take the ferry over on Thursday to meet up with another one of my friends to do some last minute scouting before the season starts. However, on the drive-in I immediately realized how wet this hunt was going to be. I had heard about Vancouver Island rain in the fall, however, when they say it’s like standing in a shower with the tap turned on full blast, they weren’t kidding! Luckily I had brought my Helly Hansen jacket and pants, as it definitely was going to be used. When we arrived at camp we were welcomed with pounding rain, and immediately grabbed shovels and started digging trenches to try and divert some of the water that was filling our “swimming pool”. As I dug soaking wet, I couldn’t help but smile knowing that there was definitely going to be some of “embrace the suck” involved in this hunt.
The next day (Friday), we spent the day scouting. Surprisingly it didn’t rain this day, however, it was mostly spent driving up FSRs where I had seen elk in the summer, glassing for any possible movement. At the end of the day we spotted a 7×3 bull with a small group of cows, which was reassuring to me. It was good to know that they were still bedding with cows during the “post-rut” and thus hadn’t disappeared into the thick forests as bachelors.
Opening day I awoke with excitement, it was like Christmas morning as a child. All the planning, preparation and scouting had come down to this. Regardless if I got anything, I reminded myself that I was so blessed and fortunate to just have the opportunity to chase these beautiful animals. I had to keep reminding myself this, as for the next 3 days it poured straight (by the end our swimming pool started to look more Olympic sized). During these days we would hunt dawn to dusk, but didn’t see a single elk. However, I kept positive and just enjoyed the company I was with, having laughs and looking forward to drinking home-made wine at the end of the day to warm up.
Tuesday morning the rain finally stopped. In my gut I knew that this was going to be the day. At the crack of dawn we posted up at a spot where we had seen lots of fresh sign, including massive trees and brushes all freshly thrashed up. At about 1000 yards away we started glassing a clear cut and sure enough spotted what appeared to be a rag-horn bull and a cow. After watching the stragglers for a while, we were ready to move to another spot when I spotted something out of the ordinary. I turned to my buddy and said “I think I see at least 15-20 cows on the side of this clear cut”, immediately everyone jumped back onto the glass and confirmed what I was seeing. We kept scanning the herd trying to spot something with antlers, and sure enough I spotted a nice looking 6×6 and then my buddy called out “I see a giant looking 7×7”. Two big bulls in a herd?! I was thinking that the satellite 6×6 was a shooter, let alone this 7×7! However, the impracticability of getting within shooting distance of these bulls quickly sank in. We were currently glassing over valley, with the herd on the direct opposite side. Thus, the only way to get within shooting distance was to sneak along the edges of the surrounding clear-cut and pray that we didn’t get winded. Sure enough, that’s exactly what happened, we tried to close the distance but a quick whiff by a cow sent the herd barreling over the side of bank, never to be seen again. They were in an optimal location for survival, easy to detect predators with a 360 field of view, not to mention easy escape routes.
I was a little bummed that I couldn’t put my scope on one of the bulls, but at the same time was just excited that I wouldn’t being going home not seeing any animals. They’re out there I kept reminding myself, it’s just a matter of time. After a quick lunch, we returned to one of the spots we had visited previously with no luck, however felt that it was really “elky”.
Similar to the previous location, there was a valley with a stream running through. However, there were no clear cuts on either side, just a swamp at the bottom of this valley. Our game plan was that we would slowly move along and hug the mountain side of the FSR, hopefully then getting into a position with the wind blowing towards us where we could peer down into the valley. As we quietly inched our way along this FSR, I made a few quick trips to the side of the road to peer down into the valley, “guy’s I see a bunch of bedded cows down at the bottom of this valley”, I whispered to my friends. I wanted to stay and glass for a surrounding bull, but knew that I should go back and hug the side of the road in order to not get busted. After what seemed like an eternity of creeping we finally reached the end of the FSR, I peered over the edge and saw what I at first though were thick tree branches by a tree. However, these tree branches slowly turned and I could see the slight outline of what appeared to be an elk. “Hey, I think I see a big bull over here”, I whispered to my friends.
Before they could peer over the edge to see, I noticed that the cow elk started to stand-up…the wind had changed and was directly blowing down into the valley. Everything started to move in warp speed for me, by this time all the cow elk had stood up and started to dart in a single-file line back into the forest. The bull elk finally stands up and I notice how big he looks. “Yeah that’s a shooter I said to my buddy”. Unlike the cow elk, he had no rush and followed behind them in a nonchalant and lordly way. As they are piling into the forest, I quickly scramble to chamber a round and dive into prone position. As the bull is just about to exit the edge of the forest line we let out a cow chirp, he turns around. I let out a few deep breaths and squeeze the trigger, the 180 grain 30-06 round stops him in his tracks and within seconds he’s on the ground.
