Moricetown canyon beach seine

Here is a picture of the Moricetown canyon beach seine crew in action. This takes place in the big pool at the bottom of the small canyon below the main Moricetown Falls. The jetboat pulls the beach seine out into the pool, then the crew pulls it into the beach, slowly tightening it until the fish captured can be handled.
This is part of the Wet'Suwet'en fisheries program and is used in stock assessment in a mark and recapture study. Fish tagged below the falls and re-caught by the Falls dipnetters (seen in the photos in the previous post) and/or recreational anglers on the river can give fisheries biologists population estimates.
For Bulkley river steelhead anglers, if you catch a fish with a tag this is where it was tagged.
This is also the location and method the sonic tags were placed on Bulkley steelhead in 2008 and will again in 2009. Ministry of Environment, Smithers says 66 sonic tags will be placed on steelhead through August. The objective is not so much upstream tracking of the fish, but whether or how many 'drop back' downstream after the tagging episode. Fish that drop back downstream can alter the statistical interpolation of the tagging/recapture program making it appear there are more fish than there really are.
Learn more about Wet'Suwet'en fisheries here: http://www.wetsuweten.com/departments/article/fisheries-and-wildlife