Part 4: Interviews from Sointula - LEK from BC's Central Coast

Part 4 of a 6 Part Series - by Kirie McMurchy

During my interview project with Living Oceans Society, every single person I interviewed mentioned the Mifflin Plan. The Mifflin Plan is the colloquial name for the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Pacific Salmon Revitalization Strategy that came into effect under then-minister, Fred Mifflin. The Mifflin Plan was a reaction to a decrease in fish stocks in the 1980’s and it attempted to conserve the stocks by reducing the size of the fishing fleet. The plan went about this in two ways: buying back fishing licenses to reduce the number of boats able to fish and sectioning up the coast into zones so one fishing license no longer allowed one to fish the whole coast. It has been said that in one year alone, the west coast lost more than 8,000 jobs from the salmon industry. In a community whose lifeblood was the salmon fishing industry, it is understandable why this was such a huge blow.
The following is an excerpt from an interview I conducted with Living Oceans own, Will Soltau about his recollections of the Sointula-hatched action against the Mifflin Plan in the mid ‘90’s.

Excerpt of Interview with Will Slotau (contributed with permission)
"It was April of ’96 [that] we decided that we had to do something. There was a bunch of us from [Sointula] that went up to [the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) office in] Port Hardy. The secretary came up, these two guys just jumped up on the counter, went inside, one of them opened the door and we all rushed into the main office and we said “We’re not leaving until we hear from the minister that he’s not going to implement the Mifflin Plan!” and they said “Okay, good luck.” DFO got on the phone to find out what they should do." "So we made promises [that we would not be violent or destructive] and DFO left that night from work and they brought in a couple of commissionaires to sort of babysit us all night. The rotation of our people that were in the office changed on a daily basis. After about a week DFO didn’t like this free flow of people in and out of the office, and they didn’t want to drag us out and create a scene like that so what they decided they’d do was they would lock the doors and the people that were in there that day could leave at any time but they would not be allowed back in. There were eight of us, I believe, and we spent another eighteen days in there. It got pretty tense after a while. We were sleeping on the floor people would bring us food and they were still marching outside, they had placards by that time. " "Because of us, the DFO office in Tofino, Nanaimo, and finally in Vancouver got occupied but we were the first ones that actually took action like that. They might have even occupied the Prince Rupert office, I can’t remember. There were people that came from Port Hardy and Port McNeil once we occupied the office but the plan was hatched by a bunch of Sointulians." "Glen Clark was premier of BC at the time and he was all for supporting the fishermen, he had gotten the union behind him and there was a big press conference down in Vancouver one day and there was a bunch of people that had come to the office to protest. It was getting pretty noisy outside and I kind of felt like things were coming to a head with this whole press conference and the way people were feeling. Those of us that had been inside had had enough after eighteen days. So I let a bunch of people that were outside in and some of the people that were inside went out and from there it just kind of dissolved. Everybody was cleared out that evening, the cops showed up but they just kind of escorted people outside and then DFO locked the doors and that was the end of that. Nothing really came of it, DFO didn’t change one bit. "

Kirie McMurchy is a Guest contributor to coastal voices blog. If you have Local Knowledge about the ocean or about living on the Central Coast of British Columbia - we want to hear from you! Contact us at info@livingoceans.org.

Part 3: Interviews from Sointula - LEK from BC's Central Coast

Part 3 of a 6 Part Series - by Kirie McMurchy

I learned so much during my interview project with Living Oceans Society, and I wish I could share every ounce of knowledge with all of you. However, I’ve been given a limited word count for these blog postings. One thing I think is essential to share is how hard but rewarding most people seem to find the fishing lifestyle. The following excerpt from my interview with Rebekah Pesika, an artist and prawn fisherman living in Sointula conveys that sentiment quite well. She’s been running her own boats for many years and just this past season, she took her six month old daughter out for the season prawn fishing with her.

