Savoring – and saving – our nation’s largest wild salmon fishery
Fish Populations, Conservation Groups
May 14th, 2010
Our friends over at Trout Unlimited have been working on a new campaign, Savor Bristol bay, here’s guest blogger Elizabeth Dubovsky from Trout Unlimited to give us some more insight.
Over the coming months, Trout Unlimited’s Savor Bristol Bay campaign will be gathering signatures from chefs/restaurateurs for a letter asking President Obama to ensure that our nation’s largest wild salmon fishery in Bristol Bay, Alaska be protected from large-scale mineral development, specifically the proposed Pebble mine. The Pebble mine would be one of the world’s largest open-pit gold and copper mines and would be developed in some of the most productive wild salmon habitat left on the planet: the Kvichak and Nushagak Rivers. Given the seismically active zone in which Pebble would be built and the dynamic hydrology of the Bristol Bay watershed, scientists have many reasons to believe that the Pebble mine could become an environmental disaster, destroying both Bristol Bay’s salmon fisheries and the Native communities who rely on the annual return of Bristol Bay’s salmon.
Already, dozens of chefs from around the country have partnered with Trout Unlimited’s Savor Bristol Bay campaign to promote Bristol Bay salmon and educate their clients about Bristol Bay’s story and the people and places that make it so unique.
One of these chefs is Kevin Davis from Steelhead Diner and Blueacre Seafood in Seattle, WA who even traveled to Washington D.C. in 2009 to lobby for protection of Bristol Bay’s salmon fishery. “As someone who relies on wild salmon for my business, there’s a lot at stake in Bristol Bay. Not only is a critical source of our wild salmon at risk, but an iconic food that has inspired Northwest cuisine for thousands of years as well.”
Not only have chefs and grocery retailers started to speak out in support of protecting Bristol Bay’s salmon, but jewelers such as Tiffany & Co. and Zales have also pledged to not source any gold that comes from the Pebble mine, should it be developed.
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