PART I
TECHNICAL AND REVIEW PAPERS (Contd.)

FISHING, FISH YIELD PARAMETERS AND STOCKING IN FRESHWATER BASINS IN FINLAND

Esko A. Lind

Department of Zoology, University of Oulu, 90100 Oulu 10, Finland

ABSTRACT

The average annual catch during the period 1953–1977 amounted to 19 000 tons; no trend in catches was noted. The number of fishing licenses increased from 170 000 to 345 000 during the same period. As a result, the area/license decreased from 18 ha to 9 ha and the catch/license from 100 kg to 60 kg. These facts, and the decrease in the catch/fishing unit with increasing rate of exploitation indicate that some fish populations may be overexploited. 77% of the catch was harvested by non-professional fishermen, 16% by semiprofessional, and 7% by professional fishermen. Positive correlations between the fish yield obtained and alkalinity, conductivity, growing season and rate of exploitation were noted, whereas the correlations between the yield and coloration of the water and the proportion of predacious fish in the yield were negative. These correlations may be explained partly on the basis of differences in the trophic level and partly on that of differences in the community structure. A negative correlation was noted between the survival of the young stocked and the density of predatory species. Similarly the correlation between the survival of the young stocked and the coloration of the water was a negative one.

RÉSUMÉ

On a constaté qu'il existait un rapport positif entre la production effective de poisson et l'alcalinité, la conductivité, le pH, le phosphore, le potassium, la saison de croissance et le taux d'exploitation, et un rapport négatif entre la production et la demande chimique d'oxygène, la coloration de l'eau et la proportion de poissons prédateurs dans les prises. Ces corrélations s'expliquent en partie du fait des différences de niveau trophique et en partie en raison des diversités de la structure communautaire. Les lacs oligotrophes sont peuplés principalement d'espèces—proies—tandis que les lacs dystrophes renferment surtout des prédateurs. On a constaté une corrélation négative entre la survie des jeunes du stock et la densité des espèces prédatrices, de même qu'entre la survie des jeunes et la coloration de l'eau. Cela s'explique en partie du fait du rapport négatif qui existe entre la nourriture disponible et la coloration de l'eau et en partie en raison du rapport positif qui apparaît entre la densité des prédateurs et la coloration de l'eau.

INTRODUCTION

The rivers and lakes in Finland comprise a total area of 32 000 km,² the number of fishing licenses issued amounts to 300 000, and the yield obtained reaches some 20 000 tons, or 6 kg/ha. This yield is harvested by professional, semiprofessional, and non-professional fishermen, most of the last-mentioned being engaged in recreation.

Some fish populations have decreased due to the construction of hydroelectric power plants, water regulation and pollution, and an attempt has been made to compensate for this by stocking the waters with young.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

Fish yield statistics and community structure, based on a lake area of 3 000 km², or 9% of the total freshwater area, have been presented by Lind (1977, 1979) and Myllymaa and Lind (1979) and similar data on the survival of the young introduced by Lind et al. (1972) and Lind (1978 a, b).

Figures for the yearly variation in 1953–1977 in the catch and number of fishermen, as indicated by the number of licenses issued, are taken from the Statistical Yearbook of Finland (Central Stat. Office of Finland 1954–1978).

RESULTS

Fish Yield Statistics

Positive correlations were noted between the yield and the rate of exploitation, growing season, alkalinity and conductivity, whereas the correlations between the yield and the coloration of the water and the proportion of pike in the catch were negative (Table 1). The correlation between the catch/unit and the rate of exploitation was likewise negative.

Table 1. Catch related to several variables.

Fig. 1. Yearly variations in catch, number of fishing licenses and area/license according to Central Stat. Office of Finland (1954–1978).

Kg/unit = -1,39 x + 9,99
Kg/unit = 0,02074 x² - 0,64621 x + 5,63793

These correlations, excluding rate of exploitation, are explained partly on the basis of the differences in the trophic level and partly on the basis of the differences in the community structure. Clear lakes are populated mainly by species of prey, whereas humic lakes are populated mainly by predacious species.

In the case of the rate of exploitation the area examined amounted to 580 km², which yielded 600 tons, or about 10 kg/ha. The number of fishing licenses was 3 500, corresponding to 1 licence per 17 ha of lake area and 172 kg of fish caught.

Catch Statistics

The average annual catch during the period 1953–1977 amounted to 19 000 tons. No clear trend in catches was noted (Fig. 1). Of the catch 77% was harvested by non-professional fishermen, 16% by semiprofessional, and 7% by professional fishermen; the average catch/license being 55 kg, 800 kg and 3 000 kg respectively.

Fig. 2. Yearly variation in catch/fisherman (modified from Hanski, manuscript).

The number of professional fishermen decreased from 1 000 to 300 during the same period, and that of semiprofessional fishermen from 9 000 to 3 000, whereas the number of nonprofessional fishermen increased from 160 000 to 340 000. As a result, the area/license decreased from 18 ha to 9 ha, averaging 12 ha.

The catch/license decreased from 100 kg to 60 kg during the period 1953–1977, as one might expect (Fig. 2), although this decrease was evident only in the case of non-professional fishermen, the present level being about 50 kg/license. At the same time the average catch obtained by the professional fishermen increased from 2 000 to 4 000 kg/license, and that of the semiprofessional fishermen remained virtually unchanged.

The most important species for non-professional fishermen were the perch (Perca fluviatilis), pike (Esox lucius), bream (Abramis brama), burbot (Lota lota), whitefish (Coregonus lavaretus) and roach (Rutilus rutilus), whereas the vendace (Coregonus albula) was harvested mainly by professional and semiprofessional fishermen (Fig. 3).

Fig. 3. Species composition of the catch. The numerals above the columns indicate the fishing mortality rate according to the relevant Finnish literature. The figure above the group “Miscellaneous” represent the fishing mortality of the roach (Rutilus rutilus).

A negative correlation was noted between the fishing mortality and total length of fish in the coregonids (Fig. 4).

Stocking of Young

The most favoured species for stocking purposes are the brown trout (Salmo trutta), rainbow trout (S. gairdneri) and certain coregonids. A negative correlation between the survival of the young stocked and the number of predacious species in a lake has been noted (Lind et al. 1972).

Since 1951, it has been customary to raise the young of brown trout to an age of 2 years before stocking. The number of young introduced has increased gradually, and the target of 1 million smolt/yr was reached in 1976. The young have been introduced in both fresh and brackish waters, the average yield being 200 g/smolt. These stockings could thus result in a yield of 200 tons/yr. A negative correlation between the survival of the smolt (Y = percentage of fish recaptured) and the intensity of coloration of the water (x = Pt mg/l) was noted as follows:

Y = -0,00004 x³ + 0,01212 x²
- 1,24126 x + 44,19070

There is a negative correlation between the fish feeding on plankton animals (Coregonus albula, Osmerus eperlanus) and the color of the water. In addition, there is a positive correlation between the duration of the age-class predominance of C. albula and the intensity of color of the water (Lind 1976). The usual size of the main plankton feeders at the age of one year varies from 6 to 10 cm. Thus, the availability of prey in clear water is no limiting factor for the brown trout; whereas in humic water there may be shortage of available prey.

Fig. 4. Correlation between the fishing mortality and the length of coregonids, according to Ahrén (1966) and the relevant Finnish literature. Material is from brackish-water area; it is believed that the same is true for freshwaters (see Fig. 3).

There is a positive correlation between the predators and the intensity of color of the water. This may explain both the high survival of the smolts stocked in clear water and the high mortality rate of the smolts stocked in humic water.

Young coregonids for introduction are usually kept in natural rearing ponds to an age of 1 summer before stocking. These ponds amount to a total of 3 000 ha in area, each producing 6 000 young/yr (NCE-Symposium 1979). Thus the production amounts to about 20 million/yr. It is estimated that these young will give a yield of 20 g/ind., or about 400 tons/yr, after stocking in lakes or brackish-water areas.

CONCLUSIONS

The decrease in the water area and catch per license, the drastic decrease in the catch/unit with the increasing rate of exploitation, and increase in fishing mortality with the size of fish indicate that some fish populations may be overexploited. Thus restrictions seem to be needed to control fishing for recreational purposes, which is responsible for the greater part of the yield obtained. On the other hand, the yield obtained from stocking could be increased considerably by careful selection of the stocking areas.

LITERATURE CITED

Åhrén, T. 1966 Märkning av siklöja i Piteå skärgård. Svensk Fisk. Tidskr., 75:102–104.

Central Statistical Office of Finland. 1954–1978 Statistical yearbook of Finland. Helsinki. Various pages in annual issues.

Hanski, K. Manuscript, Kalastus Suomessa. 18 p.

Lind, E.A. 1976 The age-class cycle in some populations of Coregonus albula (L.) in Finland. Rev. Trav. Inst. Peches Marit., 40:654–656.

Lind, E.A. 1977 A review of pikeperch (Stizostedion lucioperca), Eurasian perch (Perca fluviatilis), and ruff (Gymnocephalus cernua) in Finland. J. Fish. Res. Board Can., 34:1684–1695.

Lind, E.A. 1978a A review of wild and stocked populations of brown trout, Salmo trutta L., in Finland. Pages 193–204 in Proceedings of Wild trout—catchable trout symposium. Eugene, Oregon, Feb. 15–17, 1978.

Lind, E.A. 1978b Jumiskojoen vesistön rakentamisen ja säännöstelyn aiheuttamat kalataloudelliset haitat sekä niiden korvaus ja kompensointi 105 p. Helsinki (Stencil).

Lind, E.A. 1979 Fish community structure in lakes of Finland with special regard to yield. Pages 68–73 in NCE-Symposium. Ecology and fishery biology of small forest lakes. Lammi, Finland, Nov. 15–17, 1978.

Lind, E.A., T. Juntunen, O, Kukko and J. Turunen. 1972 Kalanistutusten tuloksellisuudesta petotiheydeltään erilaisissa vesissä. (Summary: Survival of planted fish in relation to predation). Kalamies, 1972 (2):3.

Myllymaa, U. and E.A. Lind. 1979 Limnological characteristic and fishery in small lakes in Kuusamo, NE-Finland. Pages 74–78 in NCE-Symposium. Ecology and fishery biology of small forest lakes. Lammi, Finland, Nov. 15–17 1978.

NCE-Symposium. 1979 Conclusions. Pages 8–10 in Ecology and fishery biology of small forest lakes. Lammi, Finland, Nov. 15–17, 1978.

LONG-TERM TRENDS IN RIVER AND OFF-SHORE EXPLOITATION OF THE SALMON, Salmo salar, IN FINLAND

Esko A. Lind

Department of Zoology, University of Oulu, 90100 Oulu 10, Finland

ABSTRACT

The catch obtained from the Baltic Sea was high at the end of the 19th Century, low during the period 1900–1945, high in 1945–1950, and low again thereafter, with the years of good catches being those in which the winters were exceptionally cold during the river phase of the young. The water of the rivers flowing into the Baltic is usually humic, and it is suggested that this results in long-term fluctuations. An increase in the off-shore catch in the 20th Century has resulted in a decrease in the river catch. As a result there may be a shortage of spawning fish in the rivers, and consequently, low densities of young populations have been noted. The rivers flowing into the Arctic Ocean, however, still produce good river catches, due to the excellent water quality, low rate of exploitation in the growing areas, and consequently high densities of the young populations. These rivers are free-flowing, whereas 5 of the 6 large rivers flowing into the Baltic are dammed. The natural production of wild smolt has been about 500 000 smolt/yr. The present level of stocking is 150 000 smolt/yr, and about 700 000 more hatchery-reared smolt/yr could be introduced. A wild smolt gives a yield of 1,0 kg/smolt, whereas a hatchery-reared smolt yields 0,5 kg/smolt. It is recommended that off-shore fishing in the Baltic Sea should be restricted considerably. It is also proposed that Finland should increase the number of young stocked to about 850 000 smolt/yr.

RÉSUMÉ

Les captures provenant de la mer Baltique ont été fortes à la fin du 19ème siècle, faibles pendant la période 1900–1945, fortes en 1945–1950, puis à nouveau faibles depuis lors; les bonnes captures ont été réalisées durant les années pendant lesquelles les hivers étaient exceptionnellement froids au cours de la phase fluviale des juvéniles. Les rivières qui se jettent dans la Baltique ont généralement des eaux humiques et l'on pense qu'il en résulte des fluctuations à long terme des populations. L'accroissement des captures côtières survenu au 20ème siècle a provoqué une diminution des captures fluviales. De ce fait, il se peut que les reproducteurs aient été peu nombreux dans les cours d'eau, d'où une faible densité des populations de juvèniles. Cependant, les cours d'eau qui se jettent dans l'océan Arctique continuent à donner de bonnes captures fluviales, dues à l'excellente qualité de l'eau et au faible taux d'exploitation dans les frayères, d'où résulte une forte densité des populations de juvéniles. Ces voies d'eau sont libres, tandis que cinq des six grands cours d'eau qui se jettent dans la Baltique sont endigués. La production naturelle de tacons sauvages a atteint environ 500 000 unités par an; le niveau actuel d'empoissonnement est de 150 000 tacons par an, et l'on pourrait introduire chaque année 700 000 autres tacons élevés en écloserie. Un tacon sauvage donne un rendement de 1,0 kg/tacon, tandis qu'un tacon élevé en écloserie donne un rendement de 0,5 kg/tacon. Il est recommandé de restreindre considérablement la pêche côtière en mer Baltique. Il est en outre proposé que la Finlande porte le nombre des juvéniles immergés à quelques 850 000 tacons par an.

INTRODUCTION

A natural fluctuation in populations, an increase in off-shore fishing and a decrease in river fishing, and the damming of rivers for hydroelectric power and the stocking of smolt since the 1950's are the main characteristics affecting the exploitation of the salmon (Salmo salar) in the Baltic Sea.

The purpose of this study is to describe the population fluctuations of the salmon in Finland and the Finnish share of salmon fishing and smolt production in the Baltic. The data are compiled from the literature.

FLUCTUATION IN POPULATIONS

The fluctuation in salmon populations in the rivers draining into the Baltic Sea described by Lindroth (1950) is true also for Finland. Thus the catch figures were high at the end of the 19th Century, low during the period 1900–1945, high in 1945–1950, and low again thereafter, the difference between the good and poor catches being 5-fold (Fig. 1). This type of fluctuation is unknown elsewhere within the distribution area of the salmon.

The water of the rivers flowing into the Baltic Sea is usually humic with low alkalinity and conductivity values, and it is suggested that humic water results in long-term fluctuations in populations. It has been stated previously that Coregonus albula shows a positive correlation between duration of age-class predominance and intensity of water color (Lind 1976), with the years of good salmon catches being those in which the winters were exceptionally cold during the river phase of the young (Fig. 1). Thus a negative correlation may be said to exist between smolt production and winter temperature. This statement is especially true for the humic rivers flowing into the northern part of the Baltic.

Fig. 1. Above, fluctuation in salmon populations in certain large Finnish rivers flowing into the Baltic Sea during the period 1869–1975. Below, mean air temperature in Helsinki in January over the same period.

This assumption is supported by observations on present young populations, which show a non-linear negative regression between density and water color (Fig. 2). Thus the highest densities, of 7 000 fish/ha, were noted in non-humic rivers flowing into the Arctic Ocean, and the lowest ones of 500 fish/ha in humic rivers flowing into the northern part of the Baltic.

This assumption is further supported by observations on the stocking of smolt, which show a negative correlation between the survival of the fish introduced and the distance of the deep water from the stocking site (Lind 1979). The correlation between the survival of the smolt stocked and the color of the water may also be said to be negative, since deep areas possess clear water, whereas the water in the shallow areas is turpid or humic.

Fig. 2. Correlation between the densities of young populations of the salmon and brown trout in certain Finnish rivers (material from Karlström and relevant Finnish literature). The salmon populations have been studied only in the Teno and Tornio rivers.

Fig. 3. Long-term trends in Finnish salmon catches obtained from the Baltic Sea and its rivers (material from Christensen and Johansson and the Central Stat. Office of Finland).

RIVER AND OFF-SHORE FISHERY

The Baltic salmon has traditionally been harvested in rivers during the spawning migration, the oldest catch statistics in Northern Finland dating from the 16th Century. An increase in the off-shore catch in the 20th Century resulted in decrease in the river catch (Fig. 3).

Nowadays the majority of the fish are harvested in their growing areas at a size of 3 to 4 kg, i.e. before the size and age of maturity (Fig. 4). Thus only 0,014% of the smolt introduced into the Oulu River, for example, returned to their home river at a size of more than 5 kg during the period 1959–1979. As a result there may be a shortage of spawning salmon in rivers which are not regulated, and consequently, low densities of young populations have been noted (e.g., Karlström 1977).

