tay salmon fishing

[tynetraveller]

WG-Catch every cast? Catch every other day would be nice. For example, how many fish has your rod yielded in the last three weeks of hard fishing? How much are the Park and Lower Crathes rods paying on average for a Springer in the last month? More than £1,000 I bet, maybe more than £2,000.

Taking two fish from a burn in exchange for 1000 smolts returned to the river is hardly evironmental sabotage. I totally agree that the long term solution is habitat improvement, but it will take decades and is there the will to do it en-masse? we are talking about hundreds of miles of fencing, river bed and flow management, gravel depositing,all in minor header streams. Big money and time. Who is doing it on the Spey system?

Also, we have the ability to artificially improve the runs above the normal carrying capacity, why should we not do it? I wouldn't run a pheasant shoot, even on ideal ground, without a gamekeeper to create artificial habitats and reduce the game bird's predators. Indeed, I would put down birds. Should salmon not use some of these principals?

What we really need is a rich benefactor to buy an entire system like the Thurso with the aim of maximising the run by any technology possible, just to see what could really be done. If that river's tennants were catching several fish each per day throughout most of the season, we would soon see other rivers taking note. The comments about the victorians just show that salmon management technique has not materially changed since the 1900s. We need to get Abramovich fly fishing.

[zephead]

Frankly quite shocked fishers/owners etc are still,still pandering to the scientists with yet more talk of "another 5 year programme" and a "let's see how it goes" experiment.

I have had enough big bloody salmon on my line and spent time watching spawning burns stiff with fish on the Tyne to know that a well managed hatchery used to send mature smolts out to sea works a treat and boosts the population.

I agree in principle about the genetic integrity argument but nearly every river I fish has old timer ghillies going on about how runs of fish have altered slightly due to the introduction of differing strains over the ages when a hatchery was inplace or where fish run to dependant on which hatchery was in operation at the time,the old hatchery near Tulchan being an oft quoted example.

The "habitat improver" school have had their day and in general there aren't many disaster areas like the Tyne that won't take an improved head of fish if nature is given a hand.

Frankly if theses scientists were to be judged on standard business performance criteria they'd have been sent packing long ago and many should be glad to have had us all strung along for so long while they were kept in employment.

The only cloning/genetics experiment salmon fishers should be concerned about these days is how many Peter Gray's can we make so every river can have one!

ZH.

[toucan]

I suggest you read this before assuming widespread stocking of Peter Grays will solve all our problems:

www.environment-agency.gov.uk/commondata/105385/review_10.4_version2b_885710.pdf

[davewallbridge]

williegunn said:

[Dave,
The scientific thought is now that fish are just from one river but from one part / pool of one river.

Malcolm,

Yes I had read about this view but although this may be the case with some spawning pairs I would doubt that this would the norm generally. I think it might be unusual for nature to rely upon such a localised breeding regime to maintain a species (or sub species)
As tynetraveller said - " If all fish only mated with fish from their same feeder burn, the narrow gene pool and high level of interbreeding that would result would disadvantage that population over time. "
We will have to see what further research yields.

I know from experience with the smolt rearing scheme on my local river that returning fish (identified by adipose fin clipping) are reported from all parts of the river and these are the offspring of rod caught fish whose eggs and milt are mixed randomly (in this context) - no record is kept of which part of the river the brood stock were obtained from. The scheme has been in operation for many years now and there does not appear to any negative trend noticed in the quality of fish caught.

I agree that in theory the best approach is to improve habitat, access, water quality etc. but our fish are under such extreme pressure from so many different directions that I think it foolhardy to dismiss the use of hatcheries. As has been said, these were used extensively by our forebears to maintain good runs of fish at a time when conditions and exploitation at sea were very minor considerations.
A final point, which I believe I may have made before, is that even if no other benefits come from operating a smolt scheme, having one does provide some insurance - the means of re-establishing a rivers ( gene specific ) stock in the event of a major pollution incident or other catastrophe.

Though not directly related to this topic there is an interesting video at:
www.fishandfly.com/articles/20070426
Although the conclusions reached are based upon circumstantial evidence so far, it provides some food for thought.

