of the Fishery Board for Scotland. 
39 
district — one in Assynt, the other in Eddrachillis. 50,000 can be hatched 
in each. A quantity of ova from the Duke of Sutherland's Hatchery at 
Brora has been imported into the district. In obtaining ova from the 
rivers, the proportion of male fish far exceeded that of female — five to one. 
In the Lochy and Spean the fishing was nearly a half better in 1891 than Answers froni 
in the previous year. There are no nets on the rivers; all the fishing is the Lochy 
by rod. The angling is the best on the West Coast of Scotland. It is and S P ean ' 
suggested that a small steam-launch would aid much in enforcing the 
observance of the bye-laws. The police, coastguard, and preventive men 
should also be called on to assist. There are twenty-two watchers on the 
Lochy and Spean, and the protection is as efficient as is compatible with 
a reasonable outlay ; but there is a good deal of poaching on the sea 
coast. There are no artificial obstructions, but there is a natural 
obstruction on the Spean at the Falls of Mounessie which could be blasted 
without much difficulty, and another further up at Inverlair, which would 
be more costly to make passable for salmon. These obstructions shut out 
salmon from about 40 miles of river, and several lochs. The salmon 
disease showed itself in 1887 both in kelts and clean fish ; but there has 
been no noticeable increase. It is suggested that fishermen, dealers or 
others, having salmon or fish of the salmon kind in their possession, 
should be obliged to give an account to watchers or other persons in 
authority of how the fish came into their possession, and that dealers and 
shopkeepers should be obliged to keep a book, like game-dealers, in which 
their purchases are entered, and from whom. This to apply to all seasons 
of the year, and the legal presumption to be against the possessor of the 
salmon or fish of the salmon kind. It is further suggested that no 
fish of the salmon kind should be sold in any district after the nets are 
off. 
Mr A. Johnstone Douglas, the Chairman of the Annan District Board, Chairman of 
expresses his views, as follows, with regard to the vexed and thorny Solway Annan 
Question, which has been considered by so many Special Commissions B^rd* 
since Mr Buckland and I reported on it in 1871, but which has never as 
yet been attempted to be solved by Legislation, without which there can 
be no adequate or satisfactory solution : — 'Nothing short of Legislation,' 
writes Mr Douglas, 1 for regulating the whole of the fishings on the 
• English and Scotch shores of the Solway, can possibly unravel the 
' tangled skene of laws at present applicable to the Solway Firth. The 
' right of salmon and the public right of white-fishing has, for many years, 
' been in serious conflict on the Scotch side of the Solway, and the 
' Legislature should step in and define the rights of the conflicting 
' interests. The paiddle-net fishers at Pow-foot are a respectable in- 
£ dustrious class of men who have had their legitimate and lawful trade 
1 well-nigh confiscated and abolished by the action of one of the largest of 
' the stake-net lessees. Water-bailiffs or the police should be armed at all 
' times with the necessary powers of search for fish suspected of being 
' illegally caught, and the law at present regulating the traffic in game 
' should be made applicable to fish.' 
Mr Douglas states that ' the annual close-time is not observed by the 
' whammel-net fishers who fish out with the jurisdiction of the Annan 
' District Board beyond low-water-mark. The 9th section of the Solway 
' Act, 1804, is inoperative, inasmuch as it does not apply to the sea; 
c and, consequently, the only process available by the proprietors of 
1 Salmon Fishings to protect their right is by way of civil interdict, a 
' costly and expensive method of proceeding. The annual weekly close- 
1 times differ on the English and Scotch shores of the Solway. They 
' should be made the same ; and any fisherman, holding a license from the 