The rivers flowing into the Arctic Ocean, however, still produce good river catches, due to the excellent water quality, low rate of exploitation in the growing areas (Berg 1974, 1977), and consequently high densities of the young populations (Fig. 2).

DEFICIENT STOCKING OF SMOLT

The rivers flowing into the Arctic Ocean are free-flowing, and the salmon populations seem to be well established; thus no stocking is needed. On the other hand, 5 of our 6 large rivers flowing into the Baltic Sea are dammed, and thus the natural production of smolt has decreased considerably.

Fig. 4. Map showing the major salmon rivers of Finland. Only the Tornio River and Teno River are unaffected by damming for hydroelectric power. The dots represent the recapture points in September-December 1961 of 2-year-old salmon smolt tagged and released in the mouth of Oulu River in June 1960, according to Strandman (1969).

It is known on the basis of taggings that a wild smolt in Scandinavia gives a yield of 1,0 kg/smolt (Laxforskningsinst. Meddel. 1969). This means that our natural production of such smolts has varied from 250 000 to 750 000 fish/yr, averaging about 500 000 fish/yr (Fig. 3).

It is also known that a hatchery reared 2-year-old smolt gives a yield of 0,5 kg/fish after stocking in the Baltic Sea (Laxforskningsinst. Meddel. 1969). Our present-day catch is maintained by Finnish and Swedish wild smolt and by stockings from Sweden, the Soviet Union and Finland: our present level being 150 000 smolt/yr. The Finnish Wildlife and Fisheries Research Institute, the government authorities, the hydroelectric power companies and some scientists largely agree that this catch must originate from about 1 million smolt/yr. They also agree that about 700 000 more hatchery-reared smolt/yr could be introduced.

RECOMMENDATIONS

A restriction in off-shore fishing may result in an increase in both the in-shore and river catch, and also in the total catch (Larsson 1975). In addition, it may result in an increase of the number of fish spawning in those rivers not yet harnessed for hydroelectric power.

Thus it is recommended that the off-shore fishing in the Baltic Sea should be restricted considerably. It is also proposed that Finland should increase the number of young stocked to about 850 000 smolt/yr as soon as possible.

LITERATURE CITED

Berg, M. 1974 The fish production in Norwegian rivers draining into the Arctic Ocean. Kalottialueen Rauhanpäivät, Rovaniemi, Finland, 5–7 July 1974:10 p.

Berg, M. 1977 Tragging migrating salmon smolts (Salmo salar L.) in the Vardnes River, Troms, Northern Norway. Inst. Freshwater Res. Drottningholm Rep., 56:5–11.

Central Statistical Office of Finland. 1971–1976 Statistical yearbook of Finland. Helsinki. Various pages in annual issues.

Christensen, O., and N. Johansson. 1975 Reference report on Baltic salmon with additional information on Baltic Sea trout compiled by the Working Group on Baltic Salmon. Laxforskningsinst. Meddel., 1975 (2): 1–162.

Karlström, Ö. 1977 Biotopval och besättningstäthet hos lax-och öringungar i svenska vattendrag. Inform. Sötvattenslab. Drottningholm, 1977 (6): 1–72.

Larsson, P.-O. 1975 En modell av Östersjöns population av odlad lax. Laxforskningsinst. Meddel., 1975 (4): 1–12.

Lind, E.A. 1976 The age-class cycle in some populations of Coregonus albula (L.) in Finland. Rev. Trav. Inst. Peches Marit., 40: 654–656.

Lind, E.A. 1979 Lohenistutuksen tuottavuus ja istutuspaikan syvyys. (Summary: survival of stocked salmon smolts, Salmo salar L., in relation to water depth). Kalamies, 1979 (8): 6–7.

Lindroth, A. 1950 Fluctuations of the salmon stock in the rivers of northern Sweden. Svenska Vattenkr. Fören. Publ., 415: 99–224.

Strandman, M. 1969 Lohen vaellus Itämeressä. Maataloush. Kalatal. Tutkimust. Tied., 1969 (1): 20–26.

A NECESSARY NEW STRATEGY FOR ALLOCATING ONTARIO'S FISHERY RESOURCES¹

Kenneth H. Loftus and Arthur S. Holder

Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Henry A. Regier

University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

¹ The views expressed herein are those of the authors and are not to be construed as those of the Government of Ontario.

FISH PROBLEMS, OVER A CENTURY AGO

A highly perceptive and literate Irish immigrant, John W. Kerr, was fisheries inspector in the Toronto region for the period 1864 to 1888. Carbon copies of his extensive correspondence have been preserved. Some notes typical of his concerns follow.

December 28, 1864: A five-pound lake trout seized from poachers; local fishermen have shown a willingness to pay an annual fishing license of $10.

October 9, 1865: Report that during the previous spawning season two men speared 100 salmon in a night's fishing; several of the fish weighed 28 and 30 pounds, and none less than 20 pounds.

March 23, 1866: Recommendation that Burlington Bay and Dundas Marsh be “set apart for the natural propagation of fish” except for angling.

February 16, 1867: The fishway constructed to allow fish to pass over the Dunnville Dam on the Grand River does not meet the requirements of the relevant Act.

July 24, 1867: Bass spawn in the Niagara River on the U.S. side; Canadian fishermen set nets in that area, thus disrupting the hook and line fishing; complaints from an American military officer.

April 17, 1871: A member of the Legislative Assembly who owned an oil refinery was prosecuted for allowing chemical substances and poisonous matter to enter Burlington Bay; as much as 360 gallons of vitriol and other chemicals used weekly; pike and bass tasted of coal oil and could not be eaten.

October 20, 1871: A contractor dredged out the harbour at Rondeau and dumped the dredge spoils into a fishing lot; the fisherman was obliged to move up the lake.

October 24, 1872: The St. Catharines Game Club want to stock some local streams and in return for the expense want to have sole right to fish them.

July 23, 1872: Wastes from a glue factory are flowing into Dundas Creek.

August 2, 1872: A sawmill owner in Erin village was prosecuted for persisting to pollute the Credit River with sawdust.

Those ten incidents are typical of thousands of similar incidents that stretch in an unbroken chain into 1979. Small local victories by fishery managers were over-ridden sooner or later by larger defeats. A fully comprehensive and effective policy with respect to Ontario's fish and their habitats has yet to be created. A strong start with respect to the fish part of this combination (Loftus et al. 1978) was formally endorsed by the Ontario government in 1979 and it is gradually coming into effect.

FOUR IDEALISTIC PRINCIPLES

The basic tradition in North America on the use of fish as well as of their aquatic habitats derives from four ideals:

1. the fish and their aquatic habitats are resources to be held or owned in common by all citizens;

2. access to them is to be open or available to all residents;

3. use of them is to be free of royalty or rent; and

4. any limitation of one or more of the above principles is to be permitted only when all current users of a local resource willingly consent to the specific limitation.

It has long been recognized that these principles, in pure form, are in practice incompatible with a societal goal that fishery resources should be maintained in a productive state in perpetuity. But governmental intervention to limit the breadth or depth of these principles was usually resisted by at least one group of users. The discomfort of politicians with fully effective intervention tended to insure that any corrective measures were unsystematic in nature, minor in scope, piecemeal, with internal inconsistencies, influenced strongly by short-term local political considerations, unfair to some vested interest groups, and seldom effective for long. The whole process resulted—here and there, now and then—in lively local politics, degraded fishery resources, debased aquatic habitats, impoverished commercial fishermen, disappointed and frustrated anglers, depressed tourist industry, ulcerated fishery managers, and a confused public.

THE NATURE OF GOVERNMENTAL INTERVENTIONS IN THE PAST

Governments have tried to cope by applying ad hoc constraints on one or more of the basic ideals or principles stated earlier—common property, open access, free use, and regulation only following willing consent.

The common property principle has been modified, in practice if not in theory, with respect to native peoples' reservations, some waters wholly surrounded by private property, and privately constructed ponds.

Access to a particular fish stocks has often been limited to certain periods of the year, or to particular sub-components of a stock such as those over a minimum size limit, or to certain parts of a species' habitat, etc. Occasionally fish sanctuaries have been established for local conservation purposes, or right of access was preempted through some other use, such as an artillery range. Access by commercial fishermen to certain fishing grounds may be limited by licences for which the fee may cover only the administrative costs involved in processing the application.

