Salmon numbers in Irish rivers since drift net ban ?

cameramonkey

i have been trawling the internet looking for data about salmon numbers in Irish rivers. I was wondering what people opinions are on whether there has been an improvement since the drift net ban?

effluent

cameramonkey wrote: »

i have been trawling the internet looking for data about salmon numbers in Irish rivers. I was wondering what people opinions are on whether there has been an improvement since the drift net ban?

I think it would be too soon to tell how much of an improvement there is in Salmon stocks since the ban came in in 2007, which was four years ago, considering the Salmon's life cycle. I think it will be much more clearer in the coming years whether there is any great improvement.

I believe there will be an improvement in Southern Fisheries, in comparison the North Western Fisheries, as much of the salmon intercepted were destined for southern fisheries

TimMac

I think this year we will see the first signs of an improvement since the ban, however unfortunately a lot of the counters are out of action in our rivers since last years flood.

sanbrafyffe

thanks lads im gettin the net out:D

premiercad

Southern rivers have definately benefitted, although the season appears to be getting later every year (more weather related perhaps), lots more fish seen in the Suir and Blackwater systems, long may it continue

dodderangler

cameramonkey wrote: »

i have been trawling the internet looking for data about salmon numbers in Irish rivers. I was wondering what people opinions are on whether there has been an improvement since the drift net ban?

i live in dublin and i fish the dodder regulary and i was walking the dog at ballsbridge and seen salmon trying to jump up small waterfall. i've fished the dodder for 13years and no one i know nor my dad or grandad has seen salmon in dodder for 20-30 years. that was in september. yesterday i hooked and lost a salmon on that river so as disapointed as i was im delighted t see the population spring back to its original ways :cool:

fisherking

Awesome!!
Seen sea trout allright never salmon...

dodderangler wrote: »

cameramonkey wrote: »

i have been trawling the internet looking for data about salmon numbers in Irish rivers. I was wondering what people opinions are on whether there has been an improvement since the drift net ban?

i live in dublin and i fish the dodder regulary and i was walking the dog at ballsbridge and seen salmon trying to jump up small waterfall. i've fished the dodder for 13years and no one i know nor my dad or grandad has seen salmon in dodder for 20-30 years. that was in september. yesterday i hooked and lost a salmon on that river so as disapointed as i was im delighted t see the population spring back to its original ways :cool:

dodderangler

fisherking wrote: »

Awesome!!
Seen sea trout allright never salmon...

we got sea trout last month on the fly behind donnybrook and a fella beside me caught a lovely wild browny on a silver mepps size 1 weighing at 3lb 8oz unfortunately it wasn released

slowburner

dodderangler wrote: »

i live in dublin and i fish the dodder regulary and i was walking the dog at ballsbridge and seen salmon trying to jump up small waterfall. i've fished the dodder for 13years and no one i know nor my dad or grandad has seen salmon in dodder for 20-30 years. that was in september. yesterday i hooked and lost a salmon on that river so as disapointed as i was im delighted t see the population spring back to its original ways :cool:

There is nearly always a salmon at the foot of the falls at Beaver Row. It always seems to be just the one - probably an explorer from the Liffey. A good spot for sea trout too, right up in the white water.

Salmon and sea trout fishing in the heart of Dublin 4 - what will they think of next?

sanbrafyffe

irelands best salmon river the river moy in ballina is not throwing up much numbers these days

coolwings

I hope you dodder talkers are feeling really knowledgable now.
For your forum ego boost you are making public to a city of 1M the locations of the dozen or so breeding pairs of Dodder salmon.

Have yez no cop on at all

Maybe now we move on to discussing effective poaching techniques and where to get the hardware?

Someone please take this thread down ASAP.

slowburner

The presence of anglers is one of the most effective deterrents to poaching. There has always been an angling presence at the locations discussed here. That, and the fact that they are along busy public roads, is why there has never been one single recorded incident of poaching at these locations. By making these areas known to the angling public, posters are encouraging a form of fisheries protection.
On the other hand, it is possible that there are hordes of poachers trawling these pages looking for new venues, perhaps some of the posters on this forum are not really anglers at all??

coolwings

Well it can be compared to this:
How would you like someone posting on boards the location of valuables in your house, garden and road to the internet?
You can still keep an eye on things of course......

