REASONS FOR THE DECREASE OF SALMON. 247 



caused by them, where they are set near the mouths of 

 rivers, is the enormous numbers of salmon-fry or smolts 

 which they kill. Jammed together in masses of wrack 

 and sea-weed, thousands on thousands are sacrificed in a 

 tide ; and I have heard it stated on good authority, that 

 on an occasion when one of the fishermen in the Beulay 

 Firth waded out to attend to the net, that by the net in 

 many places he waded knee-deep in dead smolts, while the 

 ground for a considerable distance about the net ivas literally 

 silvered with their scales ! After this, can any one wonder 

 at salmon decreasing 1 The wear-and-tear of gear in this 

 mode of fishing is very great ; indeed, it is the most 

 expensive as well as the most destructive of all the modes 

 of fishing. These nets, too, cannot well be made to ob- 

 serve close-time, even if one be appointed, as in very 

 rough weather it may be impossible to remove any portion 

 of them for weeks and weeks together ; and if stress of 

 weather be permitted as an excuse for not opening them, 

 every breeze will be so construed. It is not too much to 

 say, that fixed nets have been the chief cause of the 

 damage done to our salmon fisheries, and it is impossilde 

 thoroughly to regenerate those fisheries while they are 

 permitted to exist. 



By the law of England and the old laws of Ireland and 

 Scotland, they are or were, as I have said, illegal. They 

 are a comparatively modern invention, and the failure of our 

 salmon fisheries may clearly and distinctly be traced, step 

 by step, from the time of their first introduction ; l and they 



1 A singular proof of this is in the last report of the Irish 

 Fishery Board. During the last three years, in consequence of the 



