Millions of Sockeye Salmon expected to return to the Fraser River in the summer of 2009 did not show up.  Just over 8 million missing fish were the initial numbers with official numbers coming in later even higher. The 8 million initiative aims to put meaning to a number so large and to drawing attention to the 2009 Fraser Sockeye run and the loss of so many in hopes that we can prevent further collapse and in fact restore the health of the natural system.

Most of us can’t wrap our heads around a number that high. Putting meaning to a number that large is difficult. Let’s do a little math

If that many people stood side by side from the headwaters to the estuary of the Fraser River it would form a line 3 times over.

If we signed our names one at a time on a petition, taking 10 seconds to sign and pass the paper along, it would take more than two and a half years of signing 24 hours a day to finish 8 million signatures.

The 2009 population of the province of BC was just under 4.5 million, which means the number of fish missing was twice the human population of BC.

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Salmon are so key. Every single one of those 8 million would have gone somewhere up the river hopefully spawning and then dying. That’s a lot of fish not making babies. That's a lot of biomass not reaching the banks of the river. That's a lot of food and nutrients missing from the banks of the rivers and the lands surrounding them. The people, the bears, the eagles, the wolves, the trees… we all say “Where’s The Fish?!?!”