Excerpt of interview with Rebekah Pasika (contributed with permission)


"[The fishing lifestyle] is very free, it’s more organic. I think that a lot of people don’t really realize how hard it is when the fishing is actually happening, how hard the job is, to function with a total lack to sleep, to be in a dangerous environment, to have to keep quality control for your product, to have to push yourself physically to work as fast as you can in order to catch as much as you can in a short amount of time. That’s how fishing works. It teaches people willpower [and] patience. The other thing you learn is how to deal with people in close quarters for long periods of time. So there’s this whole real good understanding of how people work, and how to function, almost like a family, you become like a family out there. You can’t be a prude or you can’t be really self-conscious because when you’re going to the toilet and let out a big fart you know there’s someone sitting two inches from your ass on the other side of the wall."

"One of the reasons I stayed in fishing too, I like fishing, but sometimes I think it would be great to do other things but I just don’t spend a lot of time thinking about it. I don’t care. Work is work. Whether you’re working at whatever, it’s never fun all the time. Fishing sucks lots, it’s hard. But it’s good enough for me. Something about contentment or even happiness has a lot to do with not necessarily being satisfied all the time, it’s more that it speaks to your heart. Fishing speaks to my heart, I feel like it’s an appropriate thing for me to spend my life doing as a career. That’s what you’ve got to do. I think a job is like a relationship you’ve got to pick something that suits you but it doesn’t necessarily have to be perfect all the time. The ocean and the wind and basically the earth dictate your decisions and you totally live around it. It’s really, primitive. Humans are primitive, we try [not] to be but we’re still primitive."

"The way [Sointula] used to be would’ve probably, from my understanding, been one of the most lively cultural examples of the fishing industry because everybody was fishing and the whole town revolved around it. That would’ve been really cool. It feels really good to be working at something that’s so tangible. With fishing, it’s not like you’re marketing some plastic thing that’s made in another country or pushing papers. There’s just a lot of emotional reward in something like fishing and to have the industry and a culture and a town just totally wrapped around that whole way of life would be pretty neat."


Kirie McMurchy is a Guest contributor to coastal voices blog. If you have Local Knowledge about the ocean or about living on the Central Coast of British Columbia - we want to hear from you! Contact us at info@livingoceans.org.

Part 2: Interviews from Sointula - Local Knowledge from BC's Central Coast

Part 2 of a 6 part series - by Kirie McMurchy

Working for the summer for Living Oceans Society, interviewing people involved in the fishing industry, the one thing every single person implied was that fishing was not just a job, it was a lifestyle. This excerpt is taken from my interview with Crystal Siider whose family has a long history of living in Sointula. Sitting on the deck of her boat, the Mailee III, she had a huge smile when she’d talk about the sense of community and bringing her children up as part of that unique community. She helped out on her father’s boat as a child and now fishes with her husband. They have two daughters, now nineteen and fourteen.

Excerpt of interview with Cryslal Siider (contributed with permission)

"You meet so many wonderful people and hit so many different towns along the coast [when you’re fishing]. After gillnet openings, we would all meet, a big group of us. We called it Sea Float up in Rush Brook in Prince Rupert and we’d always have big potlucks. Everybody would make a dish and we’d set up our chairs on the docks. [People] would have their guitars out, and this fellow from the lower mainland named Beanie – he’s David Suzuki’s cousin, he was a gillnetter and he had a boat called the Easy Come – he would bring out his guitar and we’d all put our ear plugs in. Very social, it was a really social atmosphere on the weekends. Everybody was very competitive out on the grounds but you’d leave that there. You’d come into the dock and you always secretly hoped everybody did just as well, maybe that you caught two more fish than them, but that everybody did well. You never wanted to hear the stories of somebody blowing up an engine or losing their gear."

"[Sointula] definitely was and still is one of the most respected fishing communities on the coast. It’s always had very honest, and hard working good fishermen. [My nephew], he’s gone fishing with his mum and dad and his grandpa and his uncles. He and his girlfriend at the time, they weren’t married yet, had gone to Cancun, they’d rented a jeep and they were traveling around the Yucatan Peninsula. They drove into a small community called Punta Allan, and it’s a small fishing community, and they walked into this little hole in the wall pub and they were going to have a beer and a bite to eat. A fellow came up to them and asked "where are you from?' and he said 'Oh I’m from British Columbia, Canada' 'Oh, where abouts in BC?' 'Oh we’re off the north end of Vancouver Island.' 'Oh, where abouts?' 'Oh a little community called Sointula, I’m sure you’ve never…' 'Sointula?! Do you know Dave Siider?! I met him out fishing.' 'That’s my grandpa!' You meet people that know fishermen here. It’s a small world."

