Quote:
Originally Posted by bobalong
I am not sure if this was directed at me but I will answer.
How long has it been since they shut down retention?
There was lots of discussion and anger when F/W started talking about making walleye catch and release only. Campgrounds were concerned that anglers would not come to their lake if they could not keep walleye, costing them big money.
I am only familiar with the lakes around Edmonton and to the north but walleye closures and big reductions I believe began in the mid 90's. Pigeon, Lac. St. Anne, Lac La Nonne, South Buck (min size) Pine.
What have they learned since then? Other than closing off retention of walleye has had a detrimental effect on sustaining a healthy balance of fish species in our lakes?
One of the things they have learned is that if people want to keep fish to eat and can't keep walleye, they will keep pike, perch whitefish etc.
They also learned that virtually stopping all stocking of walleye in Alberta from 1999 to 2006 did not help recovery........but it didn't cost them anything either.
The province of Alberta still stocks very few lakes in Alberta with walleye. In 2006 when I sat on the Fisheries Roundtable of Alberta they were spending about 6 million dollars a year on trout stocking and 200k on walleye, even though they admitted then that walleye was by far the most popular game fish. That was 11 years ago and even now not much has changed with regard to government planning, the Bios knew what needed to be done but were not given money to do it, in fact through some of those years their budgets were cut.
My observation over the past 50 years or so of fishing in this province is that sustaining fish in our province in the lakes close to a large city will take consistent and long term stocking of walleye, pike and perch. Imagine the improvement if they spent 6 million a year even now and every year for stocking these 3 species. That would be a commitment to our fisheries and the Alberta Government has not done that for decades, so they have a lot of catching up to do.
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It wasn't directed at you Bob, but your response is much appreciated, educated, and makes a lot of sense.
You also inadvertently answered my question of where the money goes, and backed up both Brandon's and my position on it. We can keep throwing all the money we want towards conservation, but unless there is accountability for that money, it's not going to matter one bit. Some folks don't get it.
If people stopped buying fishing licenses I think they'd get the message.