European Salmon

“After a slow start in the early part of the season Iceland’s salmon fishing has exceeded all expectations and produced some amazing sport this summer. In fact, many rivers have already surpassed their average catches... Notable improvements have assisted salmon migration including a fish ladder, built in the 1990s, which opened up new stretches of gravel for spawning.... It is very encouraging to note that most of the major Icelandic rivers are showing an increase of over 30% against their ten year average.”

European Salmon have been steadily decreasing due to a number of factors. The main problems are; Cross contamination by farmed salmon. This has led to the spread of diseases to wild populations, especially sea lice; Commercial overfishing, especially in the Faroes and Greenland; Climate change is now also having an impact on salmon populations. As cold-blooded fish, salmon struggle to survive when the temperature of streams and rivers rises above 20 degrees Celsius.; Habitat loss and degradation of stream pools; Lack of force behind regulations and rules designed to help salmon populations recover.”

“Simplifying salmon production into the factory-like operation of hatcheries gives the illusion of efficiency, control, and success. Just look at all those thousands of little salmon in the hatchery raceways; its a vision of success. In reality it is a well-crafted illusion enhanced by positive, if not always honest, spin.”

The Tweed River in Scotland has the largest salmon population in Europe “Here the problems of salmon-friendly habitat were vigorously addressed. The hundreds of miles of miniature streams feeding the bigger branches and the hundred-mile main river were protected from trampling cattle and over-numerous sheep with fencing. Riparian zones were brought back into a condition they would not have seen since before Man started serious farming... the whole effort was vindicated not only with wonderfully recuperated young salmon densities but dizzying catches by anglers, peaking in 2011.”

“Chemicals are used in ever-greater quantities and ever-greater numbers to combat epidemics and sea lice [in farmed salmon] which, especially since 2009, have acquired immunity... Physical over-crowding, to an extinct which would never be allowed for land animals, takes place below the waves, out of sight. Some salmon farms now contain one-and-a-half million fish. Individual pens can hold 200,000 salmon... Where these farms are most concentrated, wild salmon have almost totally expired.”

“Today the salmon is one of the cheapest of culinary fish... Farmed Atlantic salmon, from cages in Norwegian fjords, Scottish sea-lochs and — increasingly — the cool seas of southern Chile, is so abundant and inexpensive that it is consumed year- round in vast amounts. Despite health scares over chemicals involved in its production, it is so ridiculously cheap...”

“The 2004 season brought large numbers of Atlantic salmon to a great many salmon rivers. I believe it was the result of all the NASF-style agreements that now protect so much of the wild salmon’s Atlantic range. This policy of paying commercial fishermen to stop netting salmon — is the simplest and most effective way of putting more spawners into the rivers.”

“The River Tweed Commissioners have announced that there was a 46 percent increase in rod-caught salmon numbers in 2003. Almost 14,000 fish were recorded, the most since accurate record-keeping began in 1963... Nick Yongue, director of the Tweed Foundation, added, “There is little doubt our initiative to reduce exploitation by nets has played its part too. Reduced coastal estuary netting and now the substantial closure of the North-east drift-net fishery have helped a great deal.”

“The North Atlantic Salmon Conservation Organization (NASCO) – the treaty organization responsible for the international management of Atlantic salmon – has described the gravity of the situation thus: Many populations are threatened, despite the major sacrifices resulting from the increasingly stringent management measures which have been implemented in the last decade. Very strong conservation measures have been taken but the salmon are still not responding in the way that had been hoped. Through the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea(ICES), emphasis has been placed on managing salmon stocks on a river-by-river basis.”

“Acid precipitation has, for many years, reduced the pH levels of aquatic environments to toxic levels... Because of their sensitivity to changes in pH, and in particular to aluminum, salmon alevins and smolt are among the first organisms affected... In 1995 officials of the Environment Ministry stated that 18 Norwegian salmon populations had become extinct due to acidification.”

“A ‘few years ago when salmon were plentiful, fishing tickets were hard to come by — but these days have gone. No salmon were taken there in 1990... At Nursling, which used to produce an annual catch of around 500 salmon, only 95 were caught in 1990, ‘which for these days is good.’”

The first known Atlantic salmon to reappear in the Sieg, a tributary of the Rhine, which was once the most important spawning and nursery stream for the Rhine’s salmon population, is spotted in 1990.

“In 1989-91, 40% of the commercial catch from the ocean feeding ground north of the Faroes consisted of farm escapees. Subsequent figures are closer to 20%, and most originated from Norwegian salmon farms. Today, there are escaped farm salmon running upstream and spawning with the wild stock in just about every river... Escaped farmed salmon breeding with wild salmon constituted a major threat to the genetic integrity, survival and production of the wild fish.”