Here is what I know.
#1: My father was good freinds with the Cheif of the Coq band back in the early 70's. Cheif Coq. as he liked to be called gave many oral histories of the area. The word Coquitlam is an anglosized langauge for Kwayhquitlum (Red Fish Land). In honour of the late Cheif I named the fly fishing club I coordinated at Kwayhquitlum Middle school the Kwayquit Fly Fishers.
#2: I am freinds with Vance Reach who heads the Hatchery on the Coquitlam. Vance told me that the coq. was a dead river until the Hatchery built in the early 80's brought it back. I can verify his claims from my experinces fishing it from child hood until I got my drivers licence. Yes it is true the DFO made the hatchery staff stop producing Steelhead. There was actually a stand off between DFO and Fisheries (Guns Drawn) over releasing the immature Steelhead to their death when the mandate was served. (I am not at liberty to relay any more about the stand off than that.)
#3: The Sockeye run was substancial to the point that they were used as a political tool in passing the dam project. The key snake in the spin doctoring had the gereral public that the Sockeye were polluting the water system and that by eliminating them the river could privide safe drinking water. A few years back documents, letters, and photos were shown to me. The lies, and illegalities that I saw documented in print, pertaining to the building that dam are discussting. I asked for a cop of what I read but permition was not granted.
#4: I also have on trusted sources that the final death blow to the Salmon fishery was the gravel miners. I was told that anybody who lived in the area during the 50's would have seen the steam shovels lined up as far as the eye could see, from the hwy north. As I was told the gravel companies had shovels right in the river and scraped out all the gravel from the hyw to the dam, wiping out the Pink run.
#1: My father was good freinds with the Cheif of the Coq band back in the early 70's. Cheif Coq. as he liked to be called gave many oral histories of the area. The word Coquitlam is an anglosized langauge for Kwayhquitlum (Red Fish Land). In honour of the late Cheif I named the fly fishing club I coordinated at Kwayhquitlum Middle school the Kwayquit Fly Fishers.
#2: I am freinds with Vance Reach who heads the Hatchery on the Coquitlam. Vance told me that the coq. was a dead river until the Hatchery built in the early 80's brought it back. I can verify his claims from my experinces fishing it from child hood until I got my drivers licence. Yes it is true the DFO made the hatchery staff stop producing Steelhead. There was actually a stand off between DFO and Fisheries (Guns Drawn) over releasing the immature Steelhead to their death when the mandate was served. (I am not at liberty to relay any more about the stand off than that.)
#3: The Sockeye run was substancial to the point that they were used as a political tool in passing the dam project. The key snake in the spin doctoring had the gereral public that the Sockeye were polluting the water system and that by eliminating them the river could privide safe drinking water. A few years back documents, letters, and photos were shown to me. The lies, and illegalities that I saw documented in print, pertaining to the building that dam are discussting. I asked for a cop of what I read but permition was not granted.
#4: I also have on trusted sources that the final death blow to the Salmon fishery was the gravel miners. I was told that anybody who lived in the area during the 50's would have seen the steam shovels lined up as far as the eye could see, from the hwy north. As I was told the gravel companies had shovels right in the river and scraped out all the gravel from the hyw to the dam, wiping out the Pink run.
