A Kootenay Lake conservation program has been paying off with prizes on the line for the most prolific anglers.
The Kootenay Lake Angler Incentive Program invites the public to take part in conservation work by keeping predatory fish populations in check.
“The Kokanee population crashed and we’re living in a bit of a place where kokanee [salmon] aren’t able to get back their historic numbers because they’re being kept in what we call a predator pt,” said Jesse Zeman, BC Wildlife Federation Executive Director. “The goal around the Kootenay Lake Angler Incentive Program is really to just reduce the number of predators and give the Kokanee a little bit of breathing room so they can rebuild.”
Anglers wanting to take part can fish for rainbow and bull trout in Kootenay Lake and drop the heads off at local depots to enter the draw.
“There’s a lot of people who care deeply about Kootenay Lake,” said Zeman. “People are really concerned, they’ve seen these large declines and they just want to help out to make things better.”
The contest has proven to be a big hit, with over 23,000 trout heads being turned in over three years.
“We get a lot of participation throughout the West Kootenay,” said Zeman. “There’s obviously a lot of local awareness of the program and what it’s trying to achieve.”
BC Wildlife Federation officials said they recently headed out a pretty significant prize.
“Dave Johnston and his fishing buddies have hauled dozens of trout out of Kootenay Lake over the past year and one of them netted him a brand new 2022 Ford F-150, with the off-road Tremor package, from Nelson Ford,” said the BC Wildlife Federation.
Prizes are given out monthly, but Johnston entered an important draw.
“I fish with two buddies and a lot of the time we just combine our heads and one of us enters the draw,” said Johnston, a resident of Gray Creek. “This time it was my turn. But anyone of us could have caught that fish.”
He had previously earned a $1,000 prize from the monthly draw.
Zeman said the program highlights the importance of conservation work.
“Part of it is maintaining a healthy ecosystem and taking care of fish and wildlife,” said Zeman. “There’s a bunch of spinoff benefits as it relates to economics and people going outdoors.”
Zeman said they are starting to see some positive impacts of the program already.
“It seems like things are slowly starting to come around this year. The predatory fish are starting to look more healthy; before they were starting to get large heads and skinny bodies,” said Zeman. “Things are slowly coming around, but not as fast as we’d like. Now is definitely not the time to slow down, now is the time to continue to put pressure on these predatory fish to suppress them and let the kokanee rebound.”