Eulachon Eulogy?

The First Nations’ staple that helped coastal peoples survive over the centuries has been hit by rapidly decreasing populations. A biologist says research funds are urgently needed to enable further study of the eulachon.

The eulachon is an ecological treasure and a cultural icon for First Nations. Unlike the story of the Pacific salmon, which is known by every schoolchild in British Columbia, few know the story of its distant relative, the eulachon. This anonymity may soon fade however, as eulachon populations are now in a crisis as deep and dangerous as any faced by salmon.

Salvation Fish

The eulachon (or oolichan) is a small, silver fish the size of a herring that spawns in B.C. coastal rivers. The life story of this small fish is similar to the salmon’s. A eulachon spends most of its life in the ocean off the coast of B.C.

Each spring they migrate in the millions to coastal rivers, migrate upstream, and spawn in gravel beds. Gulls, eagles, wolves, seals, porpoises, sea lions and even killer whales feast on them. After spawning, when many and perhaps all eulachon die, their carcasses decay, enriching the stream and estuary.

Their role in supporting the ecosystem is obvious, but has gone virtually unstudied by fisheries researchers. This is unfortunate for, like the salmon, eulachon are at risk, and we may not know enough about them to save them from extinction.

Though both salmon and eulachon are food and commercial fish, the obscurity of eulachon can be explained by comparing distribution and abundance. Salmon spawn in over 1,000 rivers coast wide, whereas eulachon spawn in fewer than 40. The largest runs of salmon can number over 10 million fish each weighing two kilograms, (a total of 20 million kilos) whereas the largest runs of eulachon, though numbering 25 million, are comprised of fish weighing only 40 grams, for a total run of just one million kilos.

These differences in size and abundance have driven the commercial fishing effort. Moreover, these fisheries have catered to markets and few peoples other than First Nations prefer the rich oily taste of eulachon to that of salmon.

Eulachon have always played a critical role in the survival and commerce of First Nations, who give them important cultural status. By returning to spawn in the early spring, when food supplies were exhausted, the eulachon literally saved lives, earning them the name “salvation fish.”

Further, because eulachon are almost 20-per-cent oil by weight, they allowed a fine grease to be easily rendered, creating a high energy food source that could readily be transported and traded with nations further inland.

The grease trails that linked the coastal and inland tribes are an intriguing chapter of our history, part of which today lie protected in Provincial Parks. The grease itself is as fundamental to the cultures of many First Nations as butter is to those cultures of European origin.

A jar of grease on the table is more than a condiment or a staple; it is an integral part of the meal. When you consider that eulachon grease is rendered by a method centuries old every year by entire extended families in rustic camps centuries old, you realize why the eulachon fishery is the event of the year that defines a large part of native culture.

In 1994, eulachon runs were surprisingly poor up and down the coast. First Nations put pressure on government to do more research. In response, the department of fisheries and oceans formed the Eulachon Research Council, an informal group of eulachon researchers, including both First Nations and industry, that has been supported by the B.C. ministry of forests.

The council has met every year or two, allowing eulachon researchers and managers coast-wide to share their research. Forest Renewal B.C. funded several research programs in 1996 and 1997, but the funding for eulachon studies dried up in 1998.

DFO has done some basic research since that time, on an admittedly shoestring budget that provides just a fraction of the knowledge needed to adequately understand eulachons and manage those activities than can affect them.

Our ignorance is profound, even dangerous. We don’t even know if eulachon return to spawn each year in the same river, spread out coast-wide, or do a bit of both. Imagine having similar uncertainty when managing salmon populations —even basic management decisions such as whether to allow a fishery opening would be impossible. In the absence of such knowledge, decisions must still made.

Some of those decisions, such as the canceling the commercial fishery on the Fraser River, and stricter self-management of food fisheries by First Nations, were of benefit to eulachon. Other decisions, such as allowing continued forest harvesting in eulachon watersheds, may not have been wise, though we do not have the data to test this. Regardless, it is apparent now that the management of eulachon, their habitat and the fisheries that affect them has been inadequate.

