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Appendices to Second Annual Report 



used to raise the level of the loch to such au extent that the river, 

 receiving the accumulated waters from this extensive reservoir, over- 

 flowed its banks, and damaged the productive lowlands below Ness 

 Glen. With a view of putting a stop to this, the two chief proprietors 

 of the loch, the Earl of Cassilis and Mr Macadam of Craigengillan, 

 in the end of last century, cut tunnels through the rock at the exit 

 of Loch Doon, and constructed sluices intended to regulate and 

 control the outflow of the water. The experiment, however, was 

 not successful. The land gained from the loch by lowering its 

 level was of little value, and the other objects aimed at were 

 not attained. There are two sluices at the top of Ness Glen, each 

 6 feet in width and 6 feet 8 inches in depth, raised by levers so 

 situated that for weeks together they cannot be worked in time of 

 flood. There should be a wooden staging so placed as to enable 

 them to be worked at all times. The tunnels cut through the 

 rock to the river below are 66 feet long. One of the sluices is 

 kept open all the year round ; the other is scarcely ever opened. 

 The rush of water through the open passage is in general too violent 

 to allow of the free ascent of salmon. In the first part of the 

 valuable Report above alluded to, Mr Leslie and Mr Shaw write 

 as follows about the supply of water in Loch Doon:— Of course 

 ' the present supply of water ought to be carefully preserved from 

 1 diminution; and, further, we consider that it would be of immense 

 ' advantage to the mills, the fishings, and to the lowlands adjoining 

 ' the river, which are now liable to be flooded, to increase the 

 ' available storage of Loch Doon, by raising its high-water level. 

 ' This would make it always capable of receiving and storing up 

 ' the summer and autumn floods, which are those which do most 

 ' mischief by inundating the lowlands and carrying off the crops or 

 ' injuring them. The advantages to the mills, fisheries, &c, of a 

 ' storage of water in Loch Doon, cannot be too strongly impressed 

 ' on the minds of the heritors of the river Doon ; for the value of 

 ' the water-power would be most materially enhanced, and in dry 

 ' weather there would be a much larger body of water in the river 

 ' than at present, which would greatly facilitate the ascent of the 

 ' salmon. The present area of the loch, by the Ordnance Survey, 

 1 is fully 1240 acres, and its outlet is such that a large additional 

 ' quantity of water may be impounded at a very small expense.' 



At the conclusion of the second part of their Report, they 

 farther write : — ' As before stated in the first section of our Report, 

 ' we recommend, both for the sake of the mills and of the fisheries, 

 ' that the storage of Loch Doon should be increased by raising its 

 ' high-water level ; by which means, without any damage to 

 ' property beyond flooding a small protion of moorlands on its snores, 

 1 there might be an available depth got of 20 feet. This would 

 1 give a storage of 1080 millions of cubic feet, which would give 



* 4000 cubic feet a minute for six months in the year, in addition to 

 4 the natural flow of the river. This quantity would fill a rect- 

 ' angular channel of 12 feet wide and 2 feet 8 inches deep, falling 

 ' 1 in 4000, or nearly 16 inches per mile. In the event of this 

 ' being done, we consider that it would be necessary to have two 



* salmon ladders for the ascent of the salmon ; one to be used when 



