Regional Director’s Message

Hello everyone/Bonjour à tous,

Where did the year go?! I took the reins as ASF Regional Director only one short year ago but what a year it was.
I would first like to congratulate all of those on the New Brunswick Salmon Council, who were involved with the Healthy Watersheds – Healthy Fisheries workshop held in Fredericton in March 2007. Everyone involved with this initiative should hold their head up high as the event was a resounding success and quite possibly the crowning achievement of the NBSC and their partners in 2007.
This past year ASF and the NBSC were very active in providing comments and recommendations on multiple levels of fisheries management documents authored by DFO. The Canadian Implementation Plan under NASCO; the Integrated Fisheries Management Plan for Gulf Region, and most recently the Wild Atlantic Salmon Conservation Policy were among the frameworks drafted and consulted upon. With each successive draft the documents were made clearer and more palatable but there is no getting around the new climate of partnership and collaboration we find ourselves in. The federal and provincial governments will be increasingly turning to stakeholder and watershed groups to assist with the management of our natural resources.
As you may know, ASF has developed and refined ocean tracking equipment that will afford us a glimpse into the migratory journey of smolts and adult salmon. The primary goals of the smolt tracking research are to determine the locations, timing and causes of mortality during their trip form river to sea. Your group or organization can help ASF add to this important dataset by “sponsoring” a smolt in one of the participating river systems. For more information contact myself, the Atlantic Salmon Federation, or visit our website at: www.asf.ca.
I look forward to helping out with ASEF proposals; insinuating my way into your field programs; attending your dinners; and waxing poetic with you on the banks of the river this year …hopefully I will finally land something bigger than the one in this picture!
Cheers,
Trish