The symbolic journey by big canoe will travelling down the Fraser and end in Chilliwack

The Last Stand for Wild Salmon Paddle on August 12 is a fundraising voyage on the Fraser River with five big canoes. (Submitted)

The Last Stand for Wild Salmon Paddle is a fundraising voyage on the Fraser River by big canoe slated to finish in Chilliwack on August 12.

“The goal of this symbolic paddle is to focus public attention on the immediate need to act,” said organizer Eddie Gardner, of the Wild Salmon Defenders Alliance.

The target is raising $45,000 to offset the legal costs of Indigenous leaders mounting a legal challenge to the presence of open-net aquaculture in their territories, and the federal government’s refusal to test for piscine reovirus before stocking the pens.

“This legal action is the culmination of 30 years work to get collaboration from both levels of government on this urgent matter,” said Gardner, who has been at the helm of the Wild Salmon Defenders effort based from Chilliwack for five years.

The paddlers will travel by the river from Scowlitz First Nation next Sunday to Shx’wa:y First Nation in Chilliwack in dugout canoes from Vancouver Island, the Fraser Valley and the State of Washington.

Pledges raised for the event so far total more than $11,500.

Proceeds from the paddle will go with legal costs for reps from communities such as The Namgis, Mamalilikulla, Musgamagw, Dzawada’enuxw and Kwikwasut’inuxw Haxwamis First Nations, which have been doing “their level best” to secure collaboration from federal and provincial reps to evict the farms from their respective territories.

Asked why people in the Lower Fraser region would care about fish farms in the ocean, Gardner was unequivocal.

“The same salmon that swim up the river to Chilliwack are the ones that have to swim past the gauntlet of fish farms in the ocean posing such a threat to their very survival,” Gardner said.

Canada should take a page from the Washington State playbook, he said, which is in the process of phasing aquaculture out, following other states like Oregon and California, and is actually testing for the piscine reovirus.

For Gardner this past year in particular has generated more evidence that open-net farms continue to inflict “serious harm” on endangered wild salmon.

“To date, governments refuse to remove a single fish farm, rather they support this unsustainable and destructive industry, despite the cumulative scientific evidence that shows fish farms have been doing serious harm to wild salmon and its habitat for some 30 years, and it is getting worse,” Gardner said.

There is a sense of urgency.

“Time is running out on wild salmon, and we don’t have four more years to get fish farms out of the ocean,” Gardner said.

Even the Cohen Commission recommendations insisted that the industry must employ a precautionary principle, and that is not happening.

“Legal action is being taken by Indigenous defenders at this critical stage. They deserve our political and financial support,” said Gardner.

The alliance has partnered with Shxwhá:y Village to organize the fundraiser.

The big canoes involved in the paddle include Wa’nuck owned by Chief Don Svanvik of Namgis; Northern Quest owned by Shxwa:y councillor Bonnie Russell; and the Three Sisters (Louise, Emma, and Elizabeth) owned by Shxwhá:y Chief Robert Gladstone.

Jeremy Dunn of the B.C. Salmon Farmers Association has been quoted as saying the aquaculture industry shares the concerns of Indigenous people and others about declining salmon stocks, but the farmers aren’t taking the blame.

READ MORE: Protests at fish farms

“I can understand the concern people have over salmon stocks they expect to be more abundant that aren’t,” he said. “I feel for their concern in this area as does everyone that lives on the coast.”

There are 109 salmon farms in B.C. waters, Dunn said, and the industry employs 6,600 people and generates about $1.5 billion a year.

Salmon Defenders however have been pushing for the removal of industrial open-net pen salmon farms from migration routes of wild salmon in B.C., and are very supportive of the emerging, land-based aquaculture industry, said Gardner.

“This is an international issue, and we are encouraged that a growing coalition of citizens on both sides of the border are in solidarity with the goal to have our shared Salish Sea free of open-net pen fish farms,” said Gardner.

Donors have been sponsoring the five big canoe teams online. For more details go to wsda.ca/paddle-event/

—with files from Canadian Press

@CHWKjourno

jfeinberg@theprogress.com

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Eddie Gardner and Tracy Lyster, with Wild Salmon Defenders Alliance in Maple Ridge, calling for an end to fish farms. (Phil Melnychuk/THE NEWS file)