In most jurisdictions of North America anglers must purchase licences. Economic or resource rent is seldom recovered by the licence fees charged, since they are too inexpensive to achieve that purpose. Instead the fees may cover some part of society's cost in managing the angler fishery and the resource. Thus the resource rent foregone with such an angling fishery is similar to a loss leader in retail marketing—inexpensive angler licenses lure tourists into the hinterland where their expenditures on supplies and services contribute to the welfare of such communities. Few, if any, North American juris-dictions collect full resource rent for these common property resources, except perhaps with respect to occasional high fees for non-resident or foreign anglers.

The fourth principle—willing consent—usually modified, capriciously, in the course of the local political process by which individual conflicts are often addressed. More organized methods of involving at least some of the affected vested interest groups plus the public that owns the resource are gradually evolving.

The preceding paragraphs contain the briefest of sketches of how the four basic principles have been constrained in practice with respect to the direct users of fishery resources. A similar kind of analysis could be sketched with respect to the degradative uses of the aquatic environment (see below) within which the fishery resources are expected to yield annual crops, in perpetuity. The ways in which one or more of the four principles have been constrained with respect to environmental quality have until recently been ad hoc, piecemeal, and in general ineffectual—especially in Ontario.

The following analysis seeks to expose in more detail why fish and their aquatic habitats as resources have so long remained politically intractable.

VESTED INTEREST GROUPS

Some groups that enjoy vested interests in the use of fish resources or aquatic habitat resources have already been mentioned. How can a group enjoy a vested interest in a common property resource? It appears to be a self-contradiction. Though a group may have no special ultimate right to fish and/or aquatic habitat resources beyond that of any other resident of the community or society, through special permission or long use a group may in fact come to exercise power almost as though it had full legal rights to the resource. Certain difficulties arise from the manner in which those de facto rights are abrogated, as explained below.

Native peoples, before the arrival of Europeans, caught and used fish as food for themselves and their dogs. This is still the case today with native people who live in regions remote from our cities. The fish harvests are important in such subsistence economies.

Market or commercial fishermen harvest valued species for the food trade, in Ontario often for the luxury food and restaurant trade. Lower-valued fish are incorporated into pet food, and “trash fish” into fish meal if they can be caught inexpensively in very large quantities. Catching live minnows and marketing them to anglers contributes to the income of hundreds of Ontario entrepreneurs.

Anglers fish for sport and recreation, and do in fact often eat the fish they catch.

Some anglers fish competitively with each other, and a few professional anglers enjoy sizeable winnings in fishing competitions, especially in the USA. They then exploit their fame to endorse particular commercial products and may earn large fees for such endorsements. These professional anglers and the related commercialized sporting events are unpopular with many of the more relaxed or naturalistic recreational anglers.

Each of the four groups sketched above—i.e., subsistence, commercial food, recreational sport and commercial sport—exhibit strong internal tensions between numerous subgroups, though those within a particular group may manage to band together on occasion to engage in combat with a worse enemy, such as one of the other groups.

These groups of fishermen all exploit a fish resource directly. There are many other groups, also with vested interests, that exploit the aquatic systems, almost always to the detriment of the fish and to the fishermen of whatever kind. The indirect abusers of the fish resources include those who withdraw water for irrigation, urban, industrial, electrical generating or other purposes and in so doing sometimes dewater the habitat or entrain and kill countless millions of small fish. Other groups unload human, agricultural, industrial and thermal wastes into aquatic systems causing eutrophication, poisoning, contamination, etc. Arranging for ship and barge transport involves digging canals, dredging channels, constructing harbors and in other ways destroying fish habitat—particularly of the most valued species. Canals that link water bodies that were once isolated from each other provide entry for pests, as with the sea lamprey and alewife into the Great Lakes. Boating accidents lead to spills of oil and toxic materials, and foul nearshore areas of critical ecological importance. Recreational boating with its associated construction of countless docks and slips provides habitat for low valued species, perhaps to the detriment of the more highly valued sport fish species. Stone, gravel and sand are removed from inshore and reef areas, thus obliterating the spawning reefs. Oil and gas wells are drilled in the bottom of lakes with the occasional blowout. Pesticides used in agriculture or deliberately dumped by unethical or ignorant industrialists find their way into water and into fish; the latter are rendered worthless because of fears that human health would suffer if they were eaten. The list can be continued, see Table 1.

Each of the 18 stresses of Table 1 is related to a corresponding group of users. Members of each group have vested interests in continuing to do whatever they normally have done with respect to the aquatic ecosystems. Almost all of these groups—perhaps all—have impacts on aquatic ecosystems that are on balance deleterious to fishery interests. On reflection one can suggest ways in which a particular group might use an ecosystem without negative effects on balance, but we refer here to what has until now been the case. Thus, in effect, North American international society as on balance allocated some fraction of the total potential fishery resource of, say, Lake Erie to each of these 18 groups. In this way allocation of fishery resources may be seen as involving many more groups of vested interests than only the various groups of fishermen.

Imagine what would happen if users from each of the major vested interest groups were to converge all in the same year on a particular virgin lake in order to initiate 18 different major uses. Then complicate the issue by having several identifiable sub-groups within each major group, all operating competitively. The ecological, economic and social effects would be disastrous and would be so perceived very soon.

The total impact would be more than the arithmetic sum of the separate impacts. The consequences of different uses of fish and their aquatic habitats usually interact strongly to the detriment of both the quality of fish and the quality of the aquatic environment. Thus the total impact would be more like the multiplicative product of the separate impacts. This presupposes that all the users would act as they have usually acted in the past—in an ecologically uninformed way.

Rather than all converging on a lake in the same year the list of users has usually grown gradually decade by decade over the last two or three centuries. In such situations only the perceptive and concerned old-timers or historical ecologists have much of a sense of the cumulative impact of the growing number of stress factors. The relevant scholarly and scientific studies have not yet been infused into the public education system.

Table 1. List of human stresses on the Great Lakes ecosystem.

With many of the larger lakes there has been a rather stereotyped sequence in the different groups' entrances and exits on a lake. Very generally, the first uses tend to have relatively little detrimental impact on the overall aquatic systems. Gradually these are displaced by progressively more disruptive uses, ending with those that degrade an aquatic system into an ecological slum (like Toronto Harbor and parts of Burlington Bay). There is a social dimension to this sequence of uses that is grossly unjust and that has never yet been resolved effectively in Ontario, nor elsewhere in Canada.

Before we elaborate the use of sequence and related injustices, consider a particular aspect of the inference that different impacts usually do not compensate for each other ecologically, and in fact are more than additive, that is they tend to interact multiplicatively. This means that a new particular use, when added to an existing use, will usually act to intensify the ecological impacts of the prior uses as well as contribute some new deleterious features of its own.

SOCIAL DISLOCATIONS WITH DOMINO EFFECT

Consider the following sequence that reflects quite realistically the historic events in Toronto Harbor, Burlington Bay, Bay of Quinte, St. Clair River, the Ottawa River below Ottawa, and smaller waters used to important ends by numerous groups.

Three centuries ago native people used fish and clams at rather low levels of harvesting intensity. Their other influences on aquatic systems were usually negligible—what serious harm could a canoe or a soapless bath do to an aquatic ecosystem?

With European invasion and settlement, the pioneers sooner or later relegated the native peoples to rather small reservations except in areas remote from cities. The individual pioneers caught and used fish when readily available. They built hundreds of dams.

When sizeable settlements appears, a role for specialized market or commercial fishermen appeared. These eventually displaced the individual riparian pioneer, for example, by intercepting and harvesting the most accessible migrating fish before they got to the individual settler's stream or inshore fishing grounds.

Near these settlements the recreational anglers from among the townsfolk then displaced the commercial fishermen, at least from the nearshore fish species that came to be valued as sport. In southern Ontario this process began towards the end of the last century.

Increased use of the waters next to the growing settlements for waste disposal degraded those habitats for valued fish, especially for the nearshore sport fish. The reduced stocks of sport fish or their foul taste due to waste contamination or the repulsiveness of the polluted habitat discouraged the more discriminating anglers, who then travelled farther afield where they in turn displaced the subsistence and/or commercial fishermen of that locale. Some of the latter moved even further afield to compete with the more distant settlers or native peoples to the detriment of the latter. With toxic industrial waste loading from urban areas, extensive harbor construction, breakwaters and shore works of great length, etc., large areas of habitat for valued sport or commercial fish species were virtually destroyed. Even the last anglers, with the least sensitivity toward the debased qualities of the environment or unwholesomeness of the fish flesh, may then give up and go farther afield. Broadly similar historical accounts apply to the suites of uses and user groups for each of the other types of renewable resources—forestry, wildlife, parks recreation, and, to some extent, even agriculture. They differ in many details, but all have contributed to a generalized process that resembles the one sketched above for fish.

