news/editorial

12 June 2022 News/Editorial

Grave, if not unexpected, news from the Spey Board that their 2022 Seal Licence application has been rejected.

Grounds for rejection include that “the removal of some seals might have an adverse impact on the conservation objectives of designated sites”. Good luck with interpreting that.

Other reasons are given, all almost equally incomprehensible and coming from a Government whose latest Scottish Wild Salmon Strategy is based on the Atlantic salmon species being under threat, and that natural predation is a significant part of the problem, both birds and seals.

If I read that Strategy correctly, there is a commitment to review the bird licencing system, but it is (suspiciously) much more silent when it comes to seals.

I fear politics is behind it, for how can a Government in league with the Greens and Mr Patrick Harvie, be seen to be authorising the killing of those cuddly doey eyed seals, even in insignificantly small numbers.

The questions should be simple:

1. Is it true that the Atlantic salmon is under existential threat as never before?

2. Is it true that the grey seal is far from under threat and is also a significant predator of Atlantic salmon?

3. If the answer to both of these is “yes”, then the correct conservation response is to offer some very modest and limited protection, from predating seals, to the Atlantic salmon once they have entered the river system (be it the Spey or any other Scottish river). This is all the Spey was seeking.

Nothing else, least of all political considerations, should be relevant. We are talking about the survival of a species, nothing less, if you believe ICES, NASCO, The Missing Salmon Alliance, The Atlantic Salmon Trust, The Salmon & trout Conservation Trust, Fisheries Management Scotland, the Scottish Government itself and others. The Scottish salmon catch figures for 2021, just published, were the worst ever recorded.

For context, here is an extract from the NatureScot website;

The grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) is only found in the North Atlantic, the Baltic Sea and the Barents Sea. As one of the rarer seal species worldwide, its entire population is around 400,000 individuals. About 40% of all grey seals live in UK waters – and about 90% of this number breed at colonies in Scotland.

In other words, 40% of 400,000 or 160,000 grey seals are in the UK, and 90% (or 144,000) breed in colonies in Scotland. Grey seals can each live for 30 years and weigh up to 300kg. They eat a lot of fish. There are also up to 24,000 common (or harbour) seals in Scotland.

For further context, best recent estimates from ICES are that numbers of adult Atlantic salmon returning to Scotland’s rivers have decreased from over and around 1 million in the 1970s and 1980s, to 250,000 now.

144,000 grey seals and 24,000 harbour seals, making 168,000 seals in total in Scotland.

And just 250,000 salmon.

Can that be right? Someone, please, tell me it is not.

And the Spey could not get permission to protect the dwindling stock of Scottish salmon by killing just one or two seals that stray into the river, and which stay there with the only purpose of eating passing salmon?

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Have you ever driven a car that would not/could not get out of second gear? Younger readers will never have heard of the double de-clutch manoeuvre, the sine qua non of those impoverished students driving clapped out old bangers in the 1960s.

I mention this only because Tweed fishing is stuck in second gear, and the double de-clutch is beyond us, being in the hands of the Almighty, in the form of bucketloads of rain. We cannot get out of second gear, nor is there any better prospect. If you are unwise enough, you too can consult those weather forecast gurus, who too often get it right nowadays, not leaving enough room for our imaginations to run riot in a world where rain, rain and more rain is the norm.

Maybe 100 Tweed salmon were caught last week, if you take the Fishpal and Tweedbeats totals, avoiding duplications, and adding a substantial slice for the non reporters. The top scorers are all non reporters, being Junction, who have breached the 200 mark, and Sprouston and Tweedmill (used to be Lower Lennel, the dark horse of Tweed salmon beats) who must both be over 100 by now.

I hear there are fish in the lowest beats, but reluctant to take a fly. They wouldn’t lob something metal and upstream at them, would they? Of course not.

So there we are, more of the same next week, possibly even less fishing friendly, for at least last week was windy and cloudy at times. Next week looks less windy, warmer and sunnier.

Oh well, there is nothing we can do about it.

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We have just returned after two days fishing on the Deveron, a lovely river and not unlike the lower Tweed, albeit about half the size, as it meanders through wonderful countryside down the the sea.

I met two owners, both desperately concerned at the reduced numbers of fish. They too have lost their autumn run, and in case you doubt what it used to be like, there was a picture in the cottage, our billet for the trip, of Mrs Tiny Morrison’s 61 lber caught on a fly on 1st November 1924, the largest fly caught Scottish salmon ever.

Their problems are a mirror of ours, too many goosanders and cormorants, far too many seals (have you seen that picture of the 300+ on the sandbanks of the Ythan estuary, a staggering sight?) and despite almost 100% catch and release, the graph of fish caught and returning adults, seems to be ever downwards.

Not that it makes it any better, but the Tweed’s problems, if you accept there are any, are pretty much identical to other rivers.