Tyee Test Fishery

Here's an interesting fact we just learned about Tyee; the salmon killed are all kept and belong to DFO. The steelhead that cannot be revived or are dead on arrival at the boat, are in fact kept by the contractor.Why this is allowed we can only guess...but probably one of those multi-jurisdictional fall through the cracks type thing. The Federal DFO is in charge of salmon while the Province is in charge of steelhead. Somewhere in the shuffle the steelhead got lost as it where. This is pretty amazing when you consider every commercial fisherman on the coast must release steelhead..dead or alive...they cannot be landed or sold. But in this unique instance the contractor is allowed to keep them....and presumably sell them.
Why this hasnt been dealt with is a major concern. Consider this; those dead steelhead could be 'traded' to First Nations folks upriver so they dont need to kill any more valuable steelhead....The Tyee Test Fishery is a public information gathering tool and any fish killed in the process should not, in our opinion, become the property of any individual. Those are the public's steelhead...yours and mine....and if they have to be killed for 'science', then they should be used in whats best for the public interest afterwards not quietly sold off. If the contractor feels his contract is inadequate without this perk, then both the government agencies involved should pay enough so that this isnt the case.