Where
The Colquitz Fish Counting Fence is located on the Colquitz River in Victoria about 100m SW of Montana’s Restaurant in Tillicum Mall.
What
The Fence was installed (not by GRR) in October 2001 to trap returning Salmon so that they can be counted for Conservation reasons, after which they are released upstream of fence to spawn further upstream. Schools often do field trips to visit the fence during counting time. In 2018 the area on the East bank was cleared of brush to allow more viewing room for school groups and new crushed gravel laid down on access trail.
How
Golden Rods and Reels has been an active supporter of the fence assuming fish counting services weekly on Thursday’s in fall 2017 and 2018.
Results
- 2013: 1398 Salmon & 6 Cutthroat Trout counted.
As featured in BC Wildlife Foundation article by FFS of BC:
The Victoria Golden Rods and Reels Fishing and Social Club have already taken advantage of this fantastic opportunity presented by the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C.
The Victoria Golden Rods and Reels Fishing and Social Club is instumental in the launch of a new project with funding from the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C. The project is calledPortage Inlet Cutthroat Initiative (PICI) Phase One. The project kicked off in early September of this year and is anticipated to go until the end of November 2019. The lead group on the project is the World Fisheries Trust in conjunction with the Peninsula Streams Society and the Victoria Golden Rods and Reels Fishing and Social Club.
The focus of the project is research on past and present cutthroat populations in Colquitz River, Craigflower Creek, Portage Inlet, Gorge waterway and Victoria harbour. It includes habitat, water quality and water flow levels, also a couple of restoration projects with Peninsula Streams. The club is currently working on an in-depth review of all existing literature and water quality and flow data bases to determine what the research says before they conduct any field work.
“We are doing this project because cutthroat trout are seriously threatened, and we need to know more about them before we can begin restoring their populations,” said Mick Collins, the Conservation Director for the Victoria Golden Rods and Reels Fishing and Social Club.
“To me, it is a continuation of 5 years of work to restore Elk/Beaver Lake,” said Collins, “It is the logical extension to continue working on Colquitz River which starts at the Beaver Lake dam and to extend the effort to Craigflower Creek which starts at the Thetis Lake dam. For the club, it is a continuation of restoration work from the 1990s on O’Donnel Creek, the main stream entering Elk/Beaver Lake.”
This project would not be possible without the generous contributions from local angling clubs and the support from the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C.
You must be logged in to post a comment.