I stop to catch my breath, “did that actually just happen?” I now scream to my buddies. We put a rangefinder on him and the distance is 250 yards away (luckily I had zeroed my rifle in at 200 yards). I cut my tag and stop to take a few pictures from a far… now the real fun begins we all said. With a steep decline into the valley, not to mention it being littered with stumps and logs, winching him out becomes an unrealistic endeavor. The sun is slowly starting to set, so we decide that the safest route is to go down and gut him and pack him out early next morning.
When we arrive early the next morning, we see that it had snowed 4-6 cm the night before. “Great, this 45 degree climb uphill with 100 pound packs of meat just got even more fun”, I’m sure was what both my friends were thinking about me at this point. I was definitely getting my fair dose of “embrace the suck”. By the 4th trip (with night time rolling in and a headlamp on) I was crawling on my hands and knees and praying to get me off this god-forsaken mountain. As I sat on a log halfway up the mountain, taking a short huckleberry snack break, I hear a gunshot in the distance, “could that be another set of hunters?” I wonder. When I reach the top my buddy says that he had just scared off a sow and a cub black bear, who had been getting dangerously close to my truck (now loaded with meat). Luckily, that was one of the last trips, as going back down into that valley with a headlamp and a bunch of hungry bears did not appeal to me. I was ready to get the F*ck off that mountain.
Now, looking back on this adventure, as I write this story with a freezer filled with meat and memories which will survive long past, I would do it again in a heart-beat. My “once in a lifetime hunt”, was not just about getting an elk, but the experience and friends made a-long the way. All I know is the next time I sit around a fire, I can chime in on the ancient tradition of hunting itself, story-telling.
Across North America, black bears are rousing after a long winter’s nap. How do they function after essentially not moving for up to five months?
For a number of years, I regularly trained for and ran distance races: half-marathons and marathons. But the current time demands of a toddler, work travel and writing conspire to make it difficult to keep up a regular running regime. The toughest is when I stop running for a few weeks, and then try to get back into it. That makes running even 3 miles feel like a slog, and my muscles feel it the next morning. I have to build up endurance all over again. My legs lose their strength rather quickly.
Anyone who exercises or trains for an athletic event understands this. And we also know that if someone is confined to a bed for weeks or months, their muscles atrophy and bones weaken. When it comes to the human body, it really is “use it or lose it.”
Not so for black bears.
As Bernd Heinrich describes in his excellent book Winter World: The Ingenuity of Animal Survival, black bears can spend five months in a den, without eating, drinking, urinating or defecating and lying almost entirely immobile — and not lose muscle mass or bone strength.
Heinrich is fascinated by the bear’s adaptations; he calls them the “ultimate couch potatoes.” He also happens to be a record-setting ultra-marathoner, so he understands the physiology of exercise.
Bear hibernation is not easy to categorize. Hibernating bears are immobile, but they can awaken easily (a fact that makes studying bear hibernation quite difficult). Whereas hibernators like ground squirrels lower their body temperature to almost freezing, bear body temperatures only drop about 6 degrees Celsius. The bear’s thick coat and fat, coupled with regular shivering, keep the bear warm. But maintaining body heat takes energy. Despite this, bears don’t take in calories or expel waste all winter.
Biologists have found that black bears metabolize their urea into nontoxic creatine, and nitrogen wastes are recycled back into protein. Waste calcium is cycled to the bones to keep them strong. Unlike a bed-ridden human, who loses bone mass, bears emerge from their very long rest with their bones still strong and functional. They also make their own water, likely by metabolizing fat. As researchers noted in a study in the journal Science, a hibernating bear is essentially a closed system, with no nutrients coming in or out.
That study involved five bears that had wandered too close to civilization in Alaska. After being captured, they were placed in artificial hibernating dens where University of Alaska-Fairbanks researchers “fitted the bears with sensors to record their temperature and heart rate, and the dens with infrared cameras and other sensors that monitored the bears’ movement, oxygen consumption, and even their snoring.”
Despite the relatively low drop in body temperature, their metabolism and oxygen consumption dropped by 75 percent.
The researchers found that, “While sleeping, [the bears] took only one or two breaths per minute. As they inhaled, their hearts did a quick flutter and then stopped until the next breath—resulting in a heart rate of about four beats per minute.”
The researchers also found that bears enter an intermediate state before hibernation. They eat and drink normally, but with their body already experiencing a lower metabolism. The bear’s body is preparing for a long period of rest.
