The Sun.
London, England, