Some Alberta anglers are worried that the province is about to ban the sport in a number of popular rivers and say they are taking the fall for the government’s failure to deal with the effects of heavy industrial and recreational use.
“Anglers are being used as a scapegoat for what we see as broader problems,” Jordan Pinkster of the Alberta Backcountry Hunters and Anglers said Wednesday.
Pinkster said government officials outlined their plans to concerned groups at recent meetings in Calgary and Edmonton.
“The plan talked a little bit about some of the habitat implications, but the real focal point is the angling closures,” he said. “It’s the only thing they had any concrete information on.”
The proposed five-year closures could include some of Alberta’s best trout streams such as the Ram, the Clearwater and the Kakwa rivers. It could also include popular rivers such as the North Saskatchewan.
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A provincial spokesman confirmed consultations have been held.
“Alberta Environment and Parks routinely consults on changes to fishing regulations each year,” said department spokesman Matt Dykstra.
“No decisions regarding potential closures have been made at this time.”
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Duane Radford, former fisheries director for the anglers, said it’s not fair to shut down a catch-and-release fishery when the real issue is sedimentation caused by roads, stream crossings, logging, random camping and off-highway vehicles.
“What the sediment amounts to is a death warrant for fish,” said Radford. “It just reduces the overall productivity of a stream.
“If they have a problem, it’s primarily related to habitat issues, not angling.”
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Previous studies have outlined problems in Alberta’s fish-spawning rivers. In 2015, a study found virtually all southern Alberta streams that spawn native trout were threatened by industrial development or overuse.
Scientists suggest land that contains trout streams shouldn’t have more than just over half a kilometre of trail, cutline or road per square kilometre. The 2015 study found disturbance density in parts of the Oldman River watershed was nearly 10 times that.
As a result, cutthroat populations are estimated at five per cent of historic levels. Bull trout — Alberta’s provincial fish — have lost at least 70 per cent of their original range.
Arctic grayling, once common in the north, are down to 10 per cent of historic levels.
Lorne Fitch, a fisheries biologist and adjunct professor at the University of Calgary, said some Alberta rivers need drastic action.
“Some sections of those watersheds are at such low levels that even catch-and-release angling could have an impact on the ability of those populations to get to a stage where they are sustainable again.”
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He said provincial environment officials are doing what they can to address habitat issues, such as closing some off-highway vehicle trails and improving culverts for fish movement.
He points out the Environment Department has little control over logging or energy development. Officials from those departments need to work more closely to reduce habitat disturbance, he said.
“It’s unfair to categorize provincial fisheries biologists as not doing anything about habitat. They do not control the levers related to logging, for example.”
Pinkster agreed.
“If we’re identifying the health of our native fish populations as being a priority, then that should be something that cuts across a variety of departments. The ministers for these departments should be sitting around a table and saying, ‘What do we collectively need to do to make this happen?”’