In a National Public Radio story, researcher Brian Barnes called black bears a “metabolic marvel.” And part of that marvel is that there is still a lot we don’t know.
The black bear is the most common and adaptable bear species on earth. While these bears live in the wild country of the Rocky Mountains and Alaska, they also thrive in the woodlands and suburbia of the eastern United States. Their diet is similarly diverse, ranging from salmon to berries to backyard garbage. Even their coat color is highly variable, and can be brown, red, white or blue. (Yes, blue).
Despite the bear’s growing population, we still have much to learn about these animals. What we do know is that, in many parts of the country, the bears are emerging – perhaps a bit groggy, but otherwise ready to run.
Black bear with Glacier bear cubs. Photo by the National Park Service in the Public Domain
Scales from sockeye salmon harvested more than a century ago show the fish returning to the country’s second largest watershed for salmon are 70 per cent less diverse than they were in 1913, according to a new study.
There are at least 13 genetically different sockeye salmon that spawn in the rivers or tributaries of the Skeena River watershed. (Jonathan Hayward/The Canadian Press)
Scales from sockeye salmon harvested more than a century ago show the fish returning to the country’s second largest watershed for salmon are 70 per cent less diverse than they were in 1913, according to a new study from Simon Fraser University’s Michael Price.
Price, a PhD candidate in biological sciences, first undertook genetic testing two years ago of sockeye scales that have been collected since 1912 — before the introduction of motorized fishing boats on the river — to track how the abundance of sockeye salmon in the Skeena River had changed over time. He found declines of around 70 per cent.
Now he’s used even more of the fish scales, ones from 1913 to 1947, to show how the diversity of sockeye salmon returning to the Skeena River, which is the second largest producer of sockeye salmon after the Fraser River, has also seen a similar decline of around 70 per cent.
There are at least 13 genetically different sockeye salmon that spawn in the rivers or tributaries of the Skeena River watershed and that has not changed in 100 years, the study found.
However Price and co-author John Reynolds show that the vast majority of sockeye salmon now returning to the Skeena River to spawn, some 90 per cent, are of one type that originates in the Babine River, a tributary of the Skeena River.
Price says the predominant strain of sockeye in the Skeena River is wild — meaning fish that were not born in a hatchery or in a human-controlled spawning channel — which could affect the fish’s ability to thrive as climate change and other pressures on the fish progress.
“Diversity really is a barometer of resilience to provide the adaptive potential for the salmon to survive and thrive in an increasingly variable environment,” he said.
The research, done in conjunction with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, was published Monday in the Journal of Applied Ecology.
Price and Reynolds hope the new work will help with decision making in how to rebuild threatened salmon populations.
Sockeye salmon, known for their red hue when spawning, are a prized fish in commercial fisheries and are also important in the diets of marine mammals, bears and bald eagles.
Sockeye salmon is a prized fish for human consumption owing to its bright red colour and taste. (CBC)
Price said the reduction in sockeye diversity is a result of past fishing where selective gill-netting for larger fish was done, along with habitat degradation.
The study found hatcheries and controlled spawning channels have also contributed to a less diverse sockeye salmon population associated with the Skeena River watershed.
“This enhancement may increase abundances for some populations, but also can erode local diversity, homogenize life-history traits and further erode wild salmon abundances through competition in the ocean,” read the study.
Price says despite the decline in diversity, he still believes the fish have a future in B.C.
“Hope for me lies in the resilience of these animals,” he said. “They have persisted through changing climate over the last 10,000 years … they will persist in the future.”
Still, Price said that action is needed, such as limiting fisheries and restoring habitat, to help sockeye salmon stocks from deteriorating more.
There is a lucrative gill net fishery on the lower Fraser River that, unfortunately, has a very large and negative impact on Interior Fraser Steelhead.
Steelhead returns to the Thompson and Chilcotin Rivers has dropped to unbelievably dangerous levels.
From BCWF’s website:
The news that Interior Fraser steelhead (IFS) are spawning this month at historic low numbers is alarming. It requires immediate intervention by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO), the Province, and cooperation from lower Fraser River First Nations to ensure the conservation of these populations. The iconic and world-renowned Thompson River steelhead that numbered in the low thousands a few decades ago now number less than 200. The Chilcotin numbers in 2020 are less than 50. There is only one measure that can be implemented immediately to ensure that higher numbers of adult steelhead reach the spawning grounds on the Chilcotin and Thompson rivers next year (2021). Governments should announce a moratorium on the 2020 chum salmon gillnet fishery that incidentally catch and kill these steelheads as they migrate upstream during October-November.
