Atlantic Salmon Federation wants ban on keeping salmon retained

The Atlantic Salmon Federation doesn't believe the salmon population in New Brunswick rivers is plentiful enough to support a return to allowing anglers to keep fish they catch.

• Wildlife federation wants ban on keeping salmon revisited
• Gail Sheaorders all salmon caught in Maritimes to be released

Fisheries and Oceans Canada ordered mandatory hook-and-release in Maritime waters in 2015 and has yet to announce whether that policy will continue for the 2016 fishing reason.

The Wildlife Federation of New Brunswick recently issued a call for river-by-river management in New Brunswick that would allow anglers to keep grilse a salmon that has only spent one winter at sea before returning to the riverthey catch where there are sufficient numbers.

Nathan Wilbur, a member of the salmon federation, said the most recent numbers available do not support a return to allowing grilse to be kept by anglers.

Wilbur said that none of the monitored rivers in the province met theminimum conservation requirements in 2014.

"There weren't enough fish spawning," Wilbur said.

"We don't know yet what the results are for 2015, so for these reasons ASF will continue to promote live release of all salmon and take the precautionary approach."

Wilbur said the general consensus is 2015 was a stronger year in terms of the number of salmon returning.

"This is encouraging, but the question is how much better was it and what has our baseline become," said Wilbur.

"It was better that 2014, but 2014 was terrible."

He said the 2015 run shouldn't be used as the starting point for making a decision for the 2016 catch.