Dear editor,
In regards to Mr. Tom Fletcher’s column “Salmon mystery far from solved” (North Island Gazette, Nov. 15):
Even before salmon farming was on our coasst, if you dipped your toe alongside “urban people fishing” rivers like the Puntledge, you would find dead ranch-raised salmon every few yards that were not able to survive the raised water temperatures created by a power dam.
Or, if you followed the Tsolum River, you would see it devoid of all fish and insect life due to toxic runoff from an abandoned copper mine.
“Ranch fish,” as you call them, were only meant to be used as an intervention to enhance the gene pool on river systems like these. Knowing that 80 per cent of a Conservation Stamp, that you buy with each fishing license, never benefits restoration and that the Conservative government is planning to introduce Bill C-38 that will change the importance of protecting fish habitat and promoting biodiversity.
It is easy to see how Mr. Cohen has no confidence his policy (recommendation) will ever be implemented without dedicated funding.
“Its fate lies with a cabinet of dreary old men who have lost their capacity for wonder, if indeed they ever had any.” — Roderick Haig Brown
Donald Grimway
Burnaby