Dave.

[buzzers]

There is a very interesting article in mays T & S called Scotsmen in the conway makes me wonder if we should listen to the scientists at all. if we listened to them most of us shouldn't be here now what with cjd (mad cows),bird flu and others.

[williegunn]

tynetraveller said:

WG-Catch every cast? Catch every other day would be nice. For example, how many fish has your rod yielded in the last three weeks of hard fishing? How much are the Park and Lower Crathes rods paying on average for a Springer in the last month? More than £1,000 I bet, maybe more than £2,000..

Be carefull mentioniong the P beat and poor catches you will get a ban.

tynetraveller said:

Also, we have the ability to artificially improve the runs above the normal carrying capacity, why should we not do it? I wouldn't run a pheasant shoot, even on ideal ground, without a gamekeeper to create artificial habitats and reduce the game bird's predators. Indeed, I would put down birds. Should salmon not use some of these principals?

Ah pheasants a non indigenous species introduced into this country for “sportsmen” to shoot, similar to rainbow trout, I’ll stick to the native grouse or partridge and go the habitat route.

[williegunn]

zephead said:

Frankly quite shocked fishers/owners etc are still,still pandering to the scientists with yet more talk of "another 5 year programme" and a "let's see how it goes" experiment.

I have had enough big bloody salmon on my line and spent time watching spawning burns stiff with fish on the Tyne to know that a well managed hatchery used to send mature smolts out to sea works a treat and boosts the population.

I agree in principle about the genetic integrity argument but nearly every river I fish has old timer ghillies going on about how runs of fish have altered slightly due to the introduction of differing strains over the ages when a hatchery was inplace or where fish run to dependant on which hatchery was in operation at the time,the old hatchery near Tulchan being an oft quoted example.

The "habitat improver" school have had their day and in general there aren't many disaster areas like the Tyne that won't take an improved head of fish if nature is given a hand.

Frankly if theses scientists were to be judged on standard business performance criteria they'd have been sent packing long ago and many should be glad to have had us all strung along for so long while they were kept in employment.

The only cloning/genetics experiment salmon fishers should be concerned about these days is how many Peter Gray's can we make so every river can have one!

ZH.

You are from the Tweed part of the world can you give me directions to the worlds most prolific Atlantic salmon river's hatchery?
I understand that a DNA analysis from returning Tyne fish could find no DNA from the Thurso or Spey salmon perhaps the Tyne improved despite the hatchery.

[tynetraveller]

WG- Re. Grouse, what an excellent example of just going down the habitat route- How has that been working out in your area these last few years? I was due to shoot up your way on or around the 12th 2004 and 2005 but it was cancelled each time- Something to do with lack of stock..

Salmon are a lot easier to rear artificially than Grouse!

Alan, re, If there isn't enough food to go around, why put more smolts out, this is a sensible point, but it isn't the salmon that have reduced the sand eel and capelin densities- After all, Atlantic salmon are a very rare species. Increasing the number of salmon at sea will have very little imcremental effect on bait densities.

[ibm59]

williegunn said:

Threads like this one during a Scottish election campaign are not helpful to the salmon fishery boards cause, bearing in mind their future is currently under discussion.

Eh ? Don't get that one . Isn't the run up to an election precisely the time when we should be rattling the cages of ANY political animal out there. Lord knows , they don't listen the rest of the time.

[castlikeaghille]

tynetraveller said:

WG- Re. Grouse, what an excellent example of just going down the habitat route- How has that been working out in your area these last few years? I was due to shoot up your way on or around the 12th 2004 and 2005 but it was cancelled each time- Something to do with lack of stock..

Salmon are a lot easier to rear artificially than Grouse!

The Grey Partirdge, an even better example of wishful thinking about habitat. The symbol of the Game Conservancy Council - sadly you are more likely to come across a grouse. The proof. Well it is perfectly correct to say these are two species that can only come back with habitat development - you can't, for various reasons stock them.

The Pudding, WG, the Travel Man has placed a simple response to your hypothesis - who is, or will be, doing all this habitat improvement en masse in the MWC or anywhere else for that matter? Modern funding (last 30 years) of farming/land through CAP at best discourages and at worst systematically breeds destruction of habitat. You are, so far, silent on the actual question put.

