ws The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, November 22, 2006 - B5 q TERRACE STANDARD MARGARET SPEIRS 638-7283 THE BANTAM Rep t bench watches the on-ice oo, “action against the Midget House B team here q Nov. 11. The Bantams squeezed the game in between their regular season doubleheader in i ‘ SKEENA "ANGLER ° ROB BROWN ‘No longer in the pink ngling sharpens the powers of observa- tion. The desire to provoke'a trout starts a fisherman thinking about what fish eat in general and what they will be eating at the time he sets out after them. In the last days of the year, the trout fisher no- _ tices after catching one, that-his quarry is filled, . sometimes literally to overflowing, with salmon ° eggs. He quickly learns that a plastic bead of ap- proximately the same size or a chunk of pink yarn or a small pink fly will catch them well. » The desire to catch more fish more often soon -has the angler thinking of modifications. He might have a closer look at the errant salmon eggs drift- ing downstream behind spawning pink salmon and - discover that.they are opaque with a faded orange hue, not bright pink and translucent like the lures he- was using to ape them. -With winter done-and-spring begun, the same an- gler might return to same stream and find the trout splashing and slashing after something in the same _riffle, then notice the glint of small fish past his boots and determine that salmon fry were the fish’s targets. And, later that day, while sitting on a stream side log, eating his lunch,.he might notice that one. of those fry had washed ashore: He might note its dark grey back; its lack of markings, its large eye, and ' marvel at the reflective abilities of its silver sides. As a result of this observation, the angler might, _wafter a little research back home, discover that he’d found the corpse of a pink salmon fry. After that discovery, he might sit down in front of his vise and concoct a fraudulent fry copy mimick- ing the characteristics and return to the river armed with a few and considerably more dangerous. It’s only a short way from these narrowly fo- “cused observations to an observation of the fish themselves, and of the infinite complexities of their interactions with their environs. Eventually an an- gler embraces the entire ecosystem and the fishing becomes a servant of his interest. It was this process that nurtured my fascination with pink salmon. An unusual fish for an angler to be fascinated by since it has never been held in high esteem as a sport fish. The small pink has never received much respect from a commercial industry either. This is unfortunate, for the more you study O. Gorbuscha — the lowly humpy, the smallest of the Pacific’s salmon — the more you realize that all the other fish species and the other creatures that in- habit the same river valleys stand on the abundant - shoulders. : This fact was made evident again this year when the smallest run of pinks I’ve seen in the last. 30 years returned to the Lakelse River. I can’t help fecling that it was no coincidence that the number of eagles, ducks, and gulls was down too, as were the number of trout, and that their tracks indicate. the amount of bear traffic is reduced too. Though J haven't the data to justify it, I suspect that warm water temperatures in the river during the brood year two years ago at peak spawning time may have played a large part in shaping this year’s diminished return of humpbacks, It was the first time I saw firm, bright salmon belly up in the river in some numbers. As glaciers diminish and snow packs lessen, wa- ters temperatures will rise, adding to the stress load of spawning fish... Subjecting the pink salmon migrants to lice. pre- dation by introducing fish farms at the mouth of the Skeena would throw another obstacle in front of the small salmon that may ultimately threaten their survival, as was dramatically demonstrated by the work of Marty Krkosek who showed that up to . 91 per cent of juvenile salmon swimming past the farms do not survive the lice infestations. A small light in all this darkness was the good ’ news that The Wilderness Tourism Association of B.C. called for immediate government action to ad- dress the precipitous decline of wild pink and chum salmon in the Broughton Archipelago. Pointing out that B.C.’s wilderness tourism sec-_ tor generated $900 million in direct revenues in 2001, the 100-member association is insisting that the provincial government act now to protect their sustainable industry from the impacts of open net- cage salmon farming on the B.C. coast. “The. returns of pink salmon on the coast are dismal and in the Broughton desperate,” said Dean Wyatt, Director of WTA. “Our nature- based indus- try relies on healthy wild salmon.” Mr. Wyatt could have gone farther to say that we _all, to a greater and lesser degree, depend on wild salmon, and that all our coastal rivers as well as their valleys are wired to run on the flesh of salmon, and of all the salmon species, the pink, being