DFO and the Province are responsible for the decline in these steelhead populations. Ineffective measures to mitigate the gillnet by-catch of IFS steelhead have been in place for over a decade. BCWF President Bill Bosch states, “these measures have been a failure as evidenced by the continuing downward numbers of steelhead, so the time has come for the responsible parties to get serious about steelhead conservation, which is the mandate of both government levels.” Bosch points out that conservation groups have sent numerous letters and have had meetings with governments over the last number of years to express concerns. These concerns have been ignored, and most often, there has not even been a reply to such communications! A review of the chum salmon fishery by an outside government expert is required.
NSF&G President Rob Chipman met with newly elected North Van-Seymour MLA Susie Chant and Constituency Assistant Eli Mallin February 9 over Zoom.
This initial meeting was a great chance for our local MLA to get to know about our club, the BCWF, and the concerns about fish and wildlife management that club members have.
We discussed reconciliation, the lack of funding for fish and wildlife management, as well as the need for the increased application of science and Indigenous knowledge in decision making.
It’s important that meetings like this be regular, and that we hold them with as many MLAs as possible. Contact Rob at rob@robchipman.net if you’d like some help doing this sort of thing.
The B.C. Wildlife Federation has reviewed the paper “Large carnivore hunting and the social license to hunt.” [1] The paper infers hunters kill carnivores such as black bears for trophies and that only a minority hunt carnivores. A literature review related to hunters’ motivations and license sales in B.C. demonstrates this claim is unsupported by available evidence.
Research has shown that the top three reasons people hunt in B.C. are: 1) getting out in the wilderness, 2) the opportunity to harvest a legal animal and 3) spending time with friends and family. The least important factor for hunters in B.C. is the opportunity to harvest a trophy.[2]
The popularity of hunting in B.C. is on the rise. The number of licensed hunters has increased more than 20 percent, from 85,633 hunters in 2005 to 107,073 in 2020. Hunting in B.C. is shifting to being a more family-oriented activity, with increased female participation; people who are increasingly concerned with harvesting their own ethically sourced, sustainable protein are also taking up hunting.
According to government data, the number of black bear licenses sold over the past 15 years has increased more than 2.5 times from 14,362 to 36,744. Participation in black bear hunting has been on the rise since 2003, with hunters gracing their dinner tables with bear hams, roasts, sausages, stew and chili. Black bears provide hunters and their families with food, and the hides and skulls are often kept and utilized. The increase in black bear hunting is likely due to increasing black bear populations, new hunters recognizing black bear meat as high-quality protein, and declining opportunities for other species such as moose in British Columbia.
Given the province’s record low moose and endangered caribou populations, the harvest and intensity of managing carnivores will have to increase. With a landscape heavily marginalized by industrial extraction and urbanization, we will face the choice to either manage wildlife, including carnivores, through science-based management and traditional knowledge or have prey species continue to decline and, in the case of caribou, go extinct.
Works such as the paper “Large carnivore hunting and the social license to hunt” represent an unfortunate situation where anti-trophy hunting agendas are incorrectly vilifying hunters who choose to hunt carnivores for a variety of legitimate cultural and subsistence purposes.
“Hunting is growing in B.C. Hunters want to spend time in nature with friends and family while looking to fill their freezers with high-quality meat,” Jesse Zeman, BCWF Director of the Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program says. “Black bear and cougar meat are both exceptional table fare; at wildlife banquets and fundraisers across the province, cougar meat is always the first to disappear.”
Zeman points out that hunters in B.C. have been disproportionately affected by declining wildlife populations. In the 1980s, as many as 12,500 moose filled B.C. families’ freezers; today, that number is closer to 4,000. “Hunters are deeply concerned about the state of wildlife and habitat and are busy giving their money and time to try to turn that around,” Zeman notes. “It is unfortunate to see wildlife researchers so focused on stereotyping hunters when we have endangered caribou and record low moose populations staring us in the face.”
[1]Large carnivore hunting and social license to hunt Chris T. Darimont, Hannah Hall, Lauren Eckert, Ilona Mihalik, Kyle Artelle, Adrian Treves and Paul C. Paquet,
Sam Foster, PhD Candidate from the University of Idaho will be presenting a SIMDeer update webinar on: – How human disturbances can disrupt ecological communities – Animal risk response and how we can explore them with camera trapping – Southern Interior Mule deer camera trapping program and next steps.
This is the second SIMDeer update webinar in the series, presented by BCWF.
North Shore Fish and Game is a supporter for the SIMDeer project – we purchased one of the collars being used to track the does.
The SIMDeer Project monitors mule deer does and fawns in 4 areas of BC. Two of the ares were badly burned by forest fires in the last decade while the other two were not. We want to know what’s killing the deer and why populations are falling.
