134 SALMON"ID^ OF BRITAIN". 



stifficient discussion and owing to wliicli Ireland in 1851 liad to deplore the 

 prostration and ruin of her salmon fisheries. 



It was held in 1842, as many assert now, that by extending the period for and 

 means of capturing salmon an augmented supply would be obtained.* That fixed 

 engines in a river were a monopoly, to remedy which they legalized a new monopoly 

 by fixtures in the sea and tideway and thus the last state of monopoly was worse than 

 the first. Then came the Act of 1863 which cleared away these fixed engines or 

 bag-nets from the Irish rivers and opened Queen's gaps in weirs where none 

 previously existed. The result was that soon a considerable increase became 

 observable in the take of salmon. But now a new difficulty set in, for with an 

 ind'ease of fish came a great augmentation of draft-nets, and in some rivers the 

 fisheries are now, and greatly from this canse, said to be hastening towards the 

 condition they were in prior to 1863. 



A Bill was introduced in 1885, observed the Conservators of No. 4 district of 

 the River Blackwater, " under the auspices of the National Party of Ireland, whoso 

 avowed intention is to benefit the poor fishermen of that country; but the 

 inevitable result of which legislation would be eventually to ruin the industry." 

 Its jDurport was to curtail the annual close season by forty-four days, and the 

 weekly close time by twelve hours,t to legalize the use of the half-tram net which 

 was abolished in 1863 : to establish different seasons for different divisions of the 

 same river, and to separate the season for trout fishing with the rod from that of 

 salmon fishing by the same means. J 



14 cwt. 3 qr. 19 lb. ; 1872, G tons 3 cwt. 1 qr. 7 lb. As a ton is of about the average value of £120 

 tliis sliows produce of between £700 and £800 a year from a river that at first was letting at 

 £170 (Major Hayes, Select Committee on Salmon Fisheries (Ireland), 1885, p. 45). Tlie reasons 

 adduced for tlie improvement subsequent to the Act of 1863 were, to the additional weekly close 

 season and the restricting of netting to the lower waters. 



Respecting the Inver Mr. Sinclair gave evidence (I.e.) that the Act of 1863 effected a great 

 improvement for a certain number of years owing to its removing the bag-nets that had been 

 legalized in 1842, but since then fixed draught-nets or half-tram nets have done incalculable 

 injury ; the figures he adduced for the river were as follows : — 5 years ending 18G8, annual average 

 take, salmon 292, trout 1284 ; 5 years ending 1873, salmon 1066, trout 391 ; 5 years ending 1878, 

 salmon 468, trout 736 ; 6 years ending 1884, salmon 245, trout 904. 



* See note, p. 131 (ante). 



f Some sea fishermen went further, in fact proposing to give them the extra twelve hours, 

 but to refuse it to the river fishermen. Thus a coast fisherman, " Mr. Leake, lessee of a consider- 

 able net salmon fishery on the coast of Donegal, about three miles in extent, and entirely in the 

 sea, said that he fished with a bag-net and a draft-net. He fished from May to August. He was of 

 opinion that he should be allowed to fish until six o'clock, because the sea was a very rough 

 place, and you could not fish more than four days a week. As to the rivers, the fishermen could 

 always fish, and he was of opinion the close time for rivers should not be reduced from forty- 

 eight hours to thirty-six. The annual close time should remain as it is." — Evidence before 

 Select Committee of House of Commons, 1885. 



X " The salmon fisheries are now retrograding towards the condition in which they were found 

 by the Act of 1863, when, as every one knows, the extinction of vast numbers of bag-nets and 

 other fixed engines was followed by much increased protection of the spawning-grounds, and 

 a consequent revival of the fisheries, although they never entirely recovered from the low condition 

 to which they had been reduced by the legalization of all sorts of fixed engines in 1842. This 

 revival, however, Avas forthwith followed by an immense increase of legal and illegal fishing at sea, 

 which from the first was so destructive as to discourage the owners of the minor rivers (which 

 are the heaviest sufferers) from resuming the protection of most of those which had been 

 abandoned, and in this district (Ballyshannon) numbered five. The earliest of the reports of the 

 inspectors of Irish fisheries to which I have an opportunity of referring to at present is that 

 for 1870. Comparing it with that for 1883, just published, I find that the destructive engines 

 licensed for salmon capture, exclusive, of course, of rods, have increased in number from 1200 in 

 the former year, to 1750 in the latter, that is nearly fifty per cent. Of this increase, that of draft 

 and drift-nets is from 790 to 1214, and this increase is annually progressing in every district in 

 Ireland except Ballyshannon, where there is an actual decrease, because drift-nets have not as 

 yet been introduced there, and tlie draft-net men find it more economical to fish without licence, 

 as they have, except in specially circumstanced stations, every facility for doing. Tliis decrease 

 is from thirty-four in 1870 to twenty-seven in 1884, and as of the twenty-seven, about ten belong 

 to river proprietors, it would seem that the sea licences have decreased by about thirty-five per 

 cent., but they will rapidly increase again if Mr. Blake's Bill for allowing boats to fish at 

 half tram becomes law, as all now fishing either draft or drift-nets can at once turn them into 



fixed engines, a ' half-tram.' Boards of Conservators should have power to cause 



sufficient watchers to be employed on tlie rivers within their districts, as well as to take possession 



