Nuu-chah-nulth Lose Bid to Stop Commercial Fishing of Dwindling Herring Stocks

Herring caught by commercial fishing boat.

David Wiwchar, Indian Country Today, March 3, 2015

A plan to stop the commercial herring fishery off the west coast of Vancouver Island this year has failed.

Five Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations had appealed to a federal court to stop the fishery because they believe the stocks are in danger of collapse. Nuu-chah-nulth biologists, elders and commercial fishermen told the court that herring stocks have been low for the past decade, and requests for a fishing moratorium made to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans has fallen on deaf ears.

DFO ‘fudging the numbers,’ court finds; bars commercial fishery off Vancouver Island

A Tlingit in Alaska gathering Herring roe.

Zoe Tennant, The Globe and Mail, March 9, 2014