In a lifetime of fishing for salmon in ireland I have observed that nothing has changed in the minds of those who want more cash and see salmon as convertible currency.

The presence of anglers is no help because anglers are the ones who will do it ....
a few of them is enough......

slowburner

I understand what you are saying.
Of course I would not like such details to be posted up about my private property. But there are two significant differences between reality and your analogy;
I do not hand out day tickets to my private property.
The salmon are not my (or your) private property. They are the property of the state until they are captured by lawful methods.

All I can say with regard to your view of anglers in general is that I find it saddening. I accept that there are greedy anglers (and worse) but I have met far less of them than I have decent ones over a lifetime involved with salmon, both professionally and otherwise.
I suppose what it all boils down to is a difference in our experiences of anglers.

coolwings

slowburner wrote: »

....I suppose what it all boils down to is a difference in our experiences of anglers.

Well I respect your opinion. You paint me as a cynic. But that is not so.

We all leave a trace on the waterside, and the best of us leave hardly any. For example, angler litterbugs trash the waterside causing denial of access by landowners all over the country. Experience ad nauseum shows this is so. To use the boxing phrase, the bad guys punch over their weight.
Poachers have caused prolific publicly owned fishing places to be banned for fishing for salmon by all anglers including the legitimate ones. Many weirs have sanctuaries from anglers downstream of the weir as a result of poacher's activities. Not just small waters, take the Moy, have you fished Pontoon recently? You can't while the run is on.
So the results of the bad eggs become permanent restrictions to be lived with by everyone.
If you are a thinking person, why make it easy for them?

Back to the specific. The Dodder has impassable weirs, and very limited spawning habitat for large fish. The water can get very low and clear. The numbers of returning fish are very very small indeed, and a biologist would say not self sustaining.
If you have not observed strokehaulers in action you either do not have the salmon fishing experience you pretend to have or say that you have, or you are blind to what goes on.
You are the one in denial if you think threads like this cause no damage.

Salmon as property you say? Well that just about describes the salmon's problem, doesn't it?
What about salmon as an asset?
What about the fact that the future salmon will never exist if the present ones are killed before they spawn? The future fish are after all only a potential within their bodies before the spawning moment.

You say "They are the property of the state until they are captured by lawful methods."
I reply to you : They are nothing if captured by unlawful methods, but a memory and someones beer money for a night.

Back to this thread. Read the posts above with a open mind to what WILL HAPPEN because I assure you IT HAS HAPPENED THERE ALREADY. This is an acute small river problem that all small salmon river anglers have had to deal with down the years.
If you have made one of those informative innocent posts above consider if you would please edit out specific information.

slowburner

I'm afraid it is too late for me to edit the post with specific details - can you do it? Go ahead if you can and if it allays your fears.

I do not wish to paint you as a cynic. I just genuinely find it sad that your experience of the angling world is as negative as you portray it.

I do not "pretend" to have experience. 35 years involved with fisheries in various capacities, in fact.
I know all about strokehauls and plenty more besides.

I would not call a person who uses a strokehaul an angler.

I couldn't agree more that salmon are an asset.

If you have witnessed strokehauling at that weir - did you contact fisheries protection or the Gardaí?

fisherking

To see strokehauling go to the dargle where the sh*tbags have it down to a fine art.....
On the original thread not sure of numbers but a mate of mine is catching good numbers of "summer" salmon averaging ten which usually would of been snaffled by the nets.....

slowburner wrote: »

I'm afraid it is too late for me to edit the post with specific details - can you do it? Go ahead if you can and if it allays your fears.

I do not wish to paint you as a cynic. I just genuinely find it sad that your experience of the angling world is as negative as you portray it.

I do not "pretend" to have experience. 35 years involved with fisheries in various capacities, in fact.
I know all about strokehauls and plenty more besides.

I would not call a person who uses a strokehaul an angler.

