
An adipose fin clipped smolt: We expect to get grilse coming back that are fin clipped in 2011.
Another season has gone and a new one to look forward to. This has been a difficult year for your association but also a very satisfying one. We finally managed to get the benches fitted at Drumtian and at Wilsons stretch above the Ballochruin Bridge. Rod rests were also fitted and another homemade bench was fitted at Drumtian. A plaque was fitted on the bench at Drumtian in remembrance of Hughie Horn, a long standing member of our association sadly missed by all who fished the endrick. That stretch is by far the most popular stretch on the River Endrick with most fish caught on the Endrick caught at Drumtian this season. It has proved to be an incredible purchase in buying the stretch, few would argue now with the purchase of Drumtian. We will now target work on Wilsons stretch to bring it into line with Drumtian with another bench and rod rests and some trimming and tree removal. Other work such as the strimming at Coolies Lynn and on the River Fruin is planned. We are looking at the possibility of putting some benches on the River Fruin provided permissions are granted.

Rod rests and benches on the River Endrick: 2010
Bank maintenance during the spring was very active with the number of trees landing in the river Endrick giving us a real headache. We had to remove numerous trees and all of this takes its toll on time and resources. We did manage to get Drumtian trimmed and looking nice but other stretches that we had hoped to get improved will have to wait until this winter or next spring.

Fallen trees are left to the association to clear.
As fishing seasons go 2010 will not go down as a particularly good one.
There will be a report out reflecting the season of 2010. It will show that some anglers did particularly well and others were sufficiently pleased with their seasons sport. The spring salmon fishing was satisfactory with some top quality fish being caught . We also had an unusual early start to the season which was an added bonus.

Alec McElwee with the first springer caught on March 23rd 2010. Eric McDonald took the first springer on the fly at 13.5lbs it too was taken on the same day on 23rd March.
Overall though, the season was spoiled somewhat by the lower than expected catches of grilse on the river leven and Loch Lomond and the disappointing sea trout runs.
It is easy to forget that in most salmon and sea trout rivers the runs of fish have always varied with good, poor and average seasons been thrown at us. The variability and uncertainty of the salmon runs has always been a feature of the Loch Lomond System and many other systems as well. The differing seasons was not a real concern in those days when fish stocks were plentiful but over this last decade much has changed to alter that position and now with increased problems at sea and elsewhere such variability can result in much poorer seasons and anglers catches in certain areas will probably reflect this.
This committee has been at management level for over a decade and observed the declining catches taking place in many rivers up and down the country and the attempts by government bodies to halt the decline without success. These days it would seem that science and red tape appears to have taken over from common sense with little prospect of an improvement in sight for salmon and sea trout stocks if we continue to rely on others to improve things for us.

We will not sit idly by and watch our fish stocks decline. LLAIA Smolts in one of the holding tanks.
That is why we had embarked on a new stock enhancement programme involving smolts, parr and fingerlings. We are not prepared to just accept things as they are and see our member’s destiny left in the hands of bureaucrats and scientists amongst others who so far have not managed to reverse this decline.
There are anglers and association members who have already decided that “stocking does not work” some of whom have voted against this committee remaining in office. We believe the majority of our members on both sides of the argument are prepared to be persuaded either way, which is a more measured approach.
Understandably anglers and members would like to know if stocking works, particularly with many biologists and scientists fighting against any kind of stocking programmes preferring to see such investment being given to them to do as they please.

Try telling these guys as they leave the VOLDAC HQ heading for the big loch just to leave things as they are, nature will sort it all out: Aye right!
We are not running a hatchery based programme for profit or to further the aspirations of science or biologists. We are doing this for the overall benefit of the fishery and the anglers that fish this system, without anglers there would be no protection of existing fish stocks and disastrous consequences for the fishery would undoubtedly take place.
All anglers and members now need to know does stocking in any shape or form work. We accept that we cannot go on as in the past with such hatchery based work unless we at least know or can prove it brings benefit to the system.
That is why we have begun evaluating this type of work. It will cost more to run any stocking programme if it also involves evaluation. The extra cost will be worth it in the end as it will end speculation and determine if it is worth doing or not.
What we do know is that doing nothing and allowing nature to take its course has resulted in the disappearance of salmon juveniles from the cashel and millarochy burns running into Loch Lomond. Doing nothing will more than likely see other areas ending up the same way?
2010 smolt output increased by 15% by marked adipose fin clipped fish!
The smolt trap on the River Endrick showed that 15% of all the salmon smolts trapped were from the LLAIA stocking programme involving fingerling and pre-smolt stocking.
This assessment was carried out completely independent from the LLAIA by the Loch Lomond Fishery Trust and proves that the LLAIA has boosted the number of smolts leaving the Loch Lomond system. The smolt counter records salmon smolts from both the endrick and its tributary the Blane combined. The smolt trap is estimated to capture only a small percent of the numbers of smolts heading out to sea from above the trap.

