These fish are a key part of the Okanagan’s survival

When Wilfred Barnes prays, he asks that the water of the Okanagan remain clear for seven generations.

“Sometimes we take for granted things that mean a lot to [our] survival,” Barnes, a syilx knowledge keeper, told Kelowna10.

Clear water means fond habitat for the Kokanee salmon – or kikinee, as it’s known in syilx – a once crucial food source to Indigenous people of the Okanagan.

And that lifeline was at the centre of the kikinee festival at Mission Creek Regional Park on Saturday. It was hosted by the Regional District of Central Okanagan to educate and celebrate spawning season for the culturally important animal.

“Kikinee is a landlocked salmon, they don’t go to the ocean,” Barnes said. “We used to catch it, dry it, preserve it for our winter food, [and] the more people we see, the more people get educated.”

Barnes said the festival has grown over the past few years with more people and families learning about the important food source. He said before contact with Europeans, about 85 per cent of the syilx diet was kikinee salmon.

The festival had a variety of educational booths, walking tours, family activities, and live music.

Risti Lesperance, a park interpreter, said it’s important to teach the community about the culture, ecology, and ecosystem in the Okanagan.

“We can all have a better understanding of how our activities impact the environment and the ecosystem around us,” she said. “At Mission Creek Regional Park, we have a manmade spawning channel that replicates the ideal habitat for spawning fish to boost and promote spawning numbers.”

Lesperance said the spawning season for the salmon is about a month long and starts in late August or early September. The fish spawning are three to five years old and are at the end of their life cycle once spawning is complete.

Over the winter, the fertilized eggs grow into fry that stay in the gravel of the creek beds until they are big enough to head down into the lake for a few years to continue living.

“I love what I do because I get to be outside, I get to talk to the community about these parks and these places that belong to all of us,” Lesperance explained. “I get to help people see and experience things in a new way every time they come out to the park.”