Salmon, however, like pheasants (ok so they've only been around for 2500 + years in the UK) can be stocked to supplement habitat/breeding deficiency. It is not the best or only answer, but it certainly helps, and there are numerous examples of this and I 'm not aware of any example of it being a negative

As for observations about the best Atlantic Salmon river/canal in Europe and it's lack of hatchery, those who have fished it for 30 years know what forked tongued chat falls behind those claims. The river is a shadow of what it was 20 years ago when, for example, catches were more than double (never mind size and quality) on the Upper Tweed beats I fish even with netting in place.

Improving salmon fishing is not just about doing one thing. It's about doing everything you can when you can on land, fresh and salt water. At different times some actions will be more feasible than others, but to rely on a single thread strategy when no-one is really carrying it out seems very odd indeed.

Regards

CLaG

[toucan]

Alan is nearest the knuckle in this discussion when he acknowledges that without confidence in the survival rates of fish at sea, sending more salmon smolts to sea could be an expensive experiment. It is one that we would have to be prepared to fund ourselves.

Yes, that means that you should be seriously considering funding a hatchery yourselves to back up your personal scientific opinion that stocking is the answer to restoring salmon stocks. If you think this is the answer then this forum is a perfect opportunity for similarly forward thinking and philanthropic individuals to kickstart the process.

No excuses - don't blame the land owners and the River Trusts who have already had to make hard decisions about how to spend their cash to preserve *our* fisheries. Don't wait for a single megarich philanthropist to buy the Thurso - stock the river by angler subscription (after all it can't cost that much ) and then lecture us on the results. I'll be first in the line to contribute if it's working. That is, of course, assuming I am spared from the hands of the mad scientists who apparently run the planet . Please don't knock what you don't understand.

While I wait for the hatchery experiments to work - with great hope - I'll continue to place my faith in action on reforming the CFP, minimizing the impact of aquaculture and countering the effects of global warming which might just actually have some real benefit for the wild atlantic salmon.

Despairing,

Mark

[storlaks]

Mark et all, I think you are kidding yourselves on thinking that money is the inhibiting factor for the implementation and running of hatcheries.
All these Estate owners on our Big rivers are very wealthy people and could well afford to fund such an activity, if they wanted or deemed it worthwhile. The money they make from tenants rents alone would go a long way to support such an activity....collectively.

The bottom line is - they don't need to. If we, the fishers, continue to rent their beat and we are content to catch 1 or 2 salmon then they are quite happy to take our money every year and do the mimimum work required. Why do you think C&R is so popular with most of them....it doesn't cost anything...EASY!

It's absolutely not up to US, the tenant, to fund this. How could that work? We are only renting a beat on a river, we own nothing.

All our major rivers (not exclusively just them) should have working hatcheries with the capability of smolt release. (This is not experimental, it's been done for years and is currently working on certain rivers on the West coast) This combined with habitat restoration and good river management is the minimum requirement for these rivers. What happens at sea is outwith their control. This is where external funding, scientific research and further investigation is still required.

Nature can sometimes be given a help-in-hand. It just takes people with vision and ambition to make it happen. Unfortunately they ain't many of them about these days.

[williegunn]

castlikeaghille said:

The Pudding, WG, the Travel Man has placed a simple response to your hypothesis - who is, or will be, doing all this habitat improvement en masse in the MWC or anywhere else for that matter? Modern funding (last 30 years) of farming/land through CAP at best discourages and at worst systematically breeds destruction of habitat. You are, so far, silent on the actual question put.

