Conventional fisheries management has appeared to be at odds with the rights of Native people in the Province of British Columbia. At the same time many Native Bands want to focus on the salmon fishery for economic and cultural revival. The combination of these two factors with growing management problems for the Federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has, for some Bands resulted in efforts toward cooperative management (co-management) of the resource. This thesis analyzes the outcomes of efforts towards co-management of one Band (Ditidaht, at Nitinaht Lake), and evaluates its effectiveness in the early stages of implementation. The thesis includes both a literature review and a case study that describes the Band's efforts at local control in light of their developing property rights, made stronger by recent court cases. It also describes how the DFO has responded to these developments, and how both groups attempted to keep the process directed toward improved fisheries management. The literature review reveals that while there are a number of advantages to the practice of co-management over conventional systems, there also a number of challenges that face local groups attempting this practice. The case study focuses particular attention on how the Ditidaht Band has responded to these challenges. Strategies used by the Ditidaht Band and the DFO, in response to increasing property;. . rights of the Band, to better manage the salmon fishery and to overcome barriers to the exercise of co-management are documented and analyzed. These strategies have generally evolved from concern for the conservation of salmon on the part of both parties. For the Ditidaht these strategies also involved a search for economic development opportunities. Outcomes of the efforts of the two parties are also analyzed in terms of propositions about co-management set out in the literature. It is concluded that the DFO has been reluctant to grant the Ditidaht control over fisheries management functions and appear to have done so done so reluctantly, and only as a result of recent court cases. Because of this Ditidaht input has been kept to a minimum and basically only involves enforcement. As for the Ditidaht Band, it has not taken full advantage of alliances with other parties as a mechanism for enhancing its control over the resource. The Band has also generally not responded to the importance of internal cohesion by establishing a forum for solving disputes over allocation. They have also failed to see the importance of using public concern for conservation as a strategic tool. The case study highlights the importance of looking beyond short-term interests, in this case economic development, in order to become self-sufficient in the long-term. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate

Coho salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch) from six hatcheries operated by the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans Salmonid Enhancement Project, were reared in a common facility and then subjected to a series of standardized challenge tests. Results suggest that there are genetically based differences in the response to stressful challenges among stocks of coho salmon from southern British Columbia. The challenge tests were: saltwater (30ppt); saltwater and an increase in temperature (30ppt and 4°C); high pH (9.4 and 10.0); low pH (3.55, 3.65, 3.75 and 4.1); thermal tolerance (1°C/h); and handling (30s netting). The measured parameters were plasma sodium and chloride ion concentrations for the saline and pH challenges, time to dysfunction in the thermal tolerance challenge and plasma glucose concentration in the handling challenge. No differences among stocks were found in responses to the high pH and thermal tolerance challenges. The Chehalis River stock had the smallest plasma ion increase in salt water but showed the largest plasma ion decrease in acidic waters. In some of the low pH challenges the Tenderfoot Creek stock showed less plasma ion loss than other stocks. The stock from Eagle River had the lowest plasma glucose concentration increase during handling challenges. The combined saltwater and temperature increase challenge demonstrated the cumulative effect that stressors can have. Sampling associated with the handling challenges revealed a diurnal fluctuation in resting plasma glucose concentrations. The low pH and handling challenges showed that stock performance and the magnitude of the response observed varied with rearing conditions. Although there was some variation in the magnitude of the stock response to challenges between the two rearing conditions used, differences among stocks were consistent. When the response to all challenges were assembled into a relative challenge response profile (or performance profile), each stock was unique. / Land and Food Systems, Faculty of / Graduate

