of the Fishery Board for Scotland. 



91 



pure, it is surely wiser to convert the waste either into something useful, or 

 at least into something harmless. 



I venture to think that if this question were carefully regarded with 

 the definite object of securing a minimum of loss to the manufacturing 

 industries, and an adequate treatment to secure a standard of purity 

 suitable to the conditions involved, it would be possible to do very much 

 to stop the cancer which is eating into the heart of our salmon fisheries. 



The standard of purity would necessarily vary under different con- 

 ditions. A highly toxic effluent poured into the estuary of a river of 

 large volume might involve a large outlay in order to secure a high 

 standard of purity, but with the free mixing of a large volume of water, 

 and the regular influx of tides, a high standard might be quite unnecessary. 

 The converse is equally true. The practical issue comes when the 

 standard is arrived at, and when the authority competent to decide upon 

 the standard, and to see that it is reached, is set up. The percentage 

 of oxygen, the solids in suspension, and the stable or instable properties 

 of the solids, are of infinite value to the life and well-being of salmon 

 fry, and to the food necessary for the fry, the parr, and the smolts before 

 they depart to the sea. The question in a particular case would have 

 to be, is existing pollution harmful, and if so, what standard of purity 

 is necessary to secure safety to the fish without undue outlay to the 

 pollutors. 



After all, the business of salmon netting all round our coasts is 

 absolutely dependent upon the breeding of the fish in the rivers, and 

 is an industry as deserving of consideration as many of those which at 

 present cause pollution in the rivers. 



If I may draw attention to an instance of former neglect of salmon 

 fisheries elsewhere, I might refer to the great natural stock of salmon 

 which existed on the eastern coast of North America in early days, to 

 the disastrous and unregulated treatment of the rivers by the erection of 

 lumber mills, obstructive racks, to the loading of the river beds with saw 

 dust, so that fish could neither reach the high spawning grounds nor 

 deposit their eggs in the lower reaches, and how the salmon fisheries died 

 out, till, at great expense, the American Government commenced to 

 re-establish them. 



The operation in this country has been less rapid, but the increase 

 of pollutions is insidious and none the less real. With the process of 

 time a pollution seldom gets better any more than a weir gets less steep. 

 Many industries are developing under the changed conditions which now 

 obtain, and not a few examples have recently arisen where much un- 

 necessary harm has been done to the fisheries. 



In the course of my inspections in 1917, I visited several districts to 

 which I may now make reference. 



Annan. 



I commenced at the eastern end of the Solway area, and first gave 

 attention to the new conditions in which salmon fisheries are placed from 

 the extensive manufacturing operations in the neighbourhood of Gretna. 

 The salmon fisheries above the Viaduct have been purchased by a Govern- 

 ment Department, and are now being fished under the former manager. 

 Before visiting the various stake nets above the Viaduct I ascertained 

 that the Newbie nets were doing very fairly well. Also that only some 

 five or six boats have been whammelling from the fishery leased by the 

 Office of Woods to the Annan Fishermen's Association. The latter fishery 

 may now be regarded as the nucleus of the openly practised whammelling, 