CLaG

The Spey Board along with some grants from the EU under the CASS (Conservation of Atlantic Salmon in Scotland) funding comes through the Spey being a SAC are removing man made articles on the catchment also the Batten burn has had considerable habitat repairs with improvements to fences and some soft engineering to the banks. The board are also identifying and prioritising areas for riparian improvement with help from HDH Wills charitable trusts. I am not claiming this is the only answer BUT I am sure that if land owners were not allowed to put down 10 000 pheasants a year and had to concentrate on Grey Partridge your chances of seeing one would be greatly improved. It is all a matter of how to help the salmon and I only ask the question is stocking doing any harm? Then if it is it should be stopped.
The Spey know the DNA of every stocked fish, but are unable to proceed with checking the DNA of returning fish as the expense is too high, anybody want to fund this useful project?

castlikeaghille said:

Salmon, however, like pheasants (ok so they've only been around for 2500 + years in the UK) can be stocked to supplement habitat/breeding deficiency. It is not the best or only answer, but it certainly helps, and there are numerous examples of this and I 'm not aware of any example of it being a negative

CLaG

I am currently awaiting a publication which puts serious doubts on the genetics of stocking.

castlikeaghille said:

As for observations about the best Atlantic Salmon river/canal in Europe and it's lack of hatchery, those who have fished it for 30 years know what forked tongued chat falls behind those claims. The river is a shadow of what it was 20 years ago when, for example, catches were more than double (never mind size and quality) on the Upper Tweed beats I fish even with netting in place.

CLaG

Are the old sunny summers and snowy winters arguement, when I was a boy. Come on WLAF you can do better than that.

castlikeaghille said:

Improving salmon fishing is not just about doing one thing. It's about doing everything you can when you can on land, fresh and salt water. At different times some actions will be more feasible than others, but to rely on a single thread strategy when no-one is really carrying it out seems very odd indeed.

Regards

CLaG

For once I agree the answer is not as simple as pushing in more smolts and waiting for them to return.

[williegunn]

storlaks said:

Mark et all, I think you are kidding yourselves on thinking that money is the inhibiting factor for the implementation and running of hatcheries.
All these Estate owners on our Big rivers are very wealthy people and could well afford to fund such an activity, if they wanted or deemed it worthwhile. The money they make from tenants rents alone would go a long way to support such an activity....collectively.

Currently 21% of the Spey Fishery Board Assesment (£418.651) goes to running their hatchery and this is no where near to producing smolts. Or to simplify the figures the hatchery costs about £100 000 /year.

[tynetraveller]

The fact that the Spey board spends 21% of its budget on the hatchery is quite impressive, it shows that they treat it as a very important part of their work.- Unfortunately we would need to see a greater investment by far to release significant smolt numbers or to fund serious habitat improvement. Are there no government subsidies/ natural lottery funds etc that can be used to top up this figure?

I personally would pay a £5 per rod day supplement to pay for the experiment. I do not know if others agree..

[storlaks]

I personally would pay a £5 per rod day supplement to pay for the experiment. I do not know if others agree.

Absolutely not. If I take a weeks fishing on the Spey and pay my money to the Estate then I see it as their responsibility to put that money or a percentage of it, back into the fishing. We pay enough as it is.

If each of the very wealthy owners up and down Speyside contributed £5K a year to subsidise a well run hatchery then it may work. It's within their best interests to do this. They own the river. They will benefit financially if catches improve. The harsh reality of the situation is, of course, that the paying fisher will eventually be funding the hatchery anyway. If catches increase, so do prices......but to offer to pay an extra £5 in the first place.....sorry not me.

[castlikeaghille]

williegunn said:

For once I agree...

Steady.....Snowy winters..oh if only.

CLaG

P.S The combined rental for Sprouston, Junction, Floors, Makerstoun and Bemersyde for the the first week of November alone is North of £100,000. You can probably double that figure and a lot more when you bring in all the other middle and prime lower beats and the Upper Tweed (Fernilee £10,000 a week )

Clearly on these meager sums, it is outrageous to suggest proprietors (combined pro rata) of the 'canal' could possibly have any surplus to put back into improving the river etc..hhhmmm.

And that's the trouble with saying it's all a problem at sea. It gives an excuse not to spend one extra penny on the river..and many (with some noteable exceptions) proprietors don't. And all this at a time when so much is been taken out of anglers pockets at no extra cost; a wasted long term opportunity for a bit of short term gain.

[toucan]

I don't have a precise figure for the current levy per fish on the Tweed but I seem to recall it being north of £75 some years ago.

Taking £75 as the amount would mean the five beats CLaG mentions contribute around £185000 a year to the improvement and protection of the river.

