Salmon 07

[atomichaggis]

How is the 2007 season going? up or down on previous years? how are the sizes of fish being caught this year compared with previous seasons?... any change?

[ford prefect]

The season is a disaster in many rivers

The grilse (1-3kg) is nowhere to be found and has a lower than average weight..

7 of my 8 days in Etne I didn't even see any fish on our stretches and 0 salmon caught

[atomichaggis]

Is that due to salmon stocks or conditions on the river?

[ford prefect]

Hopefully this season is just a "normal" downseason like every now and then..

Riverconditions can not explain the absense in so many rivers from north to south, so my bet is lack of food in the Atlantic this year. This could also explain the low average size of the grilse that are caught. If it's due to overfishing of Lodde it can be very serious, hopefully it's just a natural downfall of the salmon's natural prey.

Ther are just too many factors to know why... Sealice, seatemperature and waterconditions, absence of food, riverconditions etc etc

Endret August 19, 2007 av ford prefect

[Pchenet]

Is that due to salmon stocks or conditions on the river?

That's a very good question to which I don't think anybody has an answer. It does not seem to be limited to Norway but in the whole Salmo Salar world, Canada, Scotland, Ireland. The grilse are just not there in expected quantities and as Ford Perfect is saying, the weight in many cases is down. Feeding conditions at sea, high sea poaching in international waters, sea lice damage, poor earlier spawning results could all be reasons, which if combined, can give the poor results that we are witnessing! But salmon cycles are not easy to predict, so it could also be that the smolts stay one or two more years at sea and come back as 2-3 winter fish?

[atomichaggis]

Its quite baffling...

The reason I asked was because a fisheries student in Ireland mailed Me and said that salmon anglers had told Him that since they have now banned drift netting in Ireland the anglers are catching more and bigger salmon this season in Ireland.

He wondered if it was having a 'knock on' effect here on Norwegian stocks. Obviously not so apparent.

Perhaps the stocks are less connected than that or We'll just have to wait a year or two for some indication.

There were calls for the Irish driftnet ban from UK salmon anglers for years but it doesn't seem to have helped Them much either so far.

Lets hope the Irish reports are a sign of things to come.

[Pchenet]

Its quite baffling...

The reason I asked was because a fisheries student in Ireland mailed Me and said that salmon anglers had told Him that since they have now banned drift netting in Ireland the anglers are catching more and bigger salmon this season in Ireland.

He wondered if it was having a 'knock on' effect here on Norwegian stocks. Obviously not so apparent.

Perhaps the stocks are less connected than that or We'll just have to wait a year or two for some indication.

There were calls for the Irish driftnet ban from UK salmon anglers for years but it doesn't seem to have helped Them much either so far.

Lets hope the Irish reports are a sign of things to come.

I think that the Irish student should take a new look at figures for Ireland: I live on the Munster Blackwater and have daily access to catch figures for the Moy, Kerry rivers and obviously the Blackwater. The grilse catch is certainly not what it used to be some years ago and this despite the ban on drift netting ( which is only implemented on paper as poaching continues unabated all over Irish waters..) The fact that more 3-4 winter fish were caught in spring does not hide the fact that the overall catch for Ireland is in the doldrums. Another problem is that these "big" spring salmon are probably the last survivors of depleted stocks and their catch does not augur well for the future at all! But the central fisheries board is boosting figures to keep the foreign punters coming for the supposedly excellent salmon fishing in Ireland! It is a shame and while Norway might have some problems, the Irish situation is 100 times worse, Salmon fishing should be banned in Ireland for at least five years! That's how serious the situation is.

[atomichaggis]

This fella is in Dublin I believe and the good catches are being reported by His mates. I forwarded Your response so it will be interesting to see if some figures can back it up.

It is quite possible with patchy enforcement on the net ban that there are varying local trends.

[Pchenet]

This fella is in Dublin I believe and the good catches are being reported by His mates. I forwarded Your response so it will be interesting to see if some figures can back it up.

It is quite possible with patchy enforcement on the net ban that there are varying local trends.

Well we have also "benefited" from rather high water levels for the whole summer due to continuous low pressures over the Island and this naturally entices more late summer or autumn fish to take the river earlier than normal. These late run have never been affected by legal netting, so it is just that they come earlier due to beneficial water and temperature levels. The problem is that most of these fish were never caught before, as they tended to take the rivers after the season's end and were the real buffer for the rivers future. Now as they are caught and clubbed on the head for most of them, one can expect that contribution to future generations will be rather limited.

As to the temperature, our summer has been so poor that I cannot recall temperatures rising above 20 celsius this summer. So all in all, while there might be an slight increase in numbers, this has very little to do with the ban of drift netting. The smolt production has dwindled for the last ten years while poaching at sea has decupled and Ireland is harvesting the results of a totally incompetent strategy!! What's new??