Fisheries Committee on June 16th, 2015

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

I call this meeting to order. I'd like to thank our guest for joining us today.

Mr. Zealand, we've been trying to connect here for a little bit. We certainly do appreciate your patience in working with us to try to make the accommodation work for all involved.

As you're aware, our study is on recreational fisheries in Canada. We certainly appreciate your taking the time to meet with the committee members to make a presentation and answer committee members' questions. I'm sure our clerk has already advised you that we generally allow about 10 minutes for opening comments and remarks before we proceed to questions and answers. Members are constrained by a certain timeframe, and in light of that, I'd ask you to try to keep your responses as concise as possible to allow as many questions as possible throughout the process.

Whenever you're ready, Mr. Zealand, if you'd like to go ahead and make your opening comments, we'd certainly appreciate it. The floor is yours.

[Gordon Zealand, Executive Director, Yukon Fish and Game Association]

Thanks.

Good morning, everyone. My name is Gordon Zealand, and I'm executive director of the Yukon Fish and Game Association.

I've had the good fortune to live and work in various parts of Canada, and I just can't imagine a resource that's as important as the sport fishing sector is in all parts of Canada. I mean, to bring it home to the Yukon, what do we have? We have roughly 35,000 people, and we issue almost that many recreational licences. There's no question that it's very important to the people of the Yukon, but I know for a fact that it applies right across Canada.

This is a sector that we need to pay attention to. We often take it for granted and we assume that it's always there. Like all things man interacts with, however, there are consequences. I'm sure everyone is aware of the various issues that have occurred in the provinces.

Now, there's one thing we've done differently in the Yukon that I know hasn't occurred in the other provinces I have lived in. We have not allowed any non-resident species into the Yukon. In other words, no, we don't have walleye or pickerel in the Yukon. We made sure we didn't bring them into the Yukon and stock any of the lakes.

There's one exception to that. It happened when the armed forces were up here building the highway and what have you. Rainbow trout was brought into one section, and that group is still within the Yukon. Actually, we've benefited from it, because we're now using the eggs to stock what we call our stocked lakes. These are lakes within the Yukon that have no outlet or inlet. They're totally contained. If there's one thing we've done well up here, I would suggest that this, in combination with sticking with resident species, is it.

We had one resident from Alberta who spent the entire summer doing nothing but fishing these stocked lakes, which are mainly stocked with rainbow trout and Arctic char. He had a great experience. I couldn't believe what that gentleman was able to record in these various lakes within the Yukon. There's no question that it was an amazing experience for him, and from the information he provided us, we couldn't believe there were that many big stocked rainbow still left in these lakes. In any event, it goes to show that we also take things for granted. We didn't realize the significance.

We did have one issue with an area out near Whitehorse that has hot springs. Some folks decided that perhaps goldfish should be dumped there. As a result, we had quite a population growing. In any event, once we found that out, we managed to eliminate that particular problem. We just went in, killed off that whole section and got rid of that issue. As far as we know, we don't have an issue with the goldfish.

I think I'll just leave it there for my opening comments. In terms of the significance, I'm sure you know, because of your further work and your contact with other folks across Canada, that the recreational fishery is important to so many different people. It affects all ages. It affects all sexes. It's an opportunity to get the population out to enjoy the outdoors as opposed to the electronic world.

I'll leave it there for the moment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rodney Weston]

Thank you very much, Mr. Zealand.

We'll move to the question-and-answer period. We'll start off with a 10-minute round. We'll lead off with Mr. Chisholm.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Zealand, thank you very much for your patience in finally getting here to speak to our committee, but also for your work in this important area of the recreational fishery. I am interested in the management relationship between DFO and the co-management boards that are established under the land claim settlements. I wonder if you could speak to how effective that is and how it works.

[Gordon Zealand]

DFO managed the freshwater fishery, including anadromous species, up until the 1990s, at which time it was transferred to the territorial government. In terms of the interaction of the boards, in my experience it has worked very well. Sure, there are always issues, but at least it creates the avenue to work on the issues. Sometimes they're major, but quite often they're minor issues before they become major ones. My experience with the interaction has been very positive.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

The department mainly provides technical support to the boards in its decisions and issues around development and habitat management and protection, those sorts of things.

[Gordon Zealand]

That's true. The territorial government, though, does hands-on work with various groups, so they're not just providing technical expertise. They are out there doing the actual fieldwork. Sometimes various first nations are involved as well.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Right. Do you get a lot of out-of-territory sports fishermen coming in? Do you have a system of guides and so on?

[Gordon Zealand]

Yes, we do. There's not a big system of guides, but yes, in the various lakes. River guides are becoming more popular now, especially for Europeans who are going down the various rivers.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Do out-of-territory fishermen have to have a guide to come to fish?

[Gordon Zealand]

No, they do not. They can come to fish, yes.

[Robert Chisholm, NDP, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Okay, interesting.

I'm going to pass it on to my colleague Mr. Cleary. Thank you, Mr. Zealand, for your participation.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Mr. Zealand, my name is Ryan Cleary. I'm one of seven members of Parliament from Newfoundland and Labrador.

There were a couple of things you talked about I'd like you to elaborate on. You mentioned stocked lakes. In terms of stocking lakes in the Yukon, how much of that is done, how many lakes? Who looks after that? Who's in charge?

[Gordon Zealand]

DFO was in charge of it until the whole responsibility was shifted over to the territorial government about 10 or 15 years ago.

There are about 25 or 30 lakes within the Yukon, but it doesn't have to stop there. If somebody wishes to create a lake, it's more about the details of the lake in terms of input water, output water, that sort of thing. If it's a completely contained lake and there's no problem with oxygen during the winter, then I would suggest it could be a candidate.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

What is the budget for stocking those lakes? Which entity looks after the stocking? What are they stocked with?

[Gordon Zealand]

The territorial government looks after the stocking of the lakes. We aid them. Some of our members help stock the fish, as compared to the payment for the actual species. Quite frankly, I'm not sure what the budget is these days, but it isn't very large.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

The reason I ask questions about stocking and it always peaks my interest is because we don't stock our ponds and lakes in Newfoundland and Labrador. I've always wondered why we don't do that.

With regard to the health of the different stocks, how is the health? Because of stocking, are the fish plentiful?

[Gordon Zealand]

They are, and they grow amazingly well. It depends also within lakes on whether or not there is resident food species present. We happen to have those here in the Yukon, and the individual I was mentioning earlier who fished all our stocked lakes never took less than an eight-pound rainbow out of any of our lakes.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Wow.

Who looks after the enforcement? First, is there a licence system? Do you have to get a licence to go out and get a trout or to fish at all? Who looks after the enforcement?

[Gordon Zealand]

The territorial government looks after enforcement in the stocked lakes area. DFO has enforcement on the Yukon River that is associated with anadromous species, but it's mainly the territorial government that has the responsibility for these lakes.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Is poaching a problem at all, or illegal retention of fish? Is that a problem?

[Gordon Zealand]

It can be a bit of a problem, but I don't think it's a major one for us, as compared to some of the other areas of Canada.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

If you look at the stocked lakes versus the lakes or ponds—we call them ponds back home—are the water bodies that aren't stocked healthy as well?

[Gordon Zealand]

I would say they would be close. The problem we have in the Yukon is that our normal lakes are very non-productive in terms of the fact that our fish reach maturity for spawning when they are very old as compared to the southern provinces. Within the Yukon there are very elderly, slow-growing fish, so it doesn't take very much pressure within a resident lake to really affect them.

[Ryan Cleary, NDP, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

The water is cold. Is that why the fish are slow-growing, obviously?