To suggest the owners make no contribution to the river is therefore quite clearly false.

It is true some owners could pay more but we have read before of the pressures of a higher levy on owners with finite resources (e.g. Aviemore & Abernethy Association).

Mark

[castlikeaghille]

toucan said:

I don't have a precise figure for the current levy per fish on the Tweed but I seem to recall it being north of £75 some years ago.

Taking £75 as the amount would mean the five beats CLaG mentions contribute around £185000 a year to the improvement and protection of the river.

To suggest the owners make no contribution to the river is therefore quite clearly false.

It is true some owners could pay more but we have read before of the pressures of a higher levy on owners with finite resources (e.g. Aviemore & Abernethy Association).

Mark

Toucan, to be clear the Surplus meant excess after costs, expenses and fish levies - hence a 'surplus'. There is no suggestion that proprietors don't contribute to the river. But what they contribute is currently set by river boards. What some of us are interested to know is where is the extra marginal revenue that is being generated by the hyper-inflation price rises over the last 3 - 4 years is going?

Regards

CLaG

[sagecaster]

williegunn said:

castlikeaghille said:

The Pudding, WG, the Travel Man has placed a simple response to your hypothesis - who is, or will be, doing all this habitat improvement en masse in the MWC or anywhere else for that matter? Modern funding (last 30 years) of farming/land through CAP at best discourages and at worst systematically breeds destruction of habitat. You are, so far, silent on the actual question put.

CLaG

The Spey Board along with some grants from the EU under the CASS (Conservation of Atlantic Salmon in Scotland) funding comes through the Spey being a SAC are removing man made articles on the catchment also the Batten burn has had considerable habitat repairs with improvements to fences and some soft engineering to the banks. The board are also identifying and prioritising areas for riparian improvement with help from HDH Wills charitable trusts. I am not claiming this is the only answer BUT I am sure that if land owners were not allowed to put down 10 000 pheasants a year and had to concentrate on Grey Partridge your chances of seeing one would be greatly improved. It is all a matter of how to help the salmon and I only ask the question is stocking doing any harm? Then if it is it should be stopped.
The Spey know the DNA of every stocked fish, but are unable to proceed with checking the DNA of returning fish as the expense is too high, anybody want to fund this useful project?

I think this argument really depends on which side of the fence you want to sit, regarding science vs practical experience and application. I have significant experience of trying to save our stock of wild Grey Partridges over the last 6 years. Like grouse, the partridge is a really prolific breeder and should re-establish its self within a 3 year life cycle. I have followed all the best scientific and management advice from the G Conservancy and have habitat par excellence, which has benefited nearly everything else but the poor old partridge.

What this proves is that we should be careful how we practically apply scientific research and should only be applied between parameters. All the partridge research is done in royston, herts(i think) and not in central scotland where it hasn't worked for me.

The salmon will be no different, just because we follow the best advice on research/application carried out in Iceland/Tyne etc, doesn't mean to say it will work on the Spey or the Tay. Its a starting point and that's all, and if we are going to learn from it there has to be coherent trialling and analysis program put in place, first. Hence the DNA profiling WG is refering to and money, If the lottery numbers come up I would gladly donate a wedge ;D

CLaG

Regarding habitat(which i would wager is in better nick now than 30 years ago), as you probably know, there's funding out there for landowners and farmers to improve, protect and re-establish habitat. Unfortunately, Tony Blair gave away most of this funding to the new incumbents of the eec, so now its almost impossible to put these in place without it costing serious money. Indeed Defra/SEERAD were asked to explain why the prescriptions put in place gave a nil return on labour deployed, which is in breach of the minimum wage act. Needless to say Defra, have yet to respond to this and Seerad (via the Lib Dems) came out with the Tony Blair explanation.

Granted there are a fair few landowners of city wealth who can shoulder the extra cost, however there will be a good few more hill and tenant farmers, scraping a living, the likes of which were advised to use Pyrethroid dips by scientists because it was safer than Organphosphate. These are the guys that you need to help, educate and give financial incentive. So if you want to blame anyone for lack of habitat protection, look no further than Tony Blair .