Syilx Okanagan Nation says salmon run at risk after neighbouring nation pulls funds [Video]

The Syilx Okanagan Nation is celebrating a record-breaking salmon run in the region this year, but says it fears for the future of the restoration work after a neighbouring nation pulled funding from the project, amid a conflict between the two.

According to the Okanagan Nation Alliance, the governing body for the Syilx Okanagan Nation, upwards of 300,000 salmon have made it up the Columbia River to the Okanagan Basin to spawn this fall.

It’s a major success story for the fish species, which was nearing extinction in the area in the 1990s.

Tyson Marsel, a biologist at the kł cp̓əlk̓ stim̓ Hatchery, said the achievement is thanks to more than two decades of hard work harvesting eggs, releasing roe and restoring the region’s salmon habitat and migration routes.

For the past 15 years, the Okanagan Nation Alliance (ONA) says it has been partnering on the project with a Washington …