We are confident our stocking programme will work. Releasing the stocked fish 2010.
We have now proved that our smolt/fingerling programme does increase the number of smolts heading out to sea from the Loch Lomond system.
These results are only for the Endrick/Blane system. Obviously the Douglas and Fruin smolts will also have increased the number of smolts leaving those respective rivers as well. In the case of the River Douglas the smolt increase will be almost all due to the smolt programme as there is very little spawning below the impassable falls. There is a fish pass built into the Hydro scheme on the Douglas for the downstream migration of fish so hopefully it will have done its job as we had put the pre-smolts above the Hydro Scheme. This does not take into account the smolts that have been imprinted in the Endrick, Fruin and Douglas holding tanks for imprinting and put directly into the River Leven when deemed ready for smolting.
There is still much to be proved one way or another but it does prove that the pre smolts have not as some suggested all stayed where they were stocked and being predated on. It also proves that stocking above the impassable falls on the Loup of Fintry produces smolts and the suggestion that they would be killed going down the series of falls has not been the case.
So far so good then, but much work has still to be done yet to prove it a worthwhile venture.
The next stage is to prove we can get a percentage of these extra smolts returning as adults.
The first returns from our work will be due in the summer of 2011 in the shape of grilse and the following year 2012 by multi sea winter fish such as springers and summer salmon. We have no way of knowing exactly what percentage of the fish will return to the loch lomond system in any given year or what percentage of those that do return will be grilse or multi sea winter fish such as springers. Evidence compiled from elsewhere suggest it could be in the ratio of over 60% grilse and 30% multi sea winter fish, with less than 10% being autumn running fish.

There is a lot at stake but more of this type of fish would be at the top of our wish list. Alan Millar a springer of around 25lbs Loch Lomond 2010.
Anglers will have their own opinions as to whether our work will produce more fish or not and they are entitled to their opinions. The association cannot be expected to manage the fishery though, based on an opinion!
The association committee started this programme of enhancement based on an in-depth look at all the options available to us and what was being done elsewhere and what we could afford at any period in time. Once we established sufficient positive evidence based on work done by others etc, we were then able to determine if this type of venture was worth doing for the Loch Lomond system. We also had to consider what the alternatives were. There are few alternative routes to go down other than running an enhancement programme involving smolts etc. All the evidence suggests to us that doing nothing is not working.
Habitat improvements get touted about as though it is simple and inexpensive and when it is done the juvenile fish suddenly appear! If there is much less adult fish returning to their rivers of birth then logic suggests than there will be plenty of available habitats for the fewer numbers of juveniles to occupy. Thus habitat on its own could be viewed as akin to locking the barn door after the horse has bolted!
We have over the years carried out various habitat work and we recently reported on the latest type of work re boulder placements on the River Fruin.
The cost of such work does not come cheap almost £500 for just twenty tons of suitable boulders to get to the river. We have to pay to get them delivered by the farmer to various parts of the river and we have to put them in the river etc. It all cost money. We will have to evaluate the work to see what extra smolts we could achieve out of this work if the extra fish return to allow the improved habitat to be utilised. We will work out the extent of the habitat improved in length in relation to costs etc.

