Latest Salmonidae Stories

By ANDREW FORGRAVE Rural Affairs Editor A SPECIAL angling guide is being launched in an attempt to curb the River Dee's salmon crisis. Atlantic salmon in the river are failing to achieve sustainable spawning levels that will safeguard stocks in the future. The Welsh Dee Trust says a compulsory season-long catch-and- release policy could be imposed on the river if anglers retain too many young fish. Its postcard-sized guide will inform anglers how to handle caught salmon and includes a...

By Donna M. Perry WILTON - Matt Carlson brought his fishing pole back over his right shoulder and cast his line into the calm waters above the Wilson Stream dam Monday morning. The 11-year-old Wilton boy and his friend, Brody Pond, also 11 and of Wilton, were minutes into their fishing jaunt. Pond left his pole at home because he needed to repair it but went along for the fun. The two friends often come to fish there as it is one of their favorite pastimes, they said. They really like to...

"The legend of the trout's sagacity ... arises from man's conceit. If the trout can outwit us, the lords of creation, he must be superior to us in cunning." -P.B.M. Allan "You want to fish the deadwater Friday," Gifford said. "I was thinkin we could try that in the morning and then maybe catch the evening rise on the river," he added as an enticement. "Friday's good for me, Giff. Let's do it!" I said. One of my favorite fishing partners, Gifford Stevens of Bradley, is a skilled angler and a...

What happened to the king salmon run in Alaska may be remain a mystery, but what's known for sure is a popular fishery has closed because of a dismal return. So weak is the Deshka River run that biologists said they fear it could be as much as 70 percent off its goal of 13,000 in-river spawners, the Anchorage Daily News reported. From the opening of the first fishery in the region, things have been slow, sports fish biologists said. The Copper River near Cordova started behind schedule in...

In the last week I have observed a fish in the Avon, at the bridge by the boat sheds, which I believe is a salmon. I put its weight at between 5kg to 7kg. It was also seen by one of my workmates. I noticed it later in the week, and it seemed to have deteriorated in condition. Was this because of pollution in the river? Is this one of the salmon which has returned after release into the river some years ago? If salmon do run in the Avon, will our rates go up, to match the rates of the salmon...

By Keith Elliott Fishing Lines We never managed to see the pink seagull. Oban has many attractions: delightful harbour, wealth of history, gateway to Mull, Barra, South Uist and Islay. But we just wanted to see the Oban flamingo. This famed bird, which had ornithologists steaming up their binoculars with excitement when it first appeared, is actually an ordinary herring gull. However, it was also an environmental protest. Oban has more than its share of fish farms, and they're not doing...

An expert on fish disease blames warmer water in the Yukon River for a parasite that has been killing Alaskan salmon. The problem is white spot disease, which is caused by Ichthyophonus hoferi, a parasite that has played havoc with herring stocks in Scandinavia, the Los Angeles Times reports. Fish infected with the parasite do not smell right when caught, have flesh that turns mealy and do not cure properly. Richard Kocan of the University of Washington, who began studying salmon in the...

Seabirds must switch to less nutritious terrestrial prey or go hungryYou might think that stocking the Great Lakes with things like trout and salmon would be good for the herring gull. The birds often eat from the water, so it would be natural to assume that more fish would mean better dining. But a new report published in the April journal of Ecology by the Ecological Society of America says that the addition of species such as exotic salmon and trout to the area has not been good for the...

ON BISCAYNE BAY, Fla. _ Believe it or not, some of the best sea trout fishing in South Florida is in the heart of Miami. Despite all the people and pollution, North Biscayne Bay still has some lush beds of sea grass that support a healthy population of sea trout. As long as you don't mind the traffic on the roads and on the water, the bay is the place to be if you're looking to take home a limit of trout now that the season is open after a two-month closure. Getting to the boat ramp at...

By Dan Howley, Albany Times Union, N.Y. Dec. 10--They don't have little mittens for their fins and they don't have scarves or gill muffs, but we don't have to feel sorry for the millions of freshwater fish that live out the winter in frigid water under a canopy of ice. Adapting to the radical changes our severe Northeast winters impose on their habitat comes as naturally to fish as jumping from a weed bed to snatch an unsuspecting insect from the glassy surface of a pond on an August dawn....