1 June 2014 News/Editorial
It is extraordinary, is it not, how naturally altruistic, with some pretty grotesque current and historical exceptions, we humans are?
We plant trees when all the generations after us will get more benefit from their glory than us; we mortgage ourselves to the hilt to buy a house for ourselves and our family, but the monetary benefit more often than not ends up with our children, when the grim reaper comes a-knocking at our door.
We give to charity, often well beyond our means to sensibly afford it, and we volunteer our time and expertise for both people and causes from whom we could never derive any benefit.
That it genuinely gives us pleasure to do all these things is proof, if proof were needed, that we are not entirely selfish by nature and, despite the New Year sales stampede at M&S, that we are not wholly materialistic either. Most importantly, we might have a soul, even if Messrs Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot had some difficulty locating it.
So why this attack of the Muse, a certain melancholy, late in May/early June, with the sun shining and the countryside looking breathtakingly beautiful?
Well, it is because Tweed has had a pretty poor spring in terms of salmon caught. 2011, 2012 and 2013 springs were ok, around or above the 2,000 salmon mark, but if 2014 gets to 1,500 by the end of June, that will be about the size of it. Fishing conditions have been good after a flooded February, the inevitable and correct conclusion that there simply aren’t many fish.
But we will have caught more than in 2009, so that is a positive amidst the comparative gloom.
If 2014 has been a bit of a shocker, Ronald Campbell’s 5 year cycle for springers (2009 at 1,147 and 2010 at 1,445 springers caught to the end of June were even worse) proving yet again that if you don’t have the number of spawners you need, you can’t expect much of their children. The count of fish going over the Ettrick counter in 2009 was, from memory, better than the spring catches would indicate…..but the trouble with the Ettrick counter, indeed all counters, is that you cannot interrogate every fish going up there as to what sort of salmon it is eg spring, summer, or autumn?
It was in 2009 that 100% spring catch and release was implemented here for the first time, half way through the spring when it became clear how very few springers there were, and then implemented in full for the first time for the whole spring in 2010.
It is hard to imagine on current evidence why spring 100% catch and release should be changed any time soon, even if in theory only approved by the RTC for 5 years.
And that is what I mean, nobody forced us to do it, no big brother, no Government, it does not have the force of law, yet everyone abides by it……..I would argue for largely altruistic reasons.
We put the fish back because we know that those coming after us, quite possibly not including us, will benefit, and we want something we have enjoyed to persist….. beyond us.
The same goes for buying out netting rights.
Over recent times, starting in 1987, the Tweed proprietors in their various guises, on their own, via the Atlantic Salmon Conservation Trust, via the River Tweed Commission and the Tweed Foundation and via the fund to compensate the North East Drift Net Fishery buy out in 2003, have poured money (over £1.5 million and counting) into netting reductions so that more early run salmon can survive to spawn.
The cynics will say that they (the proprietors) did it so that they can catch more, charge more rents and then flog off their fishing for inflated capital values….. but that argument simply does not stack up. I cannot believe anyone makes much money out of letting their spring and summer fishing, which is when the bought-off nets operated, and there has hardly been a rush of Tweed beats for sale, proprietors rushing for the exit, over recent decades.
The proprietors on Tweed have been buying out netting rights now for nearly 30 years, and in the spirit of altruism which I truly believe is the primary motivation behind their decisions to go on doing so, I hope they will continue until the job is done.
There can be no better legacy to future generations, of fishermen and of those who own the fishing after us, than a Tweed free of all commercial netting…. for evermore.
I have a vision of Dr Ronald Campbell and his many successors operating a netting station, just one and just occasionally, for research purposes only.
Nothing more.
That would be something for us all to be proud of.
Not so much for us…….for the future.
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