Remembering the days when a Salmon River had salmon

When people think of salmon fishing in New Brunswick, they most likely think of the Miramichi, Nepisiguit or Restigouche rivers.

But Salmon River, near the central New Brunswick community of Chipman, was once a big draw for anglers.

And while the river's name verges on irony now, local residents haven't forgotten its abundant past.

They'd like to see the river once again teeming with its namesake fish.

Wendell Chase grew up on the river and was a ranger in the area for 35 years. He's seen a lot of change.

"In the fall of the year, like in late October, the stream was full of salmon, big salmon," said Chase, who can't remember the last time he heard of someone catching a salmon. "I don't know now whether there is a fall run or not."

Gone are the decades of netting salmon and catching them on the fly.

Chase said that in the 1960s there was enough salmon for eight to 10 legal netting operations in the river. Each net was allowed to span a third of the river's width and sat underwater hanging from buoys. The nets were often set up in front of the owner's property.

WATCH | Two local men wonder where the salmon went:

Local people remember the days when Salmon River lived up to its name.

4 months ago

Duration 4:53

In the 1970s and '80s, residents say, there were lineups to catch salmon in Salmon River, part of the St. John River system. Those days are long gone, but some are still wondering what happened.

"I've been on this river all my life and there's something, whatever's happened, I don't know what it is," said Chase.

James Mills still fishes for trout in the Salmon River but agreed with Chase that the river isn't what it was.

Mills, who operated the Salmon River Lodge from 1988 to 1995, said there were lots of sport fishermen on the river in the 1980s. There were often "fishermen lined up sitting on a bench waiting so that they could go through and fish." 

"That was a phenomenon that didn't last long," Mills said. "I left in '95 and fishing had really died right off on the river. Today nobody fishes, that I'm aware of, for salmon on Salmon River."

Endangered species

The Salmon River he's referring to drains into Grand Lake, making it a part of the St. John River system. There are other rivers with the same name in the province.

Neville Crabbe, spokesperson for the Atlantic Salmon Federation, said the St. John River salmon population "has flat-lined" since dropping down from historic levels. He said the population is "on life support."

"This watershed is bigger than the Miramichi, it's bigger than the Restigouche and has historically supported Atlantic salmon returns well in excess of 100,000 adult fish, and now we're down to just a few hundred," said Crabbe. 

The Fisheries and Oceans Canada fish counter at Mactaquac Dam counts salmon for the St. John River system. According to the Fisheries and Oceans website, in 2023, only 31 salmon were counted by Oct 31.

And yet the federal government has yet to officially declare the fish in this system, known as outer Bay of Fundy salmon, as endangered, even though the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada, an independent group of experts, made that assessment more than a decade ago.

Crabbe estimates the downturn of the population began between the late 1960s to early 70s and puts the blame on a number of factors.

"The four threats for St. John River salmon, in no particular order: hydro dams, invasive species, salmon aquaculture and climate change. And it's a toxic cocktail for sure," he said. 

It's illegal to fish for salmon in that river system but sometimes they are caught accidentally, when fishing for trout, as both species are attracted to artificial fishing flies.

Mills has noticed this year that he hasn't had any accidental catches, which he said is unusual.  

"I was fishing on one of the tributaries, and one of the things that I noticed was that I didn't catch any salmon parr and you always would catch salmon parr when you're fishing trout."

Salmon parr are juveniles that have yet to leave the river and go to the ocean.

Mills's observation is a population indicator, said Kurt Samways, a biological sciences professor at UNB Saint John.

"It would be an indicator that the salmon population in that river is declining, and it sounds like there's not a lot of recruitment," Samways said, meaning not as many adults are returning to the river to spawn, which in turn means fewer parr.

The reason for this is "death by a thousand cuts," he said, including river dams, pollution, low water and historic overfishing. 

Chase has seen some of those factors himself.

Smallmouth bass takeover

The water is low this year and more people are reporting catching smallmouth bass, he said.

He said he's been on the river his whole life and he didn't start catching bass until two years ago. He worries they've been eating salmon parr.

Mills has had the same experience with smallmouth bass. He said he never caught them in Salmon River growing up, "but now all a lot of the fishermen" catch them.

According to Samways, smallmouth bass have been in the river system long enough that they have become "naturalized," but "they can be predatory on juvenile salmon."

'Nobody cares'

Both Chase and Mills would like more attention paid to the Salmon River and what is happening to the habitat.

"Nobody cares. You know the river is going. There's no, that I'm aware of, any active fisheries monitoring of the river," said Mills.

He believes that there are parts of the river with cold water that are "perfect for the salmon," and he would like the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to do something.

But there are no plans to stock or count Atlantic salmon in the Salmon River, according to an email from the department. The department also said it "continues to employ the tools at its disposal to manage, conserve, and protect Atlantic salmon."

Samways said that the disappearance of salmon in Salmon River "is all too common." Similar declines have happened in many rivers across New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

If something is to be done about it, he said, the first steps would be to ensure the river is a suitable habitat and to quantify the current population to reveal whether the population has potential to come back on its own or if it needs help.

There is no "one-size-fits-all" program, but there are options such as relocating salmon from nearby rivers to Salmon River to supplement the population.