240 



Appendices to Thirty -fi,rst Annual Report 



APPENDIX O. 

 SALMON FISHERIES. 



MR CALDERWOOD'S REPORT. 



Fishery Board for Scotland, 

 March 1913. 



I have the honour to report upon my inspections, etc., in 1912. 



Thurso. 



Li7nits of Estuary. 



For a considerable number of years the salmon netting in this district 

 has been very considerably reduced. In order to improve the general stock 

 of fish in the neighbourhood, all nets were removed from the river Thurso 

 and its estuary, and all bag-nets were also taken out of Thurso Bay. 

 Early in 1912, however, the Ulbster fishings situated in the estuary and 

 Bay of Thurso were let to a tacksman, and nets were again put on. Owing 

 to the positions in which certain of the nets were erected, a dispute arose 

 as to the proper limits of the estuary, it being contended by the District 

 Fishery Board that a line of fixed nets were placed inside the hmits of the 

 estuary. Reference to Schedule B of the Salmon Fisheries (Scotland) Act, 

 1868, shows the limits of the estuary to be " A portion of a circle 400 yards 

 " radius drawn from a centre placed mid channel at the line of low water of 

 " equinoctial spring tides, and continued to the shore at high water by 

 " tangents, that on the east being to a point 500 yards north-east of 

 " Thurso Castle, and that on the west being in the direction of the Toll 

 House." It was this latter line, in the direction of the Toll House, which 

 gave rise to difficulty, partly because the words "in the direction of" are 

 somewhat vague, but chiefly because the Toll House has been removed, and 

 its previous site seemed to be a matter of some uncertainty. It was 

 further contended that there were two Toll Houses, and this seems to have 

 been the case, but one existed on each side of the town of Thurso, and only 

 one could be regarded as having been referred to in the direction of the 

 western line of the estuary. I had considerable correspondence with 

 regard to the difficulty ; and as the establishment of the site of a landmark 

 of this kind is of some importance, I went into the matter on the spot with 

 Mr. Keitli, who sits as Chairman of the District Board as mandatory for 

 Sir ToUemache Sinclair, and with Mr. Keith Murray, who acts as Clerk to 

 the Board. I was passing through Thurso on my way to Shetland at the 

 time, where my purpose was to survey the oyster grounds of the islands in 

 question. Some old maps in the Ulbster Estate Office showed a Toll House 

 marked at the outskirts of the town, and on calling on Mr. Dunbar, the 

 natuT-alist and antiquarian of the district, and brother to the late Mr. 

 Dunbar who for long was tenant of the Ulbster fishings, the site of this 

 Toll House was pointed out to me. Mr. Dunbar took me to a point on the 

 western side of the town where Durness Street and Olrig Street join to 

 form the main thoroughfare in the direction of Scrabster and Reay. Here 

 on the left hand side of the road, in a waste piece of ground grown over 