The rapid 1980's development of the salmon farming industry in British Columbia has been called "a poorly defined experiment in a poorly understood coastal environment", and the main impetus behind it described as "the chaotic, bottom-line orientation" not only of the industry itself but also of relevant government policy. The purpose of this thesis is to elaborate on these themes by identifying and delineating the most significant reasoning models underlying government development policy; and to offer an evaluation of the policy's 'rationality'. Throughout the development of the industry, but particularly in the early stages, two major areas of uncertainty have been prevalent. First, detailed government policy towards salmon farming has been far from clear - an inarticulation that is characteristic of the philosophy of laissez faire, which was particularly influential in Canadian government policy in the early 1980's. Secondly, a variety of possible ecological impacts have been suspected from the outset. A heuristic approach, both for the basic method employed in the thesis and for the normative model set up to evaluate government policy, is advanced for addressing these different uncertainties. In order to identify relevant policy, it is hypothesized that systems of ideas expressed formally in 'core' models of neoconservative and neoclassical economics were particularly important policy influences. It is argued that the core concept of neoconservative theory (as defined) is the adaptive efficiency of the autonomous market. The theory's fundamental adaptive ideas - economic information 'discovery' by competitive trial-and-error selection, and consumer 'regulation' via the price system - are to be found in representative federal and provincial economic policy documents from the early 1980's, as well as in the occasional government elucidations of B.C. salmon farming policy (scattered in heterogeneous historical sources). An examination of (inferred) specific decisions relevant to ecological aspects of salmon farming reveals the influence of trial-and-error - deliberate omission of government planning - on early salmon farm siting policy; and the influence of the presumption of consumer 'sovereignty', which was assumed to obviate the need for government ecological regulation. The relevant core concept of neoclassical economics (as defined) is the rational model derived from the conception of homo economicus. The model and its derivations are visible in the same early 1980's economic policy documents, which outline public sector 'restraint' criteria, as well as in salmon farming policy elucidations. It is argued that the maximizing 'solution' prescribed by the model is without operational significance in complex, uncertain situations, where ostensible use of the formal technique may be to legitimate decisions taken on other grounds. The normative model set up to evaluate government policy is drawn from three sources: Friedrich Hayek's rationalization of the adaptive market process, C.S. Holling's prescriptions for "adaptive environmental assessment and management", and Herbert Simon's development of "procedural rationality". These models support the conclusion that acquisition of information by the agency that mediates actions and goals - which, in the case of ecological regulation, must be government - has major value as the basis of more rational decisions. But acquiring conclusive evidence by trial-and-error learning involves risk of serious error, particularly irreversible ecological harm, and it is rational to utilize the inconclusive evidence that is always available for making general predictions, in order to guide search and select lesser risks. Incorporating the important constraint of search costs - particularly significant in the economic recession of the early 1980's - the requirements for rational adaptation become minimal, procedural ones of 'reasonableness': lack of bias towards any class of information relevant to social welfare; lack of denial of uncertainties, and thus of development risks, in the complex and little-known salmon farming environment; and timely response to uncertainties subsequently, adequately resolved by experience. It is suggested that all three requirements were infringed by government policy towards salmon farming development. / Science, Faculty of / Resources, Environment and Sustainability (IRES), Institute for / Graduate

Water quality studies conducted in the recent past in the Lower Fraser River Basin indicated that locally some high pollution levels exist. With further urbanization and industrialization of the Vancouver region an increase in waste loadings and a degradation of water quality can be expected if no strict pollution control is applied. Of particular concern are biologically undegradable substances such as heavy metals and poly-chlorinated hydrocarbons. They accumulate in the sediments of the river and the estuary and become concentrated in organisms of the food chain. Pollution is a gradually occurring process. Anticipation of potential problems is important for the decision maker responsible for water quality management. The Fraser River supports one of the largest salmon runs of the world and is abundant with other commercially and recreationally valuable fish. Salmon are very sensitive to pollution and could disappear from the Fraser river system as they already have from many other major rivers if pollution levels become too high. The Fraser River estuary has the function of a bottleneck. Adult salmon enter the river to migrate upstream to their spawning grounds, and juvenile salmon stay in the estuary for a while to acclimatize themselves to the saline environment. In this thesis a method is presented to simulate the effects of potential pollution on the size of a salmon stock. A model which uses data from various life stages of a particular sockeye salmon run in the Fraser system is developed. Uncertainties due to environmental fluctuations are accounted for. Using this model the effects of an increase in mortality rate in two stages of the sockeye salmon life cycle on adult return numbers are studied. The analysis showed that at a certain mortality rate chances are that the stock might not be able to recover. In light of a planned salmon enhancement program to increase salmon stocks in various Pacific rivers, the fact that decreasing water quality could counteract all enhancement efforts should be a warning signal to the decision makers. The development of a water quality index to predict future conditions is recommended and a possible procedure to relate water quality parameters to an increase in mortality rate is sketched out. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Civil Engineering, Department of / Graduate

