Vancouver Courier
for January 25, 1998

I've fished for a long time. I'm a flyfisherman, almost exclusively a trout fisherman. I tie my own flies and have collected a pretty good fishing library. I've even written a book on the subject.

This scarcely qualifies me as a good fisherman - I'm mediocre at best. No, I just want to deal with a very delicate matter concerning the favourite sport of so many of us.

In Great Britain, much of the good fishing water is private. While a lot isn't - there are hundreds of lakes and reservoirs available, nearly all on a fee paying basis and some private water is owned by clubs or municipalities which will rent you a "beat" for a fee - the best salmon water is privately owned and so expensive that only the very rich can afford it.

British Columbia is almost 100% public water. There are exceptions, such as the Douglas Lake Ranch which has superb trout fishing, but for the most part, if you see some water (provided you have a license) you can start fishing.

We're very proud of that tradition. It's part of the egalitarianism that's been part of this province since the early days.

New Zealand's the same. They maintain a superb country wide fishery open to the public for a license fee.

But they do things a bit differently in that they are divided into "Fishing Districts" and your license only permits you to fish in one district. If you want to go outside that district, you must buy an additional license. This way the Fisheries department can, amongst other things, get a very good handle on who is fishing where and make conservation decisions accordingly.

The United States, is mostly public water though in some areas access to the river is closely controlled creating a de facto private system.

I was inspired to this column by a chance meeting with Wade Hanson of Hanson's Fishing Outfitters on Hornby. He was telling me about the wonderful stream fishing in Alberta especially in the Crowsnest Pass area. As he described it, the fishing was excellent and the fishing pressure not too great. By coincidence, that same night I read an article on a fly fishing magazine which complained about growing fishing pressure in the same area.

I've noticed the same thing, for example, with the Skagit. The Vedder's impossible. As fishing explodes in popularity, pressure increases meaning more fishermen, increased bad manners streamside and fewer fish, which adds up to dramatically decreased pleasure.

I hope you're sitting down for I'm about to suggest the unthinkable.

Should we consider fee for fishing permits on B.C. waters? After all, we cheerfully pay for all other entertainment. If the fees are reasonable, and proper allowances are made for the young and the old, why not?

Now before you take to the barricades for the final fight against government pocket picking, I go further.

I suggest that we divide B.C. into conservation areas with local, almost autonomous councils empowered to enforce regulations, collect licence fees, and provide conservancy measures, such as stocking, out of the money they receive.

Of course some areas would be difficult to fund just from licence revenues and others would have a surplus. There would have to be an equalization plan.

Councils would contract with hatcheries for fish as needed. Their responsibilities would include setting local regulations, such as limits, catch and release, and permitted tackle - some waters being fly only, some being mixed and so on.

The fear that this would mean fishing controlled by strong willed minorities hasn't been borne out in European areas where similar schemes have been in place for years. The council will be faced with pressures from all sides including Chambers of Commerce seeking fishing tourists.

There are a myriad of issues which could best be handled locally.

Opening up access - or keeping it by maintaining outdated logging roads - is a big issue, for easy access often kills fishing. (This is not always the case. Last Fall Wendy and I caught a 6 pounder in a little lake from which you can hear the nearby Trans Canada Highway. We were alone on the lake.)

Ice fishing is another issue. Many people love it and it's a wonderful way to get the family out on a brisk winter's day. But, with the popularity of the snowmobile, uncontrolled ice fishing can quickly kill fishing in otherwise remote lakes. Those closest to the situation are surely best equipped to deal with this problem.

The Fish and Wildlife Branch have always been woefully underfunded. Thin on the ground, it's difficult for a local conservation office to get a good handle on the entire district.

The keys to fee for fishing rests with two important principles.

First all the funding must go back into the resource, not General Revenue.

Secondly, fishing must be a local, not a Victoria concern.

This is only the germ of an idea - but as we have more people demanding a share of a diminishing resource, perhaps it's an idea worth thinking about.