Millions of salmon mysteriously just disappear

Expert: “Literally within 2 days it disappeared, it just crashed… I have never ever seen, nor can I explain” that — “One of the worst seasons ever” — “Disturbing… Serious trouble… Very dramatic”

Late sockeye numbers ‘disturbingly low,’ monitoring group says

Pre-run estimate of 1.24 million dropped to 200,000 for entire Fraser River run

“The late South Thompson sockeye run has seen far fewer fish than expected, but the federal fisheries department says it’s still very preliminary with the final numbers not known until late December or January.

“In terms of the sockeye return, it’s much more disappointing than people were hoping to see this year,” said Greg Taylor, senior fisheries adviser for the Watershed Watch Salmon Society, a Vancouver-based non-profit organization that monitors wild salmon.

“They arrive in the spawning grounds in October, and the numbers they’re seeing are disturbingly low.”
Taylor noted that the Pacific Salmon Commission’s (PSC) pre-run estimate of 1.24 million late-run salmon was dropped to 200,000 for the entire Fraser River run, which includes the South Thompson, the Little Shuswap, Shuswap Lake and Adams River.

“It’s a very dramatic reduction.”

The update said, for example, that a total of 2,193 sockeye were counted at the Weaver Creek Channel on Oct. 28 and that no live or dead sockeye were observed Oct. 27 on the Bridge River in the mid-Fraser.

DFO spokeswoman Lara Sloan said that the department’s area director for the B.C. interior cannot be interviewed about the situation until the new federal government fisheries minister is sworn in and gives the go-ahead.

But she also said the preliminary numbers don’t tell the whole story. “Every year we release final escapement numbers, usually in December or January.”

Credit to investmentwatchblog.com

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