An overview of stock-recruitment dynamics for major B.C. salmon (Oncorhynchus spp.) stocks is presented. Stock-recruitment patterns range from linear relationships to "Ricker" type relationships to no relationship at all. However, stocks for which there are accurate escapement estimates generally show patterns expected from stock-recruitment theory. It is concluded that errors in stock definition, mixed catch allocation, and spawning counts bias optimum escapement estimates downward so that poorly monitored stocks may become severely overexploited without being noticed. Because of poor escapement counts and/or difficulties in separating mixed catches, optimum escapements for many B.C. salmon stocks, which account for about half of the total B.C. production, cannot be estimated. Most stocks for which optimum escapement can be estimated are now being severely depleted. Restoration of these stocks by increasing escapement to optimum levels would increase the total catch by at least 40% of the current yield. Further, experimental management by increasing escapement appears to be the best policy for most of the other stocks. / Science, Faculty of / Zoology, Department of / Graduate

This study explores the politics of regulating the British Columbia and Washington commercial salmon fisheries between 1937 and 1984. The principal focus of this comparative-historical study is upon one particularly striking exception to the tendency of regulators to tighten commercial salmon fishing restrictions over time - the persistence of liberal offshore trolling regulations. The dissertation argues that the anomalous treatment of the offshore troll fishery during this period may be ascribed to the competition between states for the right to harvest salmon - a common property resource. In making this claim, the study questions the adequacy of the interest-group driven explanations of policy which figure prominently in the literature on regulation. Two pillars of interest group theory, the tendencies to explain national policy only through reference to domestic politics and to reduce state behaviour to little more than the product of the demands of private sector interests, are challenged in this comparative case study. The challenge to the first tendency of interest group theory is sustained by examining the relations between national regulatory preferences and the foreign fishery policy goals of Canada and the United States. The pursuit of two goals - Asian exclusion and North American equity - in bilateral and multilateral negotiations demanded the adoption of particular regulatory profiles. Liberal offshore troll regulations may be explained according to the legitimacy and bargaining advantages they lent to Canadian and American efforts to incorporate these two goals into modifications to the traditional fishery regime. The study also suggests that, in a setting characterized by intergovernmental competition, regulatory policies may not always be equated with the preferences of interested private parties. In this setting the state's ability or willingness to respond to even the most influential private sector interests may be limited by the state's evaluation of its bargaining resources and requirements. State competition created a context where government attitudes towards offshore salmon fishing could be understood in terms of state preferences, preferences derived from officials' perceptions of the legitimacy of various national regulatory policies in the context of valued international institutions. While state competition is the centrepiece of the explanation of national fishery policy developed in this study its explanatory power is mediated by two intervening institutional variables - the capacities of states to formulate and implement policies and the structure of the international regime itself. The level of knowledge regarding the salmon resource played an instrumental role in the formulation of regime goals and of pertinent national policies. The extent to which state management in offshore waters was fragmented between different bureaus affected the ability of officials to adopt national policies which suited their international purposes. The redistribution of the American state's fishery management capacity in the 1970s was a catalyst for the severe restrictions visited upon Washington trailers at that time. A second institutional factor, the structure of the international fishery regime, also mediated the competition between states. The series of reciprocal fishing privileges agreements between Canada and the United States was particularly important in maintaining established offshore regulatory preferences during the 1970s when the clash between American and Canadian salmon fishery perspectives was intensifying. / Arts, Faculty of / Political Science, Department of / Graduate