The outcome in Ontario, by 1980, of these repetitive domino-like processes was that the least destructive user group—the native peoples—are largely relegated to reservations and areas remote from commercial or industrial settlements. Families of commercial fishermen, that were displaced by angling and pollution interests, were sometimes bankrupted or were forced to move to more remote waters in advance of the angling and pollution waves. Until recently the urban anglers, displaced by deleterious consequences of industrial urbanization, seldom acted to remedy the industrial or commercial abuses but instead moved on and forced out commercial fishermen from the waters for which they had developed vested interests. Sometimes this took anglers further offshore in which case they had to buy much more expensive boats and fishing gear. Commercial interests may then intervene to commercialize the sport, perhaps to the disadvantage the non-commercial anglers who used to fish these waters.

Meanwhile, urban-oriented environmental activists sought to reform the degradative abuses typical of industrial and commercial settlements. They got little help from either the anglers or commercial fishermen who had also suffered directly or indirectly from those abuses.

In summary, the sequence of users of Toronto-area aquatic resources, over the last eight generations, has on balance been from those that had relatively little impact to those that were highly destructive. Occasionally there have been temporary reversals—as when conservation-minded anglers displaced highly exploitive commercial fisheries, which occurred in some waters.

About every second generation, on average, a group that had established some vested interest in the resource system was unceremoniously displaced by a new group. There was injustice in that the displaced groups seldom received any compensation for the losses incurred as a result of this displacement.

Some of the displacement would have been unnecessary had there been in place more effective ways of regulating the demands of at least some of the different user groups on the same systems. The social injustice and economic inefficiency of such a laissez faire approach to the aquatic environment and fishery resources is now unconscionable.

This is not to imply that any group of users had developed effective ways of managing its own separate demands and impacts on the relevant components of the aquatic ecosystems. Far from it. Nevertheless, it remains a fact that groups with some ecological sensitivity—native peoples, settlers, commercial fishermen, anglers—have suffered reductions in fish resources from the actions of those with little ecological sensitivity: disposers of sewage, waterborne transport, industrialists, developers and even some owners of recreational hotels in the hinterland.

Until two or three decades ago Ontario's total fishery resources were large compared to total demand. After all, Ontario has over 200 000 lakes and uncounted thousands of kilometers of fishable streams. Now the demands surpass current supplies in all of the more accessible parts of the province and country. Intense conflicts have arisen that can no longer be settled at the local level by the methods of local politics. Also some continental stresses, such as acid rain, are destroying fish stocks thousands of kilometers from the origin of the acidic smoke. It follows that much more comprehensive and robust policies are required at the provincial, national and international levels.

Some important roles remain for local politicians, such as the allocation of the production of local stocks among different groups of fishery resource users, and also the zoning of lands and waters for particular uses. But we can safely predict that a much more orderly political approach to these issues will emerge in the 1980s right across the North American continent. In some important respects Ontario is already involved in this reform process.

THE STRATEGIC PLAN FOR ONTARIO FISHERIES

In Canada the Strategic Plan for Ontario Fisheries, SPOF, is the first thoughtful, deliberate attempt to specify an efficient, equitable and workable action plan that would not violate the intent of the basic four principles. SPOF was developed cooperatively by fishery experts of provincial and federal agencies, with some university involvement. SPOF focuses mainly on the direct users of the fishery resources—primarily the responsibility of the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources—but it also emphasizes the need for fishery considerations in water quality management decisions. No comparable plan has yet been developed for the aquatic habitat and its vested interest user groups; such a plan would come under the responsibility of the Ontario Ministry of the Environment. Such an initiative is now overdue.

In the context of the preceding sections, SPOF involves abrogating or rescinding most of the de facto allocations to the 18 groups identified in Table 1. Where at all possible each use pattern is to be modified or stopped so that it will have no deleterious effect, on balance, on the fishery resource nor on other ecologically sensitive uses of these aquatic ecosystems. In some cases this is practically impossible—who could turn parts of the Toronto Harbor back into a wild marsh? In such cases it may be possible to substitute a new comparable natural resource for one that was destroyed, or to enhance some desirable feature already present. Almost always it will be possible to mitigate specific deleterious practices and to undertake rehabilitative measures (Loftus 1976; Francis et al. 1979). It might even be possible, here and there, to restore a particularly valuable degraded ecosystem into a close approximation of its wild state.

Though the broader sweep of SPOF involves a wide-ranging reallocation of the de facto rights of direct and indirect users of the fishery resources of Ontario, the plan itself quickly focuses on a smaller sub-set of these issues.

STRATEGIC PLAN PRINCIPLES RELEVANT TO ALLOCATION

Some of the concepts or principles developed in the approved fishery management strategy are particularly relevant to the development of a rationale for allocation:

1. The fisheries resources of Ontario are continuing to deteriorate mainly because:

   1. the residents of the province are not aware of the deteriorated state of much of the resource;

   2. managers, in most cases, do not have the kind of information required to manage; the science on which management is based is underdeveloped;

   3. over-lapping jurisdictions among government agencies and too little coordination and cooperation has retarded management progress.

2. Access to the fishery resource is too nearly free and open and must be replaced by a system which recovers some rent and limits access at levels required for resource maintenance.

3. The new approach to fishery management in Ontario must be characterized generally by maintenance of fish resources in the north and rehabilitation in the south.

4. Resource maintenance, the protection of the self-renewing production of the fishery resource, must have priority over direct allocation to fish harvesting and “indirect allocation” on environmental users that involve habitat degradation. Without the resource there can be no allocation to fishermen of whatever group.

5. The public and fishery administrators must reach general agreement on a stated value system (i.e., the norms and goals) for fishery management.

6. Future fishery management must be broader and more comprehensive, including increased attention to all the benefits provided by the resource and the dependence of fishery resources on environmental quality.

7. Fishery resources are held in trust for all residents of Ontario by the Crown in right of Ontario.

8. After consideration of resource maintenance, fisheries are to be managed according to stated public priorities to produce long-term optimum sustained benefits, usually, but not always, involving multiple uses.

9. Allocation of portions of the resource base for recognized benefits must be made explicit, and “individual allocation” to users that degrade the environment must be explicitly limited.

The foregoing concepts form the basis for an allocation rationale and procedure which can be used on a local level for allocation decsions or recommendations. Two additional principles are also relevant:

1. Present jobs should not be sacrificed as a result of shifts in allocation unless they are replaced by jobs in other sectors of the industry.

   This is an important concept and assures retention of viability in local economies. However, this principle should not be applied if maintenanced of jobs in the short run threatens the long-term productivity of the fishery resource.

2. Using all available knowledge and data, make allocation decisions and recommendations rather than defer them. Deferment of a decision on the grounds of inadequate data means that the existing problem will intensify at the expense of the resource base.

A PROPOSED ALLOCATION RATIONALE

There are three general priorities which must be considered in the explicit allocation of the fishery resources of Ontario. The first is to maintain and/or rehabilitate (in the case of degraded communities) the fishery resource on behalf of all the residents. The second is to allocate fish in accordance with the stated fishing rights of Treaty Indians. The third priority is to allocate the remaining resource to the benefit of other residents of Ontario based upon an assessment of optimum sustained benefits (multiple uses over long time periods). These are elaborated further below.

Placing resource maintenance as a first priority is based on the principle recognizing that the resource is held in trust for residents of the Province by the Crown in right of Ontario (with a few possible exceptions, e.g., federal lands). Thus the first responsibility of fishery managers is to ensure that the resource is maintained over time for present and future residents. The amount of this maintenance allocation, which may require consideration of spawning stock size and habitat needs among other factors, would be considered along with allocations for harvest or consumptive use. In cases where rehabilitation is required, the allocation for maintenance will be larger in the short term until rehabilitation is achieved, an objective which may take years, perhaps decades, to accomplish for badly degraded fisheries. This maintenance share of fish is also available for non-consumptive users who do not participate in the harvest of fish, although some conflicts may exist and all non-consumptive users may not be satisfied.