the most abundant, is the most important. Go out.to the healthiest of our salmon streams and observe that it is so. he te THE TERRACE Bantam PwwrnrTe Tw seee es By MARGARET SPEIRS Reps mixed, it up against the Terrace Midget House B team and the Kitimat Bantam Lions. In an evenly matched game in size and speed, the Bantams kept up. to the Midgets and lead them 2-] af- ter the second period. The Midgets came back to tie it up and them slam in two unanswered goals for the 4-2 victory to cheering | from their many fans. ‘On his way to the dressing room, Bantam coach John Amos summed ; up the loss in one word: “outmus- cled.” “We told the kids a majority of [the Midgets] have played on the Bantam Rep team before. They know the systems. and all work hard,” he said, adding that midget _ house player Scott Simpson was one of his starters last year. During the game, he told his play- ers that the Midgets should be more tired than they were. Ktimat. The Midgets don’t get enough i ice time for practises or if they do, many players don’t often show up, so if the Bantams had kept pumping the puck into the Midgets’ end, the Midgets should’ ve tired quickly, he said.” In regular season play, Terrace got spanked 8-0 by the Lions in Kiti- mat after coming out flat. The squad fought back to win 4-, 3 in the second match after leading throughout the game. Reid Turner, Will Fisher, Corbin Legros and Ben Reinbolt split the - They all skate-well,” MARGARET SPEIRS PHOTO Midgets ‘outmuscle’ Bantams scoring. Terrace went into. the third: pe- ~riod up 3-1 and Kitimat’ s hard work brought it close. “They’ve gota good hockey team. Amos said. The Bantams travel.to Salmon Arm for a 12-team tournament this ° ' weekend, and expect to meet ‘and: take on some north and south Okan- agan teams. South Okanagan won the Bantam. Rep Hockey Provincials a a couple of - years ago. - “SYNCHRONIZED SKATERS take a break from practising with coach Lisa Carlson, seated on 1 bench at far right, who came from Edmonton to share her experience with the two synchronized skating teams. Synchronized skaters get chance to learn from world class coach © Pre- Juvenile Ladies skater Jorden. Hendry fin- LOCAL SYNCHRONIZED skaters trained with an experienced synchronized coach last week, . who was encouraged by the club’s skills while a trio of competitive skaters returned from their provincial championship with some impressive results. Lisa Carlson, who was on the Canadian nation- al synchronized skating team and has coached for nearly a decade, came to town to help,the two lo- cal teams, the Terrace Ice Crystals and Kermode Ice, with new moves and different ways to do their routines. Carlson, who’s from Edmonton, said local skaters showed a very high skill level and were very talented. Synchronized skating can be difficult to coor- dinate, she said. “It’s hard to coordinate two people, never mind nine,” she said, adding that most teams have 16 to 20 skaters. Synchronized skating, which has been around for more than 20 years —the first national cham- pionship was in 1983 — has undergone many Pi ae me er ek hl changes. Nov. 8-12. “This is by far the toughest competition our said head coach Jennifer Kuehne, - adding that each skater has to be able to perform required skills for each level. . The Sectional Championship is the provincial championship for competitive skaters. ‘Pre-Novice Ladies skater Jacqueline Lenuik came fifth in her short program and 14th in her long program for an overall 11th place finish. skaters see,” It used to be the place for skaters who maybe weren’t the most talented, she said, but now team members have to be top skaters. Hopefully the public will become. more ac- _ quainted with the sport in the future. Right now, it’s only shown on TV once or twice each year but plans are underway to get synchronized skating accepted as an Olympic sport, she said. Canada is one of the top competitors : in syn- . chronized skating, she added. Three skaters turned in some top scores at the ‘BC/Yukon Sectional Championship in Chilliwack ‘MARGARET SPEIRS PHOTO © ished 18th out of 37, an excellent result for her. first time, said Kuehne. “She is young enough to compete in that event next year and will nyt for a top four finish,” Juvenile Ladies skater Julianne Lenuik came 28th out of 31. The new marking system has proved to be very positive, said Kuehne. | The skaters know what each jump, spin,. field move and footwork is worth and this makes the * results more fair and understandable. ; Each skater receives a “report card,” or print-_ she said. out with scores, to see if improvements have been made from the last competition. This report card lists any deductions or - extra values so the skater knows what the judges want to see improved for next time. This judging system is used from the world level all the way down to the competitive stream now. Hopefully, the Star Skate, or non-competitive, events will have it in use in the next year or two so all levels of skating are more fair, said Kuehne.