Returns of eulachon during 1999 and 2000 have been dismal—they have disappeared from many rivers that formerly supported robust fisheries. This decline was documented on May 4 at the Eulachon Research Council met in Terrace, B.C., where researchers concluded that eulachon are indeed in decline.

Eulachon numbers have dropped off coast-wide: from the Columbia River in Washington State, to the Fraser, Skeena, and Nass rivers in B.C., and to the Copper River in Alaska. Poor ocean conditions are driving this trend, made worse by habitat degradation and by-catch in offshore fisheries.

First Nations are concerned that their aboriginal right to harvest eulachon has been infringed by effects to eulachon stocks from bycatch in offshore fisheries and habitat loss in spawning rivers. That a First Nations cultural icon is at risk should be of great concern to those with a fiduciary responsibility to First Nations.

British Columbia has already acted by classifying eulachon as blue-listed, recognizing that eulachon are at risk and vulnerable. Now is the time for federal government to act. Basic research should be funded immediately, provided it is non-destructive. Habitat regulations should be tightened to ensure that impacts to eulachon do not worsen.

Epitaph or Chronicle?

Interceptions of eulachon as by-catch, a long-standing problem that both DFO and the shrimp fishery made some progress on, must be eliminated. Such actions are entirely feasible and practical—DFO enacted similar measures up and down the coast during the coho crisis with tremendous results.

The responsibility to act goes beyond the first two orders of government. For the time being, First Nations must give up their catches.

First Nations and industry already study eulachon, but they can increase these efforts and further extend the benefit by coordinating research. Success will in part depend on how well each stakeholder puts aside other issues to focus on the eulachon crisis.

Even if we do everything within our power and we do it well, there is no guarantee that eulachon will recover. Like the salmon, eulachon abundance is governed by marine conditions and they do poorly in the warm waters brought by global warming. It is important that researchers and managers not be daunted by this grim forecast.

The difference between recovery and extinction may lie in our efforts, and we owe these both to eulachon and to the First Nations. One thing we can be certain of, a decade from now, eulachon will be better known by school children, either by epitaph or by chronicle.

The eulachon (or oolichan) is herring-sized, grey-and-silver-coloured and known by a variety of common names including candlefish, oilfish, small fish, salvation fish and fathom fish, whose scientific name derives meaning from Thaleichthys (“oily fish”), and pacificus (“of the Pacific”).

The largest member of the smelt family, eulachon are anadromous, spawning in freshwater and living as adults in the sea.

Eulachon spawn in the lower reaches of rivers, often within tidal influence, and migrate and spawn within just two weeks each spring, from early March in the Skeena River, to April in the Fraser River and May in Alaskan rivers. Eulachon migrate in dense schools, waiting in the estuary until the high tide slackens river currents and night cloaks them from predators, then streaming upriver to spawn in shallow gravel riffles.

Females release an average of 27,000 eggs that, once fertilized, rupture to expose an adhesive membrane, an anchor that holds them securely to gravel, sand, or wood debris on the river bottom. The eggs incubate for one to two months, then hatch in May and June as wispy, translucent larvae just 5 mm long and barely able to swim. The larvae leave the river quickly, using the cover of darkness to ride river currents to the estuary. During the first summer of life, eulachon are transported by tidal currents along coastal inlets, feeding at night on plankton near the surface and hiding by day in the depths. As eulachon grow, they migrate further out to sea, living most of their adult lives offshore on the banks where shrimp and flatfish also live.

Eulachon can spend up to six years in the ocean but most are three or four years old when they return to spawn.

Whether they return to the river of their birth is unknown: they may but probably not with the fidelity of salmon. Although many eulachon die after spawning, it is doubtful that this holds for all, given the capture of spent but apparently healthy eulachon in the Strait of Georgia.