Part of this maintenance share in a local area, may be set aside for research and management activities necessary for understanding and perpetuating the fishery resource. Although these activities may involve experimental removals and thus be “consumptive” and not immediately applicable to annual fish stock maintenance or rehabilitation, the consumptive impact will be closely controlled and these projects will generate more knowledge about the perpetuation of the resource.

After ensuring the perpetuation of the fishery resource, the second priority is to make available fish and fishing opportunities according to the needs of Ontario residents. These needs can be assessed by determining (1) the stated rights, if any, of some Treaty Indians requiring an explicit allocation, and (2) the optimum benefits which can be allocated after satisfying resource maintenance needs.

Certain native people have rights by virtue of Indian Treaties and/or residence on Indian Reserves which are held by the Crown in the right of Canada in trust for Indian residents. These rights must be recognized and appropriate allocations made.

The potential conflict between Treaty rights and the need to rehabilitate and protect the resource base does not seem to be an intractable issue. Indian treaties (and culture) characteristically emphasize access to undiminished resources. A spirit of cooperation should be nurtured through education and negotiation to ensure that the resource base is maintained. Should negotiation fail the Fisheries Act provides a mechanism to enforce the primacy of resource maintenance. It is expected that all legitimate needs of native people can and will be fulfilled in this Province.

Beyond the necessity to maintain a sustained supply of benefits from the fish community and a legal requirement to provide fish for native people with Treaty rights, a manager must be able to make fair and rational allocations of fish to the other user groups.

By far the major consideration in allocating harvestable surplus will be assessment of (1) the available supply of fish, fishing opportunities and benefits; and (2) the needs and wants of users and user groups and the associated costs of satisfying their demands. Costs include those additional to fishery management and include providing access (roads) and creating services (water, hydro, waste disposal, etc.) to accommodate their stay. The methodology for determining all cost and benefits of fishing is not well developed. In simple terms, a judgment must be made on how many benefits, of what kind, in what mix, can be provided over the long term: i.e., optimum sustained benefits. The term “optimum” has been deliberately chosen to stress that several kinds of benefits are desirable as a matter of principle. The term “sustained” is used in recognition of the responsibility to future citizens and the self-renewing nature of the resource. “Benefits” rather than “yield” was chosen to acknowledge that much more than numbers or weight of fish is provided to Ontario residents from the fishery resource.

The largest portion of the allocation will be made to certain user groups—subsistence and/or traditional users; resident sport fishermen; business enterprises—within the public-at-large. The rationale which separates these groups from one another and assigns priorities is summarized in Table 2. Of these user groups, people with substinence and/or traditional needs must be considered a high priority. Dependence on fish as food or a source of income may create unique allocation problems in certain locales. It is expected that very few people will actually qualify for inclusion in this group and most of these will live in remote areas. For instance, an individual or family living in a remote area and having no alternate food supply will merit special consideration, especially if their harvest impact can be regulated and competition with other users is minimal or non-existent. Similarly, a commercial fisherman, whose ancestors have been established in the business for years, and who cannot readily be relocated, retrained, or gainfully employed in another endeavour may fit in this category. A major criterion for determining whether an individual or group qualifies for inclusion in this category is whether the benefits gained individually far outweigh the collective public need for reimbursement in the form of compensating benefits; in other words, do they qualify for an allocation on humanitarian grounds? Normally these people will not be competing for a scarce resource with other groups for income and employment-related benefits.

Table 2. Benefits, benefit groups and units of measurement that can be used in making allocation decisions.

Resident sport fishermen are the largest group who collectively exert a consumptive impact on the fishery resource. They also benefit local economies by creating a flow of dollars from urban to rural areas. A large proportion of the residents of the province angle (approximately 38%) and a large unfulfilled demand exists for more fishing opportunities. Numerous and significant benefits accrue from their use of the resource: recreation, food and patronage of service industries (employment and income). Since the resource is held in trust for the people of the Province by the Crown in right of Ontario, it follows that resident fishermen are important clients and must be designated as a high priority user group. The benefits they enjoy from fishing and those which result from their activities are extremely important to all of the people of the province.

Business enterprises actually harvesting fish (the commercial fishery) or business which supply goods and services to the anglers (outfitters, guides, tourist operators) contribute fewer overall benefits to the people of Ontario (owners of the resources) than do the sport fishermen. Contributions to the resource owners tend to be those indirectly associated with export dollars from sale of fish as food and as a basis for tourism, and, of course, direct employment opportunities.

It should also be pointed out, however, that significant proportions of our fish stocks in the Great Lakes, for instance, are not readily accessible to anglers, and that many fish species are not sought by sport fishermen. These stocks can and should be used for commercial purposes. Commercial fishing will likely continue to fill a viable role in many parts of the province. In many cases, conflicts between sport and commercial fishermen need not occur if users are kept separated temporally and spatially. In most cases conflicts are more a matter of perception than of reality, and improved understanding should reduce such conflicts.

In allocation decisions, only benefits accruing to the people of Ontario are considered. Nonresidents of Ontario do not have inherent rights to fish in Ontario and may be allowed to so only when (1) their use of the portion of the resource allocated to them produces greater benefits than would accrue from any other use, or (2) there is resource available which is surplus to the needs of all residents. This principle will have important consequences in allocation decisions with respect to non-residents, tourist camp operators and fishermen, should competition or conflict occur with residents.

Entrepreneurs engaged in tourist and commercial fishing businesses require the commitment of fish allocations for meaningful periods of time because they must make major capital investments that cannot be altered or returned on short notice. For these, an allocation procedure may be adopted which commits a secure resource base on which to operate for an appropriate number of years.

It is difficult to rank the relative value of one type of business enterprise against another on a general basis, therefore, they are grouped into one category. Managers will often encounter serious information gaps in the data required to evaluate the relative values of these business types, particularly on the basis of economic impact. Ontario fishery managers have not yet developed the techniques to calculate the real economic worth of fishing-related enterprises and relate these values to public benefits. This problem underscores the need for comprehensive, broad-based, trend-through-time data to begin with, followed by a concerted effort to develop a better understanding of the economic value of Ontario fisheries.

On the basis of the foregoing rationale, an allocation ranking was devised which can be used in most instances to apportion the fish resources. It should not be used by itself as a formula, but instead, as a guide, especially when a shortage of data on a particular lake or water area precludes a more rational ranking approach. Where optimum harvest levels, user needs and wants, and benefits can be measured, the best approach is to follow the methodology outlined in the allocation procedure below.

The general priority ranking (1–5) of allocations is:

1. All residents, including future generations, through maintenance and/or rehabilitation of the resource.

2. Native people with treaty fishing rights.

3. People with subsistence and/or traditional needs.

4. Resident sport fishermen.

5. Business enterprises—priority between commercial fishing or sport fishing industries including those that cater to tourists to be decided on the basis of optimum benefit to the residents of Ontario.

Although at first glance, assessment of supply and demand may seem an impossible task, experience suggests that such an approach is feasible, even now, if used realistically by experienced local managers. In many areas even a simple assessment of resource status and the demands of users, with reference to the principles and recognized benefits stated in this policy, will allow sound decisions to be made.

IN CONCLUSION

Ontario's fishery researchers and managers are now implementing the new Strategic Plan for Ontario Fisheries. This involves more explicit allocation of the available resource among different user groups. In many ways the details of allocation protocols will be unique to Ontario. This uniqueness will be due in some instances—but, we fervently hope, in not many instances—to local and provincial political decisions entirely beyond the control of professional civil servants. Except for such anamolous occasions, the principles and rationale sketched above should severely limit the number of arbitrary and capricious decisions by regional officials with the responsibility to manage the fisheries.

LITERATURE CITED

Francis, G.R., J.J. Magnuson, H.A. Regier and D.R. Talhelm. 1979 Rehabilitating Great Lakes ecosystem. Great Lakes Fishery Comm. Tech. Rep. In press.

Holder, A.S., et al. 1978 An allocation policy for Ontario fisheries. Report of SPOF Working Group #5, Min. of Natural Resources, Toronto.

Kerr, J.W., and F.W. Kerr. 1860–1898 Their manuscripts as the regional fishing inspectors. Toronto, Royal Ontario Museum. 18 vols., longhand.

Loftus, K.H. 1976 Science for Canada's fisheries rehabilitation needs. J. Fish. Res. Board Can., 33:1822–1857.

Loftus, K.H., M.G. Johnson and H.A. Regier. 1978 Federal-Provincial strategic planning for Ontario fisheries: management strategy for the 1980s. J. Fish. Res. Board Can., 35:916–927.

