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Northern
www.northernsentinel.com
Volume 57 No. 52
Coy Cup is back in town Cameron Orr The Kitimat Ice Demons gained from a $10,000 grant from Kitimat Council. The local men’s team, so far leading the way in CIHL West Division (and second only to the Smithers Steelheads in the Central Division), will host the Coy Cup championships for the second time in a row this coming March. The major tournament means the Ice Demons are looking for some support, although they have worked out a means to hold the event without seeking corporate sponsorships, which they were hesitant to do as Kitimat so recently held the Coy Cup. Kitimat was able to host the event as no other team in the league could financially commit to the responsibility, Ice Demons president Cliff Madsen told council. But the Demons have set up a means that other teams may be able to host the cup in future years. That’s because even though as host the Demons would be required to put up some expenses for the other teams, the league agreed that teams would forgo their mileage expenses, which lessens the burden for the host. With that plan in place, the league can be strengthened with more teams able to host, added Madsen. In presenting their proposal, the Ice Demons showed a conservative budget which had the team still $459 at a loss, but Madsen explained that was based only on the games that the Demons are confirmed to play. After the three forsure games in the Coy Cup, the Demons stand to have more income the more games they play. And with Madsen being confident of the Demons’ abilities to move ahead in the playoffs, he’s sure that difference can be made up. “We think we’ll do okay, even without the sponsorship dollars,” said Madsen. That proposed budget did call for a $10,000 contribution from the District of Kitimat, which was the council’s contribution when the tournament was held in 2012. On a technical basis, this year’s Coy Cup would only be eligible for $3,500, as it’s the second year in a row the event was held. The town’s ‘Major Event’ sponsorship program allows a maximum of $5,000 every five years, and down to $750 a night any years within that five years. Councillors at the December 17 meeting felt $10,000 was appropriate as the Ice Demons do pay almost $10,000 for the ice time and building rentals, money which goes to District staff to work the arena during the games. Continued on page 6
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
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1.34 INCLUDES TAX
Gordon Durocher, with Paul Mitchell in the background, sort coho eggs at the Kitimat Hatchery last week. Coho saw a decent year for the hatchery, as did most species save for chinook salmon which is at one of its lowest levels since the hatchery opened its doors.
Chinook saw a bad year in Kitimat Cameron Orr Acting manager at the Kitimat Fish Hatchery says most salmon stocks were good this year, with one exception; the chinook. The popular spring salmon saw its worst return since the hatchery came into existence, said Markus Feldhoff. “We didn’t even come close to getting our egg target,” he said, which is about 2.3 million eggs. This year they couldn’t even reach one million. “Most of the northern stocks of Chinooks was also very poor,” he said, noting it wasn’t only the Kitimat River. However he personally has no theories on why the return was so bad, but in past years they have not had any problem in reaching their egg targets. Steelheads were good for the hatchery, and they collected their normal al-
lotment of 60,000 eggs. Steelheads are raised at the hatchery for two years now, a change from past years where they were housed for only one year. When Eurocan’s mill closed, the hatchery lost its source of heated water. Now the steelhead live in well water at about 8C degrees, not warm enough to let them grow rapidly. “That water isn’t quite warm enough to grow them to an appropriate size,” he said. “We keep them on-site for two years before we release them.” He said they will have to wait until 2014 to see how the return is from their first batch of two-year steelhead. It also looked like another good year for chum, continuing the trend of the last two years. “We did notice they appeared in the river a bit earlier than we normally saw,” he said.
The hatchery takes in about two million chum eggs now, compared to a historical four million eggs from the Kitimat River. The hatchery also no longer enhance other rivers off of the Douglas Channel. As for coho, they had no problem collecting their brood stock of about 600,000 eggs. From the administration perspective he said staffing continues to be a concern at the facility. He said a hiring freeze remains in effect throughout the federal government and its Department of Fisheries and Oceans, but thankfully hatcheries have been spared the axe in terms of layoffs. However they can’t hire full time employees. Where they are supposed to have eight, they only have three at the moment, with the remainder filled with temporary staff.
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