Delta fisherman snags well-traveled coney

A rare find in the MacKenzie Delta has fish biologists excited. An inconnu, or coney, was caught with a tag from northern British Columbia last month outside of Inuvik.

The fish made its way from the Nelson and Liard rivers down the MacKenzie to an area near Barge Lake.

"I think what was really interesting, because this fish had an internal radio tag too, they noticed the antenna sticking out of the body of the fish, but they didn't notice the yellow plastic flow tag until I got there," said biologist Sam Stephenson. "When I saw Fort Saint John on it, I was really amazed. Because right away you have no idea where it was tagged or when. Except you do know it was tagged somewhere in B.C."

Buster McLeod caught the far-ranging fish. He said this is the first time he's caught a fish from so far away.

"We always thought the fish came from this end of the country, like the ocean and the lakes," he said. "We were kind of surprised. We caught fish that was tagged from around here in the Delta and back in the lakes."

This is the second longest recorded migration for a coney.

It traveled 1,500 kilometres from northern British Columbia to Inuvik.