May Day 2025 Miramichi Salmon Blog

 

Fishing Friends –

One never knows what is in store for weather and water conditions in the first weeks of spring salmon fishing. 

The illustration below from the Canadian Government website shows water height and temperature on the SW Miramichi since opening day on 4/15.  As you can see there have been two major raises of water.  The raises do two things.  First, they fill the river with dirty water.  The high dirty water makes effective fishing difficult, and it discourages feeding activity.  The second thing that they do is temporarily lower water temperatures.  That is a good thing in July, but warmer is better when temps are near freezing.  Nonetheless, the upward trend in temps over the last two weeks is clear, and of course this will eventually lead to the kelts returning to the sea, the smolts running down the river, and finally the first bright salmon returning to the Miramichi.

Overall, this season salmon fishers have suffered through some days of tough conditions.  Nonetheless, says Byzie Coughlan of Country Haven, whenever conditions have been reasonable the catches have been quite good leaving a lot of anglers very happy with their spring fishing experiences.  Everyone is concerned about how long the fishing will hold up.  That is because the ice went out almost two weeks early, and many experienced Miramichiers think that it is the date of ice out that sets the clock running for kelts to leave the river.

 

Brock Curtis of Curtis Outfitters in Blackville reported that this initial fear of any early exodus of the salmon kelts has not been born out.  Prior to this past weekend’s heavy rains he was still getting reports in his fly shop of better-than-expected salmon fishing and fish still being caught well upriver and he feels that this bodes well for the next couple of weeks which will bring the spring salmon fishery to its normal terminus at mid-month.  Brock gave his report at mid-week and he characterized conditions as rapidly improving.  Maybe some spring salmon fishing is on the docket this weekend!  Brock went on to say that: “If you are spending any time on the river you will see salmon starting to jump and show.  It is hard to believe the transformation of vegetation since the rains over the weekend. It is really greening up and the buds are coming fast on the trees. Temperatures are starting to rise now, and for a lot of us we are moving into our favorite time of year to be on our rivers. It’s a great time to be angling on the Miramichi.”

Beyond the kelts, fishing has been particularly good for brook trout.  Some of these are sea runs, but many are residents of the myriad brooks and streams entering the main river.  The overpopulation of striped bass doesn’t greatly affect overall trout numbers because the young trout live all through this network of brooks that are too small for stripers to infiltrate.  The bass clearly have a negative effect on the numbers of large sea runs, though, because they get eaten in the lower estuary before they can grow beyond the stage where they are vulnerable to the bass.  That shortage of larger sea runs brookies has been noticed at some of their traditional haunts further up the Cains and upper SW Miramichi where numbers of the 2-to-5-pound trout have been drastically reduced.

Speaking of the first bright salmon, the Restigouche has gathered a reputation for producing a few of these May fish, and especially of some very large ones.  The Miramichi just isn’t given enough credit for producing these early fish.  If one puts the same amount of time in on the Miramichi, I’m not sure that the odds are materially better on the Restigouche.  It’s a very special undertaking and not for everyone.  You are going to be fishing with heavy tippets and relatively large flies. The river is likely to be flowing higher and faster.  If you do hook up the fish will be large salmon as opposed to grilse, and in the most fit condition that you have ever encountered.  Wilson’s, The Ledges, Country Haven, Upper Oxbow and others know the places these early fish have historically been taken.  I wouldn’t think of it as a substitute for angling later in the season, but instead consider it as a special adventure to add a few days to your season.  You might get skunked, but you’d love every minute, and you might hook the best fish of your life.  The last week of May and the first couple of June are the time.  Last year, for several days just after the first of June, David Donahue saw the Vs of schools of salmon headed through the flat water just above Doctor’s Island.  Now is the time to make those plans.

The MSA gives a special award for the first and the last bright salmon of the season.  Last year’s first salmon was caught on May 30th  by Doctor Jake Swan fishing from is camp in Blissfield.  Check this beauty out.  The MSA will give the first bright salmon documented by an acceptable, digital photo a beautiful copy of this certificate.   Just send a copy of your photo along with when and where it was caught to Butch Dalton, President of the MSA.   I’d love to have a copy for this blog too!

