of the Fishery Board for Scotland. 371 



termed a ' haevie.' It resembles a large landing net, and is poked under the 

 bank of the stream, and swept through the pools. 



From A to B, 2 feet to 3 feet ; A C B, a hoop lashed to a handle at C ; 

 A B, a cord joining ends of hoop ; D, bag-net. 



It is scarcely necessary to point out what an infernal machine this must be 

 for the destruction of fish in the narrow Orcadian burns during the spawning 

 season. 



In the course of my inspection, I rowed round the whole of the Lochs 

 of Stenness and Harray, and was very much impressed with their extra- 

 ordinary capabilities, if properly managed, and the way in which they 

 have been ruined by wasteful and illegal modes of fishing. At the head 

 of the Loch of Harray there is a stream which flows from a small loch 

 called the Loch of Rango, belonging to Mr Watt of Skaills. It is 

 strictly preserved, and is said to contain very heavy trout. All the chief 

 spawning tributaries of the Loch of Harray flow in on the east side, 

 through the land belonging to, and occupied by, the Harray lairds. It 

 seems to me that no amount of fair fishing would reduce the trout as they 

 have been reduced in the Lochs of Harray and Stenness, — there is such 

 a vast expanse of water, such a good bottom, and such abundance and 

 variety of feeding. Illegal fishing, and more especially the destruction of 

 the fish on the spawning beds, are the only things that will account for 

 the falling off. 



When I had finished my inspection of the Loch of Stenness, I drove 

 from Stromness to the Loch of Boardhouse, a distance of about twelve 

 miles. The lower extremity of this loch is situated close to the spacious 

 ruins of the ancient palace of Birsay, which has not been occupied for about 

 two hundred years. There is a comfortable and well-kept inn near the 

 mouth of the stream, which flows from the loch into the bay of Birsay. 

 The loch is a fine sheet of water, two miles long by a mile wide. It con- 

 tains fair trout, averaging half-a-pound, and some attaining a much larger 

 size. They are not equal in quality to the trout in the Loch of Stenness. 

 It is stated in the Old Statistical Account of the parishes of Birsay and 

 Harray, published about a hundred years ago, that 



There are two or three fine burns, one of which washes the middle of the 

 Barony ; and sometimes through the Barony Burn a salmon may chance to run 

 up, but always at an unseasonable time of the year. 



There has been a change for the worse since then, for neither salmon nor 

 sea-trout can now ascend through the Barony Burn, though it is the longest 

 stream in Orkney, and contains abundance of water after a flood to permit 

 the passage of salmon. This is owing to a great bar of gravel, washed up by 

 the heavy seas that roll into Birsay Bay, which stretches right across its 

 mouth, over or through which no fish can pass from the bay. A similar 

 bar, though not so bad a one, obstructs the mouth of the river Berriedale, 

 in Caithness, and greatly interferes with the ascent of salmon. 



I heard from persons in the neighbourhood that the fishing in the Loch 

 of Boardhouse is very much injured by the use of the otter, in defiance of 



