NEW MEASURES TO CONTROL SPREAD OF FISH VIRUS

For Immediate Release
March 29, 2007

NEW MEASURES TO CONTROL SPREAD OF FISH VIRUS
Strategy Aims To Control Virus While Allowing Spawning

TORONTO — The Ontario government is taking further action to control the spread of a new fish virus in Ontario, Natural Resources Minister David Ramsay announced today.

“We are taking additional steps to control the spread of viral hemorrhagic septicemia while allowing natural spawning runs to continue this spring, including the operation of fishways and people moving fish over dams and barriers, to maintain important stocks of fish,” said Ramsay.  “The measures are part of Ontario’s comprehensive, ecologically based response to this new fish disease.”

Last week, ministry staff and partners were asked to delay any planned actions in virus-positive waters,  particularly the opening of fishways, fish transfers and spawn collection, in rivers and streams flowing into the lower Great Lakes until a decision was reached on a one-year management strategy.

New measures under the one-year strategy include:

• Broadening the definition of virus-positive waters to include lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron (including Georgian Bay) and their connecting waterways and tributaries up to the first impassable barrier, excluding fishways
• Operating all fishways and allowing existing manual transfers of fish over barriers into the same watershed
• Requiring salmon spawn and trout spawn from virus-positive waters to be disinfected according to the MNR protocol or transferred only to a facility in virus-positive waters
• Allowing walleye spawn collection from virus-positive waters only if the fish are stocked into virus-positive waters and the receiving fish culture facility is located in a virus-positive zone
• Allowing eggs, or fish cultured from eggs, collected from virus-positive waters to be stocked outside of virus-positive waters only if the facility can be certified virus-free.

In January 2007, the ministry announced measures to control the harvest and transport of live bait used by anglers while ice fishing across Ontario. These measures are being modified in response to new information about the distribution of the virus, and to allow bait harvesters and dealers in the virus-positive zone to resume limited operation.

Viral hemorrhagic septicemia was first identified in 2005 after a die-off of fish in the Bay of Quinte in Lake Ontario. The virus has now been found in 16 species of fish in the lower Great Lakes, including walleye and chinook salmon. There could be serious ecological, social and economic impacts if the virus continues to spread to Ontario’s inland waters.

Related Information

• FURTHER MEASURES TO CONTROL VHS IN ONTARIO

For More Information

Anne-Marie Flanagan
Minister’s Office
416-327-0654 / 416-268-3690 (Cell)

Jolanta Kowalski
Communications Services Branch
416-314-2106

General Enquiries

Natural Resources Information Centre
1-800-667-1940
TTY 1-866-686-6072 (Hearing Impaired)