Herring populations on the central coast, and throughout B.C. waters, have declined precipitously over the past 100 years. The factors that affect herring populations are complex: water temperature, food availability, predator and competitor populations. However, many observers point to rampant commercial fisheries, which began harvesting herring en masse in the late 1800’s to make fertilizer and fish oil. In the 1960s, following decades of extremely high catches, herring populations crashed coastwide. After a short closure, commercial fisheries were reopened. Now, herring no longer spawn in many of their former spawning sites on the coast, and those who do, spawn in much smaller numbers. Four of the five major herring populations in B.C. have declined to historic low levels.

For decades, the Heiltsuk and other First Nations have been advocating for a sustainable fishery that would allow herring stocks to rebuild. However, Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) continues to open the industrial “sac roe” fishery, even against the recommendations of its own scientists.

In 2016, after years of hard-fought battles and many more months of negotiation, the Heiltsuk Nation announced it had signed a Joint Management Plan with DFO for herring within their traditional territory. The Nation’s focus is now on managing the traditional fishery and pushing to improve and extend the collaborative planning process into the future. Many of our supporters raised their voices to support the Heiltsuk Nation during the 2015 conflict with DFO, which led to the joint management agreement for 2016. We thank you!

In 2019, Pacific Wild began working with local communities on Hornby and Denman islands to raise public awareness about the herring fishery in the Strait of Georgia. It is our ongoing goal to improve protection for herring in this important region.

In 2021/2022 DFO reduced the harvest rate of Pacific herring in the Strait of Georgia (SOG) from 20% to 10% after finding their long-time 20% harvest rate to be unsustainable. While this is a step in the right direction, it is not enough for recovery. Despite halving the total allowable catch from the year before, commercial landings of Pacific herring during the 2021/2022 season totaled only  3,407 tons, not fulfilling the allowed quota of  7,850 tons for non-Indigenous fisheries in the Strait of Georgia. This suggests that despite the fishing effort, there were insufficient amounts of fish to fulfill the quota. Pacific herring populations are still in a dire state and deserve the protection of a fisheries moratorium so that they may re-build instead of holding on by a delicate thread.

Across B.C., herring continues to be in a low-spawning, low-biomass (total weight and quantity) state. Put simply, their populations are failing to recover in a meaningful way.  Spawning biomass (the total weight of the fish in a stock that are old enough to spawn) in the SOG sharply declined by 26% between 2020 and 2022. The 2021 productivity value of SOG herring was negative (meaning their total biomass declined post spawning, rather than increasing), representing the most negative production estimate since 1988 when estimates began. Looking ahead to 2023, spawning biomass in the SOG is projected to decline an additional 13% from 2022. While variations in spawning productivity is natural within herring populations, these declines are happening at a time when mortality pressures (such as predation and the effects of climate change) for herring are increasing exponentially. Natural mortality rates for herring have sharply increased in recent years, and are currently higher than at any time since the late 1960s.