TEMPERATURE changes in the North Atlantic could be the cause of the disastrous drop in salmon and trout stocks in Scotland, a Government Minister warned yesterday.
Scottish Office Minister Lord Sewel was commenting on reports that salmon could be wiped out on many of the great fishing rivers within two years.
The decline is very marked in north-west Scotland, and some experts point the finger of blame at disease spread by commercial fish farms.
But Lord Sewel said: ''We have certainly had two very bad years and it's difficult to understand why.
''It's not geographically specific; the east coast is suffering as badly as the west coast, so it can't be linked to fish farms because on the east coast we don't have any and yet the Aberdeenshire Dee is in a very bad state,'' he said on Radio 4.
''I suspect it is most likely to do with temperature changes in the North Atlantic, which affects the feed stock for the salmon itself.''
Habitat management and catch-and-release schemes could provide a way to deal with the problem, which would affect the Highland tourist industry, he said.
Dr James Butler, a fisheries biologist of the Wester Ross fisheries trust charity, told the programme the decline could partly be blamed on the El Nino effect.
''What the Minister said about temperature changes affecting salmon numbers is very true for all of the North Atlantic salmon-producing countries,'' he said.
''But he was ignoring the problem in north-west Scotland, which is the horrendous decline in sea trout. They have been decimated by something more complicated.''
The area was affected by a ''nasty cocktail'' of problems, of which climate change was one, Dr Butler said.
He urged the Scottish Office to act over the crisis, saying there had been a dramatic increase in predators, including grey seals, as well as over-fishing in The Minch, which affected the salmon and sea trout's food supplies.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article