27 June 2021 News/Editorial
30th June represents the halfway point in the Tweed’s salmon season, five out of the ten months have gone. This half term report might initially use words such as “disappointing” and “distinctly average”, all too familiar from those long off days when we were at school
A reasonable guesstimate of the 2021 catch might be around 1,300 salmon, certainly under 1,500.
Here are the spring catches for the last 10 years;
2020 1,678 (little more than 2 months fishing)
2019 1,925
2018 1,083
2017 1,852
2016 2,464
2015 2,030
2014 1,737
2013 2,110
2012 2,842
2011 3,072
If the 2021 figure at 1,300-1,500 is roughly right, then 2021 is about 60-70% of the 10 year average of around 2,100, so that “disappointing” might be a more apt description, as “distinctly average” it was (sadly) not. Only 2018, at 1,083, was worse than 2021.
Perhaps more concerning is the obviously dipping trend, even if you allow for 2020 being significantly understated thanks to Covid, since 2017. The 6 year average 2011 to 2016 was 2,375; the 5 year average 2017-2021 (assuming the higher figure of 1,500 for 2021) will now be around 1,600, a reduction of a third in that short period.
Of course, you can prove anything with figures, depending on the timeline chosen and numerous other factors, but of one thing we can be quite sure, that there is no sign whatsoever of any improvement in the numbers of spring fish coming into the Tweed over the last 5 years. If anything, the reverse is true.
As for both last week’s and next week’s fishing, without any sign of meaningful rain, more of the same seems to be the prognosis. If anything has changed, albeit very slowly, there are a few more fish now appearing off the tide in the lowest reaches, even the odd, most welcome, grilse.
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One of the most condescending comments you can ever make is that someone is “overthinking it”. It reeks of intellectual superiority of the “there there, dear” variety, followed by the mandatory pat on the head.
Some say I am overstating, overthinking even, the plight of the Atlantic salmon, they prefer not to read Simon Kurlansky’s “Salmon”, not bothering to watch either “Seaspiracy” or “Artifishal”, content that everything is fine, and that people like yours truly are fussing about nothing. Believe me, such head-in-the-sand condescension and arrogance exists.
In April 2021, the Environment Agency updated its assessment of salmon fisheries in England and Wales. Of the 64 rivers in England and Wales, there is not one that is definitely “not at risk”. In other words every single salmon river in Great Britain, south of the Tweed, is either “at risk” (57%), “probably at risk” (36%), or “probably not at risk” (7%). The definitely “not at risk” category gets not one single entrant, even the Tyne not meeting the necessary criteria.
Marine Scotland have issued their own Assessment of salmon and seatrout stocks north of the Border. The key message is this; “Numbers of Atlantic salmon returning to Scotland’s coast have declined since at least 1971 and fail to meet conservation targets. Approximately half of assessed stocks (95/193) are in poor conservation status.” The attendant graph of salmon returning to the Scottish coast shows consistent figures of between 750,000 to 1,500,000 salmon between 1970 and 1990, since when there has been a steady decline, most markedly since 2011, to the current estimate of just 250,000 (1 in 4 of the 1970-1990 peaks). Until recently, the buffering capacity of removing nets and rods releasing salmon, has meant that the numbers of spawners, despite the reduced numbers coming back, remained fairly constant. However, between 2011 and 2018 salmon returning, already low in 2011, reduced by a further 44% to 2018, so that despite the buffering of removing nets and rods exercising catch and release, there has been a (negative) impact “post 2011 on the number of estimated salmon spawning in Scottish rivers”.
And finally, in Marine Scotland’s assessment of the conservation status of Scottish rivers for 2021, of the 173 rivers assessed for grading, only 36 were in (the good) Grade 1, and even those 36, if the Tweed is anything to go by, have different stocks (spring especially) that are protected by law (until 31st March) and often until much later in the year by local edict, well beyond their spring runs.
By way of summary, here in 2021 of the 237 salmon rivers assessed on the island of Great Britain, 201 do not qualify for the definitely ”not at risk” category, and the other 36 all have additional measures protecting at least their spring stocks.
50 years ago, in 1971, every single one of those 237 salmon rivers would have had no restrictions whatsoever on what they catch and kill, and despite massive high seas, coastal and inriver netting, for most not only would their stocks have been rated as good, but they supported thriving salmon rod fisheries.
When things happen slowly and gradually over 50 years it is easy not to notice, to pass it off as the natural variations of a wild resource. But this is a massive change over those 50 years, and as yet there is no sign that the decline in numbers has stabilised, let alone reversed. It should be both highly concerning and sobering for us all.
As is the following; The Times comment on the latest report ‘The Marine Assessment 2020’ published by Naturescot.
“The decline of Scotland’s wild salmon is spiralling despite measures to save the “king of fish”, a report has warned.
Closing coastal netting fisheries and encouraging anglers to release fish they have caught briefly stopped the fall in numbers but it has not brought a permanent revival.
Salmon stocks have continued to plummet over the past decade with sea trout in even steeper decline, according to an assessment by NatureScot, a government agency.
The Marine Assessment 2020, billed as the most comprehensive assessment of Scotland’s seas to date, said there was some evidence that sea health was improving but warned of a “mixed picture” for many fish species.
It will add to concerns that wild salmon will become extinct in the next 20 to 30 years, mainly because of climate and habitat change in their north Atlantic feeding grounds and their home rivers.”
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