X 
Report on Salmon Fisheries. 
' deter them in their upward passage. . Fish caught in the hang- 
' nets in the Tyne are not so good as those caught with other nets, 
1 inasmuch as they are both hanged and drowned. They struggle 
1 in the net till dead, and the flesh then becomes soddened with 
' water. The fish caught in the whammel-nets in the Solway are, 
' probably by the same rule, not so good as those caught in the 
' stake and draft-nets.' 
Mr Dunbar on The late Mr Dunbar, Brawl Castle, Thurso, for several years 
Superintendent of his Grace the Duke of Sutherland's Salmon 
Fisheries, agrees with and corroborates Mr Buckland's views : — 
'Hang-nets' — he writes, 'should be entirely abolished ; they are 
' the worst nets ever invented; they kill the foul as well as the 
' clean fish ; the fishermen cannot help it ; they are blown up to 
' an unnatural size by being hours dead, and they are just, like any 
■ drowned or strangled animal, unfit for human food/ 
Mr Joseph Mr Joseph Napier, who has been Superintendent of the Forth 
evidence about Salmon Fisheries for 23 years, and who has had several years' 
Hang-nets. experience of the working of hang-nets in the Forth, recently gave 
the following evidence with regard to them before the Commission 
on Crown Eights in Scotch Salmon Waters: — ' The hang-net is a 
' system which has been introduced into the Forth District within 
' the last 14 or 15 years. First of all a man from Buckhaven 
' started it with one net, and he was successful, and it has gone on 
' increasing every year, until last year there were between 50 and 
' 60 nets between Alloa and Kincardine. These nets are from 
' 100 to 200 yards long. They are 9 feet deep. They are loaded 
' with lead sinkers and are floated with cork floats so as to make 
' them stand perpendicularly ; and when 50 or 60 of these are 
' stretched across a district of 5 or 6 miles, it is almost an impos- 
4 sibility for any fish to get past them up to the upper waters. 
' The fish that are caught in the hang-net are hung by the gills. 
' The mesh of the net is 10 inches — that is 3 inches above the 
' mesh of the sweep-net which is allowed by Act of Parliament. 
' The hang-netter has thus a benefit. There is a penalty on any 
' person using a net with a mesh of less than 7 inches, but there 
' is no penalty attached to anyone using a net with a mesh above 7 
' inches so that the hang-netter has the benefit of that and works 
' accordingly. There are tw T o men in each boat and sometimes 
' there are three. Upwards of 100 men were employed last year in 
' that mode of fishing. They are not regular fishermen at all. 
' They are men who are employed at other work — dock labourers, 
' shoemakers, blacksmiths, and others — who leave their ordinary 
' work and go off to this fishing, and this in the very throng of 
' the run of the salmon to the upper waters in July and August. 
' They make a good thing of it. They get permission from a person 
' at Dunmore who takes the fishings from the Earl of Dunmore 
' and pays a small rent and lets them to all and sundry for 15s. 
' a boat. These men are not regular fishermen and I regret to say 
' that they are mostly of a very outrageous character. Our Board 
' have been at considerable expense during last year in keeping an 
' extra staff of men to put down poaching and protect the fisheries 
' during the annual and weekly close times. Several very severe 
' conflicts have taken place between the bailiffs and poachers, the 