 

On the conservation front, I wish that I could give better news.  It never fails to amaze me how complex some parties have made the simple solution that the experts I speak with are confident would turn around the state of Miramichi salmon.  Everything was very good on the Miramichi until spawning striped bass numbers went north of 100,000, and everything has been straight downhill since.  Look at this chart of salmon returns to the SW and the NW Miramichi dating back into the 1990s.  The best years in the time sequence were 2010/2011.  These were the culmination of years of releasing large salmon to build the spawning stock.   We need to bring the bass back under 100K to get survival of Miramichi salmon smolts back to sustainable level.  Beyond that, we need to engage in a strong stocking program to start the salmon quickly onto the road to recovery.  Every scientist looking at the situation has come to the same conclusion.

In DFO’s recently released wild Atlantic salmon conservation strategy they make the following statement:  “The Strategy includes four strategic outcomes: supporting healthy, climate-resilient salmon populations; ensuring alignment with Indigenous rights; fostering a vibrant and knowledgeable salmon community; and transparent, well-informed management practices.”  We have been in a total crisis mode for at least 24 months, so what has actually been done?  The answer is very little, and as it stands now almost nothing that will actually be effective.  The striped bass quota was increased last fall from 50K to 175K.  175K is too little because the bass will replace those fish with new spawners every year.  But what has been done to ensure that even the 175K bass will ever be caught? First, the pledge of transparency has already been violated.  I heard recently, directly from the horse’s mouth, that one First Nations band that caught 50K fish last year was denied their request to increase their catch to 100K.  I’m told that this was even though the other FN bands who are slotted to get a piece of the 175K have never harvested striped bass and have no plans to do so in 2025 – if ever.   I believe that the reason for this refusal is that the Moncton office of DFO does not actually want this quota to be caught.  They have their head down and are pushing ahead to keep the Gulf of Saint Lawrence full of Miramichi stripers, and if that means the extirpation of Miramichi’s iconic salmon and the very important smelt fishery, that is acceptable to them.  This is politics at its very worst, a bureaucracy that decides what it wants to do regardless of established policies that they are legislatively mandated to adhere to.

Our very best chance of turning the Miramichi salmon situation around may now be in the hands of the Canadian courts.  Save Miramichi Salmon has taken DFO to federal court and a hearing is in the offing for DFO to try and have SMS’s case dismissed.  The grounds that DFO is seeking dismissal on are essentially that no one has the right to challenge their management of fisheries.  Apparently DFO thinks they are judge, jury and in this case has taken on the role of executioner.  SMS lawyers are prepared to present very vigorous arguments with lots of scientific verification from top experts.  We hope and expect to prevail and send this to trial, then DFO’s malfeasance will be forced into the light of day.

If you are interested in SMS’s legal efforts to save Miramichi Atlantic salmon you can follow this link to Save Miramchi Salmon’s website and sign up for updates.

Recently a Miramichi man named Roger Jenkins wrote an excellent piece for CBC News that expresses what an awful lot of people feel about the river and its fish.  Here is a link to the brief article.   I mourn the decline of Atlantic salmon. I need politicians who get what’s at stake  | CBC News  It is impossible for most of us to understand how DFO cannot see the need for balance with this resource, but they don’t, and it appears that it is going to take more than polite conversation to see salmon restored to the Miramichi.

On the international salmon front, it’s the worst low water in years for the Northern Highlands of Scotland.  I talked with friends on the Helmsdale a day or two ago.  The rivers rimming the north and east coasts are bone dry and there is little prospect of any rain for at least the next two weeks.  Michael Wigan, River Manager of the Helmsdale told me that on a tiny raise the other day a good number of fresh salmon ran through their new counter.  So, it’s not a problem with fish, just with low water.  All of a sudden that will turn around and fishing will be off the charts.  I’d sure like to be there when it happens.

All issues aside, it is time to go fishing.  There are still spring salmon available, and brook trout fishing is just beginning.  As Brock Curtis says, we are quickly coming into a terrific time of year just to be out on the river.

Thanks for reading.  Brad Burns