I couldn't agree more that salmon are an asset.

If you have witnessed strokehauling at that weir - did you contact fisheries protection or the GardaÃ*?

dodderangler

You would swear that every angler out there that finds a river with salmon is going to kill every fish that they catch. not everyone that goes fishing kills everything that they catch. what ever happened to sport fishing like catch and release
il agree majority of people will keep a salmon to eat but your painting everyone the same colour basically saying everyone kills their catch and it almosts sounds like you catch and kill your catch. now i've killed stocked fish but there are certain fish out there that ive enough respect for to put back knowing the numbers in the river so please stop accusing every angler out there of catch an kill when there are others that respect the numbers of fish to release them.

coolwings

Hi DA: I have returned approx 200 salmon at this stage ... so not any sort of a "meat man". Also know the habits of the fish well.
I also am not a "return everything" person, and am perfectly willing to keep one for eating, but often that would be from a stocked venue.
The reality check comes because I was an active waterkeeper for a long period and that meant I would confront trouble rather than leaving the scene and telling someone else. I would also never miss the telltale signs that these kind of people leave behind, scales/blood on vegetation, etc. and thus return later to set up an "interview meeting".

There are two factors that apply here:
A) In Ringsend area there is an old habit of snagging, strokehauling mullet, and some "anglers" are tooled up with the implements of the job. Now I know some of those walk/stalk the river too.
With exceptionally large fish some legit anglers have what might be called "a red mist" that descends over their vision upon catching the big fish. They are then incapable of returning that fish, but are bound by strong emotion to kill it and have a trophy to show friends who might not believe in their "amazing catch". It's a beginner thing that confidence and self assurance cures in time, but many have it.
All in all, the best defence big trout or salmon have is ignorance of their existence, and concealment. But low water during summer breaks down both defences. All we have left when that happens is good morals and enforcement.

BoarHunter

coolwings wrote: »

Hi DA: I have returned approx 200 salmon at this stage ... so not any sort of a "meat man". Also know the habits of the fish well.
I also am not a "return everything" person, and am perfectly willing to keep one for eating, but often that would be from a stocked venue.
The reality check comes because I was an active waterkeeper for a long period and that meant I would confront trouble rather than leaving the scene and telling someone else. I would also never miss the telltale signs that these kind of people leave behind, scales/blood on vegetation, etc. and thus return later to set up an "interview meeting".

There are two factors that apply here:
A) In Ringsend area there is an old habit of snagging, strokehauling mullet, and some "anglers" are tooled up with the implements of the job. Now I know some of those walk/stalk the river too.
With exceptionally large fish some legit anglers have what might be called "a red mist" that descends over their vision upon catching the big fish. They are then incapable of returning that fish, but are bound by strong emotion to kill it and have a trophy to show friends who might not believe in their "amazing catch". It's a beginner thing that confidence and self assurance cures in time, but many have it.
All in all, the best defence big trout or salmon have is ignorance of their existence, and concealment. But low water during summer breaks down both defences. All we have left when that happens is good morals and enforcement.

Totally agree with that and i have to say that I did it in the past. Now with Digital camera it should be a thing of the past...

coolwings

BoarHunter wrote: »

Totally agree with that and i have to say that I did it in the past. Now with Digital camera it should be a thing of the past...

Funny thing, but true and you nailed it right there.
The digital camera/cam-phone is a huge conservation item.

DavyDee

Due to the tagging system that was brought in, which had been promised at first would never limit anglers catch done exactly that 2 years later data compiled by the authorities will never be anywhere near the actual numbers of salmon caught. I seen first hand on the river moy last year about 20% of the total catch would have been tagged and recorded. The river moy has came on leaps and bounds since the drift nets in both numbers and average size of fish. The river was choc a block with salmon come the end of last August from source to mouth. Biggest problem facing the moy now is pollution, Foxford has no sewage treatment facility, Ballinas sewage system is ancient and regularly flows into the river, Castlebars "treated" sewage is pumped into lough Conn which surprise surprise holds no more arctic char!

cameramonkey

http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0928/salmon.html