news/editorial

14 September 2014 News/Editorial

With only 4 days to go, it is hard to think about anything but the referendum this week, especially as water and fish are so scarce.

Malcolm reminded me that in this (past) week in 2003 the river height was minus 1.5 inches on our guage, over 1 foot lower than it is now, yet our tenants caught over 60 in the week.

So the low water and blazing sunshine conditions do not help, but lack of fish in any meaningful numbers is also to blame.

I hear reports of dolphins/porpoises tossing salmon into the air in the estuary at Berwick and down to Goswick, indicating large numbers waiting to come in if we can only get some rain.

That hateful spinning business is over for the season, as is all netting, so if the dolphins and seals will let them go, most salmon wanting to come in should be available to be caught by the rods (even if according to statistics and sampling the rods never catch more than 1 in 20 autumn salmon/grilse anyway!).

That massive high pressure is slipping away this week, but predicting when enough rain will fall so as to flood the river is another matter altogether.

My old friend Johnny Aitchison, whose family have kept rainfall records meticulously for over 100 years, tells me that so far this year at Lochton (Birgham) they have had just 17 inches of rain; not much and the law of averages would indicate we are going to get a lot more soon.

Once it starts, it may never stop, such are the extremes of weather nowadays.

As I look out over the river to England, I cannot help thinking that in 4 days time the dye may be cast for it to become a foreign country, and what will that mean for all of us, and for the management of Tweed, three quarters of which is Scottish and one quarter English?

By grandparentage, I am the other way around, three quarters English and one quarter Scottish but have lived in Scotland most of my 64 years.

The question being asked on Thursday is one I have never wanted to answer; it is essentially divisive, like being asked to chose which of your children you prefer.

Ah well, it will all be over soon and just maybe, I hope not, the view of England will become even more attractive by Friday morning.