Credit ONA for showing us path to better earth

DEAR EDITOR:

It was very good to read the news about the return of the sockeye salmon to Lake Okanagan (“Salmon make splashy return,” Dec. 12, The Daily Courier).

The sockeye salmon were reported as far as Mission Creek in Kelowna and even Six Mile Creek in the Okanagan Indian Band lands. I think we should all be grateful and thank the Okanagan Nation Alliance for spearheading and persisting in this restoration of a salmon run that was extinct.

This extinction was caused by the building by dams and channeling of natural waterways along the nearly one thousand kilometre salmon migration route to the Pacific Ocean.

Jim Taylor, in his insightful Saturday column points out that the salmon have right to exist. I am grateful that our Indigenous neighbours recognized this and did something about it.

Perhaps we should stop thinking of the salmon as a natural resource and instead think of them as an earthly treasure and fellow creature.

Taylor referenced the verses in Genesis — 1:26-30 — where humans are given dominion over the earth. This is a dreadful power. But as Stan Lee once said: “With great power comes great responsibility.” Yes, we can exploit the salmon to extinction, but the Okanagan Nation Alliance have shown that we can bring them back and restore them.

That is being responsible. I thank the Okanagan Nation Alliance for acting responsibly and giving us some good news in what has been a dreadful year. May we have more good news like this in the New Year.

Howard Hisdal, Kelowna