"We’re not kids anymore, we’re participating as adults now and bringing up our kids on the boat. Both of them had a chance to spend summers with us and they took turns, and made a little bit of money, and got to meet a lot of people. [My eldest daughter] Cailyn is out fishing now and I think she’s really enjoying it. It’s hard work, it’s different working for somebody other than your parents. You have a different perspective of it. [My younger daughter,] Scotia, has always been a little deckhand. She never got sea sick or anything and she was always so fascinated with whatever was coming up in the shrimp trawl. She used to sit up in the sorter, where we would dump the shrimp and sort through it all, and we’d have her sitting on a little basket with her gumboots, and her dress, and her little dolly and she’d sit there for hours and hours. It was great having them out on the boat."

Kirie McMurchy is a Guest contributor to coastal voices blog. If you have Local Knowledge about the ocean or about living on the Central Coast of British Columbia - we want to hear from you! Contact us at info@livingoceans.org.

Part I: Interviews from Sointula - Local Knowledge from BC's Central Coast

Part 1 of a 6 part series

Let me introduce myself. My name is Kirie McMurchy. I grew up on the island community of Sointula and have recently moved away to attend Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario to receive my bachelor’s degree in global development studies. I was fortunate enough to be awarded this amazing opportunity to work with Living Oceans Society for the summer. My main project has been to interview people in Sointula who have been involved with the fishing industry and prepare the collection to potentially be printed one day as a book. I have learned a tremendous amount about the history of my community and the fishing lifestyle. I didn’t think that either the Sointula community or the ocean could be any closer to my heart, but this project has drawn them in further and helped me to understand and appreciate both in a whole new light. For that, I am ever grateful.

The following is an excerpt from my interview with Denise Aleksich who comes from a family with a long history of living in Sointula. One thing I noticed while interviewing Denise was that she seemed to have really, truly enjoyed the fisherman’s lifestyle and appreciated that her family had been able to sustain themselves that way for generations. For one who doesn’t know what living in a coastal community is like, I thought her words might help shed some light on why Living Oceans Society is dedicated to healthy oceans for healthy communities. I’m so grateful towards everyone who let me interview them and allowed me to share their precious insights on a fascinating lifestyle that has, unfortunately, disappeared for so many people.

Excerpt of Interview with Denise Aleksich (contributed with permission)

"I started seining with my dad when I was thirteen. There weren’t a lot of young girls [out seining]. It was a very interesting environment to be in. I loved being out on the boat, I loved the fishing part, and I loved the traveling. My dad was a traveler. We traveled to every part of this coast. It was very exciting and it was a marvelous lifestyle. I never really thought about [being in rough weather], but after years as you start getting worn down. I used to sit up on the bridge when we’d cross [Queen Charlotte] Sound from here up to Namu or Bella Bella and if there was a really good swell I’d let the water wash over me: I was a nut bar! But I was so excited by it. I loved being out, I loved everything about it, everything excited me: the phosphorescence in the water, any kind of wild life we saw, absolutely everything. I was always animated when I was on the water, nothing ever got me down even all the snarls and the snags and the messes we got into. My dad, he hit so many rocks – they used to call him rocky or something, Crash Peterson, that’s it – he was an adventurer. It wasn’t until after I had kids that that feeling just dissipated. It’s now when I think about being on a boat, I think of work. I think of bracing myself all the time, I think of how much organization it takes to be out in a little boat in bad weather and all those things. You’re so full of every little detail when you’re on a boat. If you’re in a house it’s “oh yeah, I have to do this and this and this” but there’s no time constraints, the dishes will sit there ‘till the morning. It’s not like that on a boat."

Kirie McMurchy is a Guest contributor to coastal voices blog. If you have Local Knowledge about the ocean or about living on the Central Coast of British Columbia - we want to hear from you! Contact us at info@livingoceans.org.

Genetically Modified Atlantic Salmon. Spooky.