A METHOD FOR THE ASSESSMENT OF DEMAND FOR RECREATIONAL FISHING IN THE SOUTH WALES AREA OF THE U.K.

G. W. Mawle and P. F. Randerson

Department of Applied Biology, University of Wales Institute of Science and Technology, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff CF1 3NU, Wales, U.K.

ABSTRACT

This paper discusses the adaptation of a model developed in the U.S. by Talhelm to the estimation of the demand for recreational fishing in S. Wales. The model seeks to classify angling sites in the region into categories of recreational use (products) and to determine the relationship between the level of angler use and the costs to the angler of participation in each product. Predictions may then be made of changes in demand after simulated changes in product availability. The problems involved in adapting the model to the S. Wales situation, which differs both qualitatively and quantitatively from the U.S., in the costs of angling, are discussed. The relative merits of sampling by postal questionnaire and by personal interview are discussed with reference to their respective biases, and to the sample size achieved with given resources. The chosen strategy of sampling for the present survey in S. Wales is outlined, and some preliminary results are presented to highlight methodological problems.

RÉSUMÉ

Nous presentons l'adaptation d'un modèle développé aux États Unis per Talhelm à l'évaluation de la demande pour la pêche de loisir dans le sud du Pays de Galles. Le but du modèle est de classer les sites de pêche à la ligne de la région en catégories d'utilisation de loisir (produits) et de determiner le rapport entre le niveau d'exploitation par le pêcheur et le coût de participation du pêcheur pour chaque produit. Il est alors possible de prévoir les changements de la demande en fonction de changements simulés de la disponibilité des produits. Les problèmes relatifs à l'adaptation du modèle aux conditions spécifiques du sud du Pays de Galles sont exposés. Les avantages respectifs de l'échantillonnage par l'envoi par la poste de questionaires ou par interviews personnelles sont commentés en reférence à leurs biais respectifs et à la grandeur de l'échantillonnage atteint avec les ressources données. Nous présentons les grandes lignes de la stratégie choisie pour l'échantillonnage utilisé dans la présente étude ainsi que quelques résultats préliminaires afin de mettre eu évidence les problèmes dûs à la méthode.

INTRODUCTION

The statutory duties of the Water Authorities in the U.K. include the maintenance, development and improvement of fisheries and the provision of facilities for water-based recreation (Water Act 1973). The need for the economic evaluation of recreational fisheries in Europe is now recognised (Norling 1968; Alabaster 1978), such evaluation being required if management bodies are to have a rational basis for the allocation of resources to the recreational field.

Evaluation should consider the regional effects, on angling demand and benefits, of changes in the character of sites so that provision, based on angler behaviour, may be made within given cost constraints. A method of analysis developed in the U.S. by Talhelm (1978) employs such an approach and this paper describes some of the problems involved in the application of this method to a current study of the recreational fisheries of the mainly industrialized and heavily populated area of South Wales in the U.K.

The study area (Fig. 1) comprises the Usk and Glamorgan River Divisions of the Welsh Water Authority (W.W.A.) and offers a wide range of fisheries. The River Usk has high quality salmon (Salmo salar) and brown trout (Salmo trutta) fishing, whilst the heavily polluted rivers of the coalfield (e.g. the River Taff) maintain impoverished natural fish populations but do have some ‘put and take’ trout fisheries. Still-water fisheries include coarse fishing lakes (e.g., sites 1, 2, 3 in Fig. 1) containing several species such as tench (Tinca tinca), roach (Rutilus rutilus) and pike (Esox lucius), and also water supply reservoirs (e.g. sites 4, 5, 6) managed as brown trout and rainbow trout (Salmo gairdneri) fisheries.

Fig. 1. The study area

THE TALHELM ANALYSIS

This consists of four basic steps:

1. Classification of recreational fishing sites into angling products.

2. Analysis of the supply of each product.

3. Estimation of demand for each product.

4. Construction and use of a simulation model.

For a full discussion, the reader is referred to Talhelm (1978) but the steps of the analysis are outlined below.

Classification of Recreational Fishing Sites

Although individual sites are unique in their recreational characteristics, they may be classified into different products and within each product group be regarded as perfect substitutes. The assignment of sites to product groups is made by observation of the costs incurred in angling visits, on the assumption that anglers will typically visit the least expensive fishery in a product group.

Analysis of Supply

The supply of each angling product to a particular user is defined as the minimum price at which that product is available, i.e., the total cost of angling at the site offering that product most cheaply. Angling differs from most markets in that the angler is both supplier and consumer and it is assumed that the price, at which the product is available to any individual angler, is constant regardless of the number of visits made, i.e., supply is perfectly elastic for any individual but varies between individuals depending principally on their location of residence.

A supply ‘schedule’ is constructed, consisting of the minimum prices at which different products are available to users from each population origin zone within the study area.

Estimation of Demand

A demand equation is constructed for each product from a schedule of angler use at varying prices of both the product in demand and its substitutes, and at varying levels of population and other socio-economic variables.

The demand relationship typically shows a decline in the observed per capita use of a product with increasing cost, the slope indicating the intensity of demand.

Construction and Use of a Simulation Model

The simulation model incorporates an inventory of products available at each site, the supply price of each product for each origin zone, the demand equations, and present and projected data on socio-economic variables.

Changes in the levels of participation and user benefits at given sites may be predicted when alterations are made in:

1. the supply price of one or more of the products or substitute products external to the study area, e.g., by changing the product available at a particular site.

2. those socio-economic variables which are included in the demand equations.

ADAPTATION OF THE TALHELM ANALYSIS TO SOUTH WALES

The method outlined above has been used in a variety of recreational assessments in the U.S. (Talhelm 1972, 1973, 1976a,b). However, an important difference exists between the U.S. and the U.K. in the supply of angling.

Talhelm (1976b) calculated the supply schedule for angling in Michigan's inland lakes using one equation of the form:

The supply of any particular product for each origin zone was therefore calculated as a function of the minimum travel time required to reach the nearest site at which that product was available.

In South Wales, there are considerable differences among the prices of various types of angling, e.g., salmon angling is usually more expensive than trout angling, travel time being equal. Therefore, if the supply schedule is to be calculated by the Talhelm method, separate equations of the form of equation (1) should be used for different products.

Furthermore, a fishery-specific permit fee is charged to anglers at virtually every site in South Wales, in contrast to Michigan's fisheries (Talhelm 1976b). This permit fee will vary among fisheries within a product category and hence the supply price of a particular product, for a particular origin zone, cannot be calculated solely as a function of the minimum travel time required to reach the nearest site offering that product, i.e., the nearest site will not necessarily be the cheapest.

Reduced permit fees are often charged to certain user categories, e.g., old age pensioners and juveniles. This may necessitate the separate construction of supply schedules and estimation of demand for these groups.

A further complication is the availability of more than one product at one site, as permit fees may vary with the fish species sought.

A COMPARISON OF TWO POSSIBLE APPROACHES TO SAMPLING

Two possible approaches to the collection of the data required for the analysis are outlined and their advantages and disadvantages discussed in relation to the present study.

Data Required for Analysis

1. An inventory of sites and site attributes.

2. The levels of use by anglers from different origin zones, for sites in each of the final product categories.

3. The costs per visit (e.g., travel, permits, rod licences, tackle, bait and line) for users from each origin zone for sites in each of the final product categories.

4. An inventory of sites of ‘substitute’ products, e.g., freshwater angling sites outside the area or sea angling sites.

5. Costs per visit for ‘substitutes’, for users from each origin zone.

6. An inventory of population, aggregated on a 2-dimensional basis.

7. Socio-economic variables associated with each origin zone, e.g., income, age of users, leisure time.

These items will be assessed for three time ‘blocks’ within the year during which different products are offered:

March-June: game (i.e., salmon and trout) fishing products

June-October: game and coarse fishing products October-March: coarse fishing products.

Approach (1)

This approach was used by Talhelm (1976b) in a study of angling and boating at inland lakes in Michigan.

Sites are selected for on-site sampling of users' current visits. Selection requires an a priori classification of sites if all products and substitute products are to be adequately sampled, therefore an inventory of sites (including substitutes) and their relevant attributes are required prior to sampling. The population sampled consists of the visits made to each selected site during a particular time ‘block’.

Estimates of levels of use for each origin zone/site combination are obtained from visual head counts, made at appropriate times, and from questionnaires left in users' car windows or presented by personal interview. For each time ‘block’ the use estimates are calculated using the equation:

The data required on users' costs and socio-economic characteristics are obtained from the questionnaires. The selection of visits for sampling by questionnaire should be random, but to avoid antagonising respondents each user has only one visit selected.

