Press Release: 2026 Herring Food and Bait Fishery Steams Ahead

“What makes this fishery particularly egregious is that B.C. wild herring–a critical food source for salmon, whales, birds and countless other species–are being caught and turned into pet food, farmed salmon pellets and feed for marine mammals held in captivity,”  said Ian McAllister, Conservation Advisor with Pacific Wild.  “We are literally taking essential prey from the mouths of endangered Chinook salmon and Southern Resident killer whales, at the same time that starvation and lack of access to prey is identified as a leading cause of decline.”

In 2025/26 alone, the winter Food and Bait fishery may remove more than 2,000 tons of pre-spawning herring from the Strait of Georgia, part of a proposed overall herring quota of 14,385  tons. These fisheries disproportionately target resident herring stocks local to the Salish Sea that provide a year-round, irreplaceable food source for juvenile Chinook salmon.^1,2,3 In 2018, COSEWIC identified prey availability—particularly access to large, calorie rich Chinook salmon—as an imminent threat to Southern Resident killer whale survival, warning that unless mitigated, this threat “may make survival and recovery…unlikely or impossible.”⁴

For decades, experts and local residents have raised alarms about the loss of herring from traditional spawning and migration areas. Continued exploitation, particularly during the winter months when resident herring aggregate prior to spawning, is pushing local stocks toward a depressed, altered ecosystem state—undermining recovery efforts for critically endangered Southern Resident killer whales and already-declining Chinook salmon populations.

“DFO should be focusing on herring restoration, distribution  abundance – not allowing these remaining fragile populations to be exploited. Recent archeological research indicates that herring has plummeted to one percent of their historic abundance in some areas” McAllister added.⁵ 

The economic rationale for continuing the fishery also fails scrutiny. In 2023, the total landed value of all herring fisheries in B.C. was just $5.1 million, representing only 2.8% of the province’s total commercial finfish value.⁶ By contrast, wild salmon, halibut, and other fisheries—all of which depend on herring as prey—were collectively worth nearly $102 million upon landing.⁷ Marine-based tourism such as recreational fishing and whale watching generate more than $5 billion to B.C.’s economy each year, directly relying on healthy forage fish stocks, including herring.⁸

“Industrial herring fishing has been shut down up and down the B.C. coast because the fish are gone. The herring remaining in the Salish Sea are the cornerstone of the marine food web, “ said Sydney Dixon, Marine Specialist with Pacific Wild.“They are demonstrably worth far more in the water than out. We need to shift priorities now—before this quiet collapse becomes irreversible.” 

Pacific Wild is urging DFO to implement an immediate moratorium on the commercial Pacific herring fishery, excluding spawn-on-kelp, and to adopt a precautionary, ecosystem-based approach that reflects herring’s critical role in marine food webs and cultural, ecological, and economic resilience.