THE SALMON 



429 



in fresh water when the streams are low 

 through drought. Generahy speaking. 

 Salmon are plentiful in the rivers in a 

 wet season. In times of heavy rainfall, 

 they enter small tributaries and rivulets, 

 and remain in them until the water 

 subsides. The brook that a man can 

 bound across will often hold Salmon 

 during a rainy winter, and even during 

 an August flood a few fish will venture 

 into it. Some seasons are notable for 

 the number of big Salmon captured in 

 the nets at the mouths of rivers, and 



of sewage matter in the rivers. Although 

 stringent measures have been taken to 

 inhibit the contamination of some of 

 our best Salmon streams, there are 

 ri\ers, such as the Ystwyth in ^^'ales, 

 which are now quite Ashless through pol- 

 lution from mines. At one time Salmon 

 ascended the Thames, and efforts are now 

 being made to restock the river with these 

 fish. But while the tidal waters contain 

 impurities deterrent to travelling Salmon, 

 the experiment is doomed to failure. 

 There is, however, hope that the Thames 



by anglers in the streams, while others is becoming a purer stream below Lon- 

 are remarkable for the scarcity of the don Bridge. Perhaps within the next 

 heavier fish. twenty years we may see fresh-run 



A twenty-pound Salmon is a fine fish, Salmon leaping in Teddington Weirpool. 

 but there are much weightier Salmon Walter M. Gallichan. 



in our waters. Fishermen 

 regard a " fifty-pounder " 

 as a splendid prize indeed, 

 and yet this is by no 

 means the ' ' record weight ' ' 

 for Salmon. Seventy and 

 eighty pounds are not com- 

 mon weights for Salmon, 

 though fish of this great 

 growth have been caught. 

 The enormous weight of 

 103 lb. has been recently 

 recorded by Mr. W. L. 

 Calderwood, the Inspector 

 of Fisheries for Scotland, 

 who states that this big- 

 gest of all British Salmon 

 was caught in the Forth, 

 a few miles below Stirling. 

 It was a dark-coloured, 

 male fish. The Tay, in 

 1869, yielded a Salmon of 

 84 lb., which was, up to 

 that date, the heaviest 

 fish of its species taken 

 in our British waters. 



There are several causes 

 that tend to the decrease 

 in the number of Salmon 

 in the rivers of the United 

 Kingdom. The most im- 

 portant of these is pollu- 

 tion of the waters, through 

 washings from lead and 

 other mines, or the presence a shallow that salmon will not cross. 



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