Evidence of meeting #133 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was species.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC
Getting back to my question, though, how much of the information from fishermen is taken by DFO and used by DFO or provincial fisheries management?
Executive Director, Maritime Fishermen's Union
It's mostly taken into account when it comes time to devise studies to try to figure out if what the fishermen are saying is the truth in terms of scientific data or analysis.
Conservative
Co-host and Founder, Miramichi Striper Cup
Up until a couple of years ago, I'd say not much. But I've been involved in the eastern recreational advisory committee for DFO, so I have seen them actually have stakeholder meetings, which to me is a great thing. We do need intuitive...although I always caution my fellow anglers that the scientists are not biased. They're going to give you the data they have, and fishermen tend to be fibbers, so to say.
Co-host and Founder, Miramichi Striper Cup
The fastest-growing species in the world is the fish you caught like this, and by the time you get to the dock it's like this.
Co-host and Founder, Miramichi Striper Cup
DFO must take that with a grain of salt. They need to pay attention to it because we are the stewards of the river, but they also have to verify it with studies and information. That's my comment.
Conservative
Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC
If I were to wrap that up quickly, we need to rely on reliable science rather than emotional input.
Co-host and Founder, Miramichi Striper Cup
Yes, but some recreational fisheries.... I'm not going to lie to DFO. I'm going to tell them I'm passionate about the opportunity, but not everybody could be the same.
Conservative
Mel Arnold Conservative North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC
Can I ask you both briefly, how would you recommend that we make changes to fisheries departments, whether they're.... We can't suggest changes to provincial departments, but we can to DFO.
What would you recommend to make their decision-making process more reactive? It seems to take a long time for regulations to change or quotas to change. They don't seem to be that reactive. Are there any recommendations?
Executive Director, Maritime Fishermen's Union
That's a tough question. We've been asking that for 60 years.
I think we can't underestimate the need for good science in any good decision-making system. We've seen over the years that sometimes we have really good science that is done, and when it comes down to...because these are all within DFOs different departments. You have the science department, then you have the management department, per se, which will sometimes take a completely different approach to what the science department will be recommending.
As a third thing, I think that the stakeholders sometimes have really good options or suggestions to make that should be taken into account maybe for future studies or as ideas moving forward for better managing the fisheries. A multi-stakeholder approach is important, but better listening to the science and better science should be number one.
Mr. Ken McDonald (Avalon, Lib.)
Thank you, Mr. Arnold. That's all we have. It was actually over time a bit.
Now we'll go to the government side again, and Mr. Rogers, for five minutes or less, please.
Liberal
Churence Rogers Liberal Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL
Thank you to our guests.
I'm not sure if I have a lot of questions for you gentlemen today, because it seems like your crazy fishery has fluctuating numbers. Some of the stuff I've read here says that in March 2018 DFO released its findings showing that the southern Gulf of St. Lawrence striped bass population increased to over 300,000 spawners in 2016, and over 10 times the recovery target, and that “The median of the estimated spawner abundance in 2017 was 994,000”. However, the estimated spawner abundance fluctuation varied widely from a low of 486,000 to over two million.
Those are some crazy numbers in terms of fluctuations.
First of all, Mr. Mallet, you mentioned in your presentation that we should probably be considering striped bass as bycatch for lobster fishermen. Is that correct? Did I hear that right?
Executive Director, Maritime Fishermen's Union
I think I apparently didn't explain myself clearly. Bycatch for gaspereau fishermen is something that our members have talked about, and have spoken about that as an option to DFO several times in the past few years. However, that was considering the fact that the striped bass population was on the constant upswing. That's no longer the case. With the recent numbers, we've seen a decline in the last two years.
Liberal
Churence Rogers Liberal Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL
Okay. I just wanted to make that correction to make sure I understood that.
The other thing you mentioned was that the reason for the decline in the biomass probably has to do more with environmental cold and rough winters. Is that a major contributing factor from your perspective?
Executive Director, Maritime Fishermen's Union
That is my perspective on it, yes, the direct full impact.
Liberal
Churence Rogers Liberal Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL
Mr. Wilson, I just want to ask you a couple of questions around some of these crazy numbers I was talking about.
In your view, what has led to the rapid increase of the striped bass populations, some of these numbers in particular here?
Co-host and Founder, Miramichi Striper Cup
We had excellent spawning conditions back a number of years ago, so you're seeing those young of the year now. In the study I gave you, you'll see the bubble size of the population moving forward. What's concerning is the back end, where the young of the year don't look like they're repopulating that school size. As Mr. Mallet said, if that school size had gone to two million, I would be here recommending that there's probably something to do, that there's probably more of a harvesting ability. What's really a concern is that it dropped.
One might question the science behind the numbers, but if it were flawed, it's been flawed exactly the same every year. We have to really look at trends. Maybe the trend going up was flawed, but the trend going down will be flawed too. The bad information is bad every year, so we just look at trends. That's the fluctuation.
Do you see the huge mean difference they're talking about? You have to remember they're taking a trap net. If the water temperature on May 25 is not correct, and it happened May 15, the trap net wasn't there. It's only put in the water at the proper time.
There's something a bit fudgy there. It's exactly the same thing in all the diet studies, but we do know that it's a northern population and that Mother Nature will make an adjustment, and she did.
It's the same thing that happened last year in New Jersey, where all those wonderful consumers are. They lost two-thirds of their population as well—and they didn't go to Labrador, I promise you.
Liberal
Churence Rogers Liberal Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, NL
For both of you, I guess, what relationship, if any, does your organization have with DFO in estimating the striped bass population?
Co-host and Founder, Miramichi Striper Cup
I've asked them to come to our event. I think we offer by far the best data-gathering opportunity of any on the river, because we bring live fish into the scale, we treat them with love and respect, we give them to the scientists at Acadia University and they do little mucous studies to determine the stress levels and everything, so I think it's a great opportunity.
Now, I also would commend DFO. They've worked very well with me and have helped me along.
Executive Director, Maritime Fishermen's Union
In our case, we do not collaborate in terms of giving out work or working with DFO on the species. We have some other priorities, but we are following the file. We are following where DFO is going with it. As I mentioned earlier, if there were potential for a commercial fishery, we'd be the first ones hopping on it, right? It's right at the back door.