Approach (2)

This approach is based upon the users rather than upon the sites and assumes that a complete list of current users' names and addresses is available. The population sampled differs from Approach (1) and consists of all angling visits made by users during a time ‘block’.

Visits are sampled by questionnaires sent to the homes of users selected at random and information on the most recent visit made is requested. Ideally, each user should be asked for information on several visits, in proportion to the total number he makes during each time ‘block,’ but the complexity of the questionnaire, recall of information and antagonism by users are against this. It is assumed that the randomly selected sample of users' last visits is equivalent to a random sample of all visits.

Questionnaires are sent out on a regular basis, both over a time ‘block’ and over the week, to avoid bias in the distribution of last visits.

Use estimates for each origin zone/site combination are calculated from:

An inventory of sites (including ‘substitutes’) and data on users' costs and socio-economic variables are obtained from the questionnaires. Users are selected to receive a questionnaire only once.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Approach (1)

Advantages

1. A high response rate is usually obtained when using personal interviews. Pickles (1977) achieved a 98% response rate using this method of sampling in a study of South Wales anglers.

2. With personal interviews, misinterpretation of questions is unlikely.

3. On-site sampling minimizes the problems of memory recall.

Disadvantages

1. Personal interview sampling is costly in time and money. In a survey of trout anglers on a popular urban reservoir in South Wales, an average of 40 min was spent on-site per interview (Mawle unpublished).

2. A list of sites (including substitutes) and their attributes are needed for the selection of sampling sites.

3. Due to the uneven temporal distribution of visits a considerable number of visual head counts would be required at each selected site. The problem of making use estimates by head counts is exacerbated by the inclusion of river fisheries.

4. The random sampling of visits, crucial in view of the regular habits of different categories of user, would be difficult to achieve with limited resources.

5. As only one of each user's visits is sampled, the data will be biased towards less frequent users.

6. If the technique of placing questionnaires in users' car windows is employed, non-response bias may occur.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Approach (2)

Advantages

1. The cost of sampling is relatively low and therefore a large number of visits can be sampled.

2. A list of sites (including substitutes) and their attributes is not required prior to sampling, the list being produced by the sampling method.

Disadvantages

1. Bias may be introduced if non-respondents differ significantly from respondents.

2. Lists of users will inevitably be retrospective and therefore inaccurate.

3. By using retrospective lists of users, extended periods of memory recall may introduce inaccuracies.

4. The questionnaire may be either misread or misinterpreted by respondents, although such problems can be minimised by careful questionnaire design.

5. By sampling only one visit of each user, the method is biased to visits by infrequent users.

6. Visits made towards the end of fishing seasons will have a higher probability of selection than visits at other times.

OUTLINE OF THE SAMPLING PROGRAM AND SOME RESULTS

The second approach has been adopted in the present study with attempts being made to identify and, where possible, assess and eliminate bias.

The sampling program consists of:

1. A pilot postal survey

2. The main postal survey

3. The assessment of user groups not included in the survey.

Pilot Survey

The objectives were:

1. Assessment of the likely return rate of questionnaires in the main survey to estimate the number of questionnaires required to achieve a certain sample size.

2. Testing of the questionnaire as regards respondents' attitudes to and comprehension of the questions.

3. Assessment of the proportion of sampled visits to sites in the study area, this proportion affecting the proposed sample size for the main survey.

Questionnaires were posted, with a reply-paid envelope and an explanatory sheet, in batches of 16 or 17/day from 12–17 March 1979 to 100 users selected at random from the W.W.A. 1978 rod licence counterfoils for the study area. Each user was requested to return the questionnaire, completed, within 1 week of questionnaire dispatch; a reminder, for unreturned questionnaires, was sent 10 days after dispatch.

With about 20 000 users, making an average of about 40 visits/yr (Shaw 1977), the total number of visits is around 800 000/year. At the time of the pilot survey it was estimated that 4 000 completed questionnaires could be processed, i.e., about 0,5% of all visits.

The return rate of completed questionnaires was 48% in the pilot survey indicating that about 9 000 questionnaires would be required for 4 000 usable replies. However, a bimodal distribution in the temporal pattern of questionnaire returns indicated the effectiveness of the reminder, and it was estimated that a second reminder would increase the return rate by about 10%, reducing bias and the required number to only 7 500 questionnaires, for a sample of 4 000 visits.

Of the visits sampled in the pilot survey, 75% were to freshwater sites within the study area, the remainder being to ‘substitute’ sites. With this division in the main survey, 3 000 questionnaires will be available for price and use estimates of fishing at sites within the study area and a further 1 000 for calculations relating to ‘substitutes.’

The distribution of the number of sampled visits per site is shown in Fig. 2 and a chi-squared test on the mean to variance ratio (Elliott 1977) indicates that this distribution is regular (P < 0,005), i.e., sampled visits will tend to be evenly distributed between the sites. With about 150 sites in the study area, some with more than one product, and three time ‘blocks,’ 3 000 responses will provide a mean of only about 10 responses/site. With the regular distribution suggested by the pilot survey, use estimates for each origin zone/site combination would be based on relatively few responses resulting in inaccuracies in the final model; consequently it was decided to seek additional resources and increase the sample size.

Fig. 2. The distribution of the number of sampled visits per site for sites within the study area.

Main Survey

The main postal survey was begun in May 1979 with questionnaires being sent to randomly-selected users over 6 consecutive working days in each month: Sundays are excluded as, in the U.K., post is neither collected nor delivered. A total of 625 questionnaires were sent out in May, but from June onwards the number was increased to 1 250 per month, when additional resources were made available. Sampling will continue until May 1980, when only 625 questionnaires will be dispatched to compensate for the number sent in May 1979.

A first reminder is sent to non-respondents after 9 working days and a second reminder, with a second copy of the questionnaire, after a further 9 days. Nine days was chosen to eliminate possible differences between the response rates for different posting days.

Returned questionnaires were classified as follows:

1. Questionnaire completed.

2. Questionnaire uncompleted, even though it reached the user.

3. Questionnaire uncompleted, never having reached the user.

Table 1. The number of questionnaires returned and the return rate for each category of return for each month from May-October and for the whole of this period.

The monthly return rates of completed questionnaires (Table 1) compare favorably with return rates obtained in some other postal surveys (Table 2), but are not sufficiently high to discount the possibility of bias due to non-response (Warwick and Linninger 1975).

The return rates of completed questionnaires in May and June were significantly higher than those obtained in July, August and September (at P = 0,05). The effects of this decline in return rate will result in a smaller sample size and an increased risk of bias due to non-response. Furthermore, as each month's sample has a large proportion of last visits made within that month, bias may be introduced into the estimation of costs and the spatial pattern of visits, if these variables differ significantly between months.

The reasons given for the non-completion of the questionnaires returned by users are shown in Table 3. The most common reason given—that the user had not fished recently, was an infrequent angler or had given up fishing—illustrates a problem of using the 1978 W.W.A. licence counterfoils as a list of current users.

There was no significant difference between the return rates of completed questionnaires for the different days of the week on which the first questionnaires were posted for the period May-September (P > 0,05).

Assessment of User Groups Not Included in the Survey

Users who purchased their 1978 W.W.A. rod licence outside the study area or did not purchase a rod licence are not included in the list of users. W.W.A. records of on-site checks made by their staff are being used to assess the proportion of users from each origin zone, in each of these two groups, so that corrections to demand patterns may be made.

Table 2. Return rates of useful questionnaires obtained in other postal surveys.

Table 3. The reasons for non-completion given by users returning an uncompleted questionnaire and the percentage of uncompleted questionnaires returned by users for each reason in each month and in the period May-September.

CONCLUSIONS

The Talhelm method offers a new and apparently useful tool for the management of fisheries on a regional basis, but the problems associated with the collection of data may result in inaccuracies in the final model. The degree to which these inaccuracies are reflected in any predictions made with the model, should be assessed by its application to a test area, so that predictions may be validated by changes in demand and use patterns within the area.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We are grateful to Prof. D.R. Talhelm, Mr. I. Stocker, Mr. J. Alabaster and Dr. G. Harris for discussion during the development of the project and to Prof. R. W. Edwards for reading the manuscript. This work is supported by a grant from the Water Reserch Centre, Stevenage, Herts, U.K.

LITERATURE CITED

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