Aqua Bounty Technologies has created an Atlantic salmon whose genetic properties have been crossed with those of an eel-like creature called ocean pout. This genetically modified fish reaches market size twice as fast as regular Atlantic salmon; and while Aqua Bounty is not currently seeking approval to sell this fish in Canada, its quest for USA FDA approval is likely to have an impact on American trading partners.*

Graph Source: http://www.aquabounty.com/products/aquadvantage-295.aspx

If this fish is approved for market, it would be a landmark decision, as there are currently no genetically engineered animals approved for food anywhere in the world. What do you think about this new AquAdvantage Fish? Would you eat it if it came to the market in Canada? If wild fish stocks continue to decline, are genetically engineered fish just the inevitable way of the future?

*Read more about the implications of this fish on Canadian markets in the May 20th Globe and Mail.

So, Vern, Whatever Happened to those Rivers Inlet Sockeye

I moved from Rivers Inlet to Sointula in 1993 and even today I’m often stopped on the dock or at the Co-op store where someone invariably asks me, “So what happened to the Rivers Inlet (or Smith Inlet) sockeye, Vern?” This always leads to an interesting discussion as to the cause of the collapse of one of the largest sockeye runs on the B.C. coast. The fishing heritage of Sointula has been involved with the salmon runs in Rivers Inlet for generations, just as the Wuikinuxv people have relied on the sockeye arriving literally at the door step of their longhouses for some nine thousand years.

Since 1996 there have been only thousands of sockeye returning instead of hundreds of thousands.

http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=51.669984,-127.32588&z=10&t=h&hl=en

The link above will get you to a Google image of Rivers Inlet and the foot of Owikeno Lake.

A number of causes for the decline of sockeye salmon in this seemingly pristine fjord have been put forward. Overfishing, logging around the larger spawning streams in Owikeno Lake and varying ocean conditions due to changes in climate might have all played a role in causing the stock to collapse. What is even more alarming is that after the complete closure of the sockeye commercial fishery in 1995 the stock failed to rebuild.

Most of the commercial salmon fishermen that I’ve spoken with have not been up to Rivers Inlet for over a decade now and have often asked if anything is being done to determine the cause of the collapse of a once very productive fishery.

There are people working diligently in Rivers and Smiths to try and figure out why the sockeye returns have declined so precipitously.

The Rivers and Smith Salmon Ecosystems Planning Society was formed to bring together different parties and interests to pursue the common goal of stewardship for salmon and their ecosystems. www.rsseps.ca

Recent studies by Rick Routledge and his team of graduate students from SFU along with members of the Wuikinuxv and Gwa’sala-‘Nakwaxda’xw Nations are trying to figure out through a combination of traditional knowledge and science why the salmon have all-but-disappeared from this region. Their studies have focused on early marine survival of sockeye. Evidence so far seems to indicate increased mortality in the early marine phase of the sockeye life cycle as one of the reasons for the decline of the Rivers Inlet sockeye population.

http://www.stat.sfu.ca/~routledg/rivers.htm

It’s all a matter of timing.

When Owikeno Lake sockeye smolts, which are usually about half the size/weight of other nursery lake smolts, emigrate downstream to the inlet it is critical for them to grow quickly before heading out to the open ocean. If they are lucky, when they emerge from the Wannock River they will encounter a bloom of zooplankton (in turn fed by a phytoplankton bloom) comprised of mussel and barnacle larvae and other tiny crustaceans. However, if there has been heavy fresh water discharge from the Wannock resulting in an extensive layer of nutrient-poor, sometimes glacially turbid lake water covering much of the inlet, then the smolts will be under fed and under size by the time they migrate to the open ocean.

To substantiate and extend these preliminary findings, the current ecosystem will have a focus on understanding the driving forces of spring-summer plankton productivity.

Further studies on the whole Owikeno Lake/Rivers Inlet ecosystem are planned and valuable financial assistance has been provided by the Tula Foundation.

http://www.tula.ca/RESEARCH/coastalecology.html

For most people, the enduring mystery of salmon is their epic struggle upriver as they fight to spawn and continue the life cycle. But for those who study salmon in the ocean, who harvest salmon and whose ancient cultures still rely on salmon to this day the ocean biology of Pacific salmon is equally grand and considerably more mysterious. Answering some of the questions about what salmon do in the ocean and why they are motivated to do so may also be of considerable importance to maintaining the health of our fisheries, particularly given recent sharp downturns in ocean survival for most salmon stocks in southern BC.