Grant Approval
I am pleased to announce that the Pacific Salmon Commission has approved CERCA's grant application for breaching the causeway in the Cowichan Bay Estuary. Breaching the causeway will be a major step towards achieving our ultimate goal: the restoration of the ecological integrity of the Cowichan Estuary. In the following I will provide some background information on the rationale for breaching the man-made causeway.
Goetz Schuerholz, Chair CERCA
Why we want to breach the Westcan Causeway
The proposed intervention aims at breaching the man-made causeway currently acting as a barrier between the two parts of the Cowichan Estuary via a bridge. The project rationale is to re-enable water circulation and ecosystem functioning between the two parts of the Cowichan/Koksilah estuary which are currently artificially divided by the man-made (in-filling in the 1970s) Westcan causeway which provides road access to the Westcan Terminal. The causeway effectively blocks Cowichan River smolt from accessing a large section of a highly productive part of the Cowichan Estuary, blocking freshwater flow from the Cowichan South Fork to the southern section of the estuary, thus preventing proper ecosystem functioning of the Cowichan Estuary which constitutes one ecological entity.
Chinook is the target species of this proposal. The proposed intervention focuses on rebuilding Chinook stock from the low escapement of 2009, also benefiting Chum and Coho stocks which all use the Cowichan Estuary at critical periods of their life cycle. Chinook is considered one of the most important indicators of biological health of this ecosystem, the reason for the Southern Panel’s decision to choose the Cowichan River as an Indicator River for Chinook abundance. There is increasing understanding that marine survival of Chinook in the Georgia Strait is linked to the health of the Chinook leaving the river and estuary. This reflects the importance of estuary salt marshes and inter-tidal pools of brackish water critical for the survival of smolt.
The Cowichan River and Estuary have undergone substantial changes bringing into question the health of the ecosystem. The Cowichan River Chinook, Coho and Chum depend on the lower river and estuary during the most critical time of their life cycle. Quality habitat in the estuary and marshlands is Key for smolt survival. The return of Cowichan Chinook declined from 10,000 spawners in the early 1990s to a low of only a few hundred natural spawners in 2009. This habitat enhancement proposal addresses one of the key limiting factors to Chinook smolts in the Cowichan estuary: The lack of connectivity between the north and south side of the estuary as a result of the man-made Westcan causeway. This has been identified at the March 2013 workshop on the Cowichan estuarine and freshwater risk factors by a group of scientific, biological, and local knowledge experts, with over 300 years combined experience on the Cowichan, as limiting the productive capacity of Cowichan River fall run Chinook.
The economic value of Chinook is considered a key component of the southern BC recreational fishery and the WCVI commercial troll fishery. Gislason (2004) estimated the revenues and jobs arising from the lower half of Vancouver Island in the order of $250M along with 1800 jobs. The Cowichan Tribes created a way of life around the Cowichan Chinook. The estimated potential benefit of the proposed intervention is “High”.
The people of the Cowichan Valley have agreed in numerous forums and plans, such as the Water Management Plan, the Cowichan Estuary Management Plan and the Regional State of the Environment Report that ensuring the health of Cowichan River and watershed ecosystem is an important goal for the community, a key priority for the Cowichan Tribes, and a top priority for the Cowichan Stewardship Round Table and the Cowichan Watershed Board. Over the past years the Cowichan Valley has forged major partnerships related to watershed management, river quality enhancement and Chinook stock improvement in an effort to bring Cowichan Chinook back into sustainable fishery in Georgia Strait. Breaching the causeway has been discussed with and is supported by the Cowichan Tribes, the Cowichan Stewardship Round Table, the DFO, Cowichan Watershed Board, Living Rivers, the BC Wildlife Federation, and the Cowichan Valley Regional District (i.e., all provided letters of support to CERCA’s grant application).