Habitat work such as boulder placements does not come cheap. River Fruin habitat work 2010.
Some people suggest that previous hatchery work done by this committee did not work because we have been running hatchery based stocking of unfed fry and partially fed fry for many years and yet the runs of fish have not improved. This type of thinking is deeply flawed when one considers the number of potential negatives that have been accumulating over those same years. We have covered many of these negatives recently so have no wish to cover old ground.
It does not make sense to compare the system now with itself say thirty years ago when much has changed in the watery elements. It does make sense though to compare our system with other well established systems along the same west coast of Scotland, many of which have virtually collapsed. In so doing you might then take a different view of whether our hatchery work has been worthwhile or not. Overall it will be shown to have been better to have had a hatchery based enhancement programme than having nothing at all. You don’t have to look too far along the west coast to see how badly the state of other west coast fisheries are compared to the lomond system. One particular west coast river system in 2009 recorded the lowest number of salmon going up the fish pass since records began, a deeply worrying fact that puts things into perspective here on the Loch Lomond system. Thankfully we have not plumbed those depths….yet.
There are ominous signs occurring with the grilse runs in 2009 and in 2010 so we must do what we can to ensure we reverse this decline and start to see an improvement. Thankfully we had the vision to start our smolt programme when we did and as stated we should start to see the results in 2011. Worth noting that for every fish caught with an adipose fin clipped there will be many more that remain un-caught. It is the remaining un-caught fish that will help to reverse this decline which has badly affected the West Coast Rivers up and down the country.
So we will continue to concentrate on what we feel will make a difference rather than try to apportion blame without offering an alternative solution.
The association’s strategy is to ensure we significantly increase the numbers of smolts leaving the system in the first place, otherwise it is pointless to improve habitat when plenty of unused habitat is not fully occupied by existing runs of fish.
We know that in nature there are huge mortalities between the fish that hatch out and those that reach even the fingerling stage! If Tweed biologists statement about 97% of fish hatched out will die within the first three months is in any way accurate or reflective of fish in our own system, then by adopting a hatchery based programme of producing just fingerlings will have circumnavigated around this major mortality and provided a much greater opportunity to increase the number of smolts leaving the system.
Making use of unused excellent habitat: Above the loup of fintry River Endrick.
By selecting to stock areas above impassable falls it reduced potential competition between existing surviving natural salmon juveniles and our stocked fingerlings. This method also offers a far cheaper alternative to the boulder placements as the habitat is already in place, allowing us to conserve our cash to ensure the smolt programme is securely funded over the next few years. In this game one needs to be capable of accumulating cash but equally important to know when not to waste it.
Taking things on to the next stage of juvenile production we find that there is better survival from the fingerling stage to the parr stage and from the parr stage to the smolt stage. Once the fish leave the system as smolts it is job done and we are at the mercy of the marine phase.

At least two miles of great habitat lie above the loup of fintry: We have made use of one mile. We must work to get the water abstraction stopped in this area to give us another mile of habitat above that point.
We produced large parr for the river fruin this year and during September stocked the river with those large parr. We are trying to persuade the Loch Lomond Fishery Trust to move its smolt trap from the Luss water to the river fruin before the spring of 2011. This would provide great information on whether the stocking of these large parr was a worthwhile venture or not in terms of producing extra smolts.
Marking fish as mentioned before is not as straightforward either. Since we have several different strategies involving smolts and fingerlings etc one might ask how we know which one is best. We expect to see a return from both methods though it might be more difficult to determine the returns from the fingerlings. This will be due to the fact that the vast majority of fin clipped fingerlings have only had part of their fins cut. It is claimed that the fins if only partially cut will grow back in. We believe though that they do not grow back in perfectly so we can differentiate between any returning adult fish by a close examination of the adipose fin. With the larger pre smolts, the vast majority have had all the fins removed.
The committee are confident that the smolt enhancement programme is a sensible strategy to adopt when the problems we are having are self evident on many other river systems along the west coast of Scotland. Those who genuinely care about this system will continue to support the system by taking out a permit irrespective of who is in charge or whether they agree or not with the present management. We are pulling out all the stops and doing whatever we can to ensure that at least on the Loch Lomond system we are taking steps to halt the decline. Hopefully members and anglers who fish this system will have a better future ahead than those rivers that have seen their fish stocks virtually wiped out!
The relentless rain has meant the SIWG have yet to visit the Endrick and Fruin. We are confident though that we will get the opportunity and will continue with our smolt programme. We will be concentrating on getting brood fish for the Endrick and Fruin this year.
As we enter another difficult year with many members facing hardship with little spare money to spend we will have to tighten our own belts and ensure we work effectively for our membership and continue to run a tight ship.
We will continue to protect the fish runs by adequate bailiffing as and when required and continue to ramp up our enhancement programmes. All other items will be scrutinised to ensure they represent value for money. We are in the process of adopting changes to the rules and regulations as well as a change in how we operate from next year onwards. We are considering extending the ban on killing sea trout from the present 1st May to the 1st June, though anglers can still fish for them. We will let everyone know of these changes in due course.
Tight Lines. The Committee LLAIA.