Report on Salmon Fisheries. 
xv u 
triennial election provided for by section 24 of the Salmon 
Fisheries Act of 1862. 
3. Every District Board, within its own district, should have the Power to 
same poAvers for the prevention of pollutions in rivers and waters ^prevent 08 ^ 
as are at present competent to riparian owners in such district, pollutions. 
At present District Boards have no such power, and they can only 
prosecute under the 13th section of the Salmon Fisheries Act of 
1862, and its so-called Amendment, by the 16th section of the Act 
of 1868, which have proved utterly inadequate to prevent or abate 
pollutions. 
4. It was recently decided in the case of Captain Dunbar Proprietors of 
Brander of Pitgaveny, who is proprietor of Salmon Fishings in the sea fisheries to be 
in the district of the River Lossie, and lessee of all the rod-fishings entitled to pro- 
in that river, that he was not entitled to prosecute the manu- ^{^ond?" 
facturers on the Lossie for having no hecks on the lades and no Bye-laws where 
fish-passes on the dams connected with their manufactories/because 8?!?."* ™° ^ 
i • ' t-v -n i x • ii ^/-w i • c District Board. 
there is no District Board for the Lossie, and the 29th section of 
the Salmon Fisheries Act of 1862 provides that, ' In the event of 
' any person refusing or neglecting to obey any Bye-law made by 
' the Commissioners, the Clerk may apply to the Sheriff by 
■ summary petition in ordinary form, praying to have such person 
' ordained to obey the same, and the Sheriff shall take such pro- 
' ceedings and make such orders thereupon as he shall think fit/ 
It has been held that, under this section, no one but the Clerk to 
a District Board can prosecute for the contravention of a Bye- 
law ; and the effect of this decision is simply to make the Salmon 
Fishery Acts and relative Bye-laws inapplicable and useless in the 
numerous fishery districts where there are no District Boards ; 
for the Bye-laws regulate districts, estuaries, close-time, meshes 
of nets, dams, lades and water-wheels, cruives, and fixed 
engines ; and, if no one but the Clerk to a District Board can bring 
an action for a breach of any of these Bye -laws, it is clear that, 
wherever there is no District Board, the Bye-laws may be violated 
with impunity * The remedy is either to insert after the word 
' Clerk/ in the above quoted section, the words ' or any pro- 
* prietor of salmon fisheries in the district/ or to make an addition 
to the 37th section of the Salmon Fisheries Act of 1868, which 
will then read as follows — the additional words being printed in 
italics : — \ Any proprietor of a fishery shall be held to have a good 
* title and interest at law to sue by action any other proprietor or 
* occupier of a fishery within the district, or any other person who 
' shall use any illegal engine or illegal mode of fishing for catch- 
' ing salmon within the district, or who shall contravene or fail to 
' observe any Bye-law. 7 
5. In addition to hecks upon lades, there should be a provision smolt proof- 
for smolt-proof gratings above mill-wheels, and especially above g ^ c r ^ .[{Jove 
turbine-wheels, at the time when the smolts are descending to mill-wheels, 
the sea. Diagrams illustrating the construction «md use of such 
smolt-guards will be found in Appendix No. 10 to the Report of 
the Select Committee appointed to inquire into the present state 
of the laws affecting the Salmon Fisheries of England and Wales, 
printed in 1870. The 30th clause of 'The Salmon Fisheries 
* See also the case of 1 Blair v. Sandeman & Lumsden, 20th July, 1869.' 
S. F. b 
