Anyone visiting Squirrel Cove right now can see a series of freshly constructed rafts anchored close to the government dock. There were four of them when Cortes Currents first noticed, and another two being built on the beach. Now they are all in the Cove. There are piles of lumber and floats nearby, and a huge pile of hoop-like ‘lantern nets’ waiting on the Squirrel Cove Dock.
Continue reading The Scallop Rafts Being Built In Squirrel Cove
QXMC, the Klahoose First Nation development company, is looking for a new General Manager.
“We’ve retained a search company that has a great track record of looking for candidates of this type of size. In the past, we’ve used companies like Boyden that sort of do searches for Fortune 500 companies, and that’s not what we’re looking for,” explained Ron Buchhorn, Chairman of the QXMC Board.
“We’re looking for people who can run a diverse business. We’re probably talking about $140 million in revenue. It’s a big business mainly on the logging side, which is where most of the revenue comes from, but it’s diverse in terms of logging, aquaculture, resorts, ecotours, our bear touring operations, and having a sensitivity to our owners and understanding their goals and how they’d like the company operated.”
Continue reading QXMC: Search for a new General Manager
On March 27 Cortes Currents published some of the concerns shared by many Cortes Island shellfish growers. Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) did not have adequate time to respond, which it eventually did by email on April 6, 2023. Cortes Currents was hoping to secure an interview and sent DFO a list of topics to be covered. The most important was ‘the problems of liveaboards and recreational boaters coming too close to shellfish growing sites.’
Continue reading DFO ‘responds’ to shellfish growers concerns
On Monday March 6, Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) closed the waters and intertidal foreshore of Deep Bay Harbour, on Vancouver Island, to oyster and scallop growers, due to ‘sanitary reasons.’
Erik Lyon, owner operator of Rising Tide Shellfish on Cortes Island explained, “The problem is too many people in too close a proximity to shellfish farms. You can’t have any shellfish destined for human consumption in water where there’s any kind of a man-made dock, boat liveaboard or float house within 125 metres. That’s a setback that’s always been in place.”
Continue reading Growers Perspective: Boats and Aquaculture in Gorge HarbourCKTZ News, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Close to a billion marine creatures may have perished in BC’s recent heat wave.
“We had some of the hottest weather we’ve ever had and it happened to be on days with very low, low tides and that combination was pretty lethal for a lot of things,” explained Dr Chris Harley, a marine biologist at the University of British Columbia.
He said the one billion death estimate was obtained through calculations of mussel populations.
Continue reading A billion marine creatures may have perished in the heat
