28 
Appendices to Ninth Annual Report 
Knowes dam is a serious obstruction, and when I saw it, the river 
being very low, scarcely a drop of water was coming over the apron of 
the dam, which consists, first, of a steep slope 13|- feet long, with a 
gradient of about 1 in 4, and then of an almost flat pavement 13 feet 
long, making the whole length of the dam-face 26|- feet. The river below 
the dam was almost dry, and it is quite clear that in low states of the 
stream no fish can possibly ascend Knowes dam, as at such times nearly 
all the water in the river is carried off by the intake-lade, and scarcely a 
drop is allowed to come over the dam. When the river is high, fish are 
said to get over close to the right bank. It would be easy, and not 
expensive, to enable them to pass over by a cut made round this right- 
hand corner of the dam. 
The tide comes above Tyninghame Bridge, and often dams back 
the river. 
I walked down to the sea by the public road from Tyninghame Village. 
The mouth of the Tyne trends towards rocks to the westwards. At low 
water there is but a small shallow mouth, in places almost lost in the 
sands. The tide ascends and dams back the river as far as Tyninghame 
Bridge, or somewhat above the bridge — a distance of about 2 miles from 
the sea. The tide expands the river at high water into an extensive lake, 
separated from the spacious bay outside by a peninsula thickly covered by 
aquatic shrubs and plants on what are called the Salt Greens in front of 
Tyninghame House. The greens form a fine feature in the grounds around 
that magnificent residence ; being at one time a glittering sheet of water, 
and at another an expanse of verdant sward dotted over with sheep, and 
in summer richly covered with sea pinks. 
While inspecting the Tyne, I saw no salmon, nor was I able to procure 
a salmon taken from that river ; and the weight of evidence from persons 
qualified to speak seemed to be in favour of the Tyne being at present a 
bull-trout or sea-trout rather than a salmon river.* 
But I have been favoured with a statement from a gentleman, 
upwards of 80 years of age, who, in his younger days, was thoroughly 
acquainted with the Tyne as an angler ; and he unhesitatingly and em- 
phatically states that, in his early life, the Tyne was a salmon river, and 
that salmon were caught in it in considerable numbers and sent to the 
Edinburgh market for sale. 
He writes as follows : — 
Is the Tyne a salmon river ? I unhesitatingly reply yes, as witness what 
follows. I have personally, as an angler on the river from Pencaitland to 
Tyninghame Bridge, known this river since 1817 ; have caught a 7i lb. salmon, 
in the Dovecot Pool, below Blairston Mill, with fly, and hooked another at 
Knowes Mill dam-head ; have leistered salmon in Knowes Mill tail-dam ; have 
seen them spawning on the redds below Knowes Mill dam-head, and on the 
shallows above it and below Redheugh, Prestonkirk ; have seen them leaping 
the Preston Mill and Barley Mill dam-heads, and Linton Linn in crowds ; and 
have seen them leistered above the linn, and taken in nets below the linn, as 
heavy as 9^ lbs. The late Mr Andrew Meikle rented the tideway salmon 
fishings from the Earl of Haddington, and sold his salmon regularly for many 
years, and many were taken and sold from the stake-nets on Belhaven sands, 
and taken in the Beil Burn heloiv the dam.' ivaste near the bridge at Beltonford, and 
herds of seals could be seen in the rising tide chasing and taking the acilinon as 
* The Tyne is subject to great floods, which, at various times, have occasioned 
much damage to the town of Haddington. A tablet erected in one of the streets 
commemorates the height of the great flood of 4th October 1775, when the river rose 
17 feet in one hour. The whole suburb of tlie Nungate and more than half the 
town were laid under water. Fortunately no one perished, as the flood took place 
in the daytime. It was conjectured to have arisen irom the bursting of a watei'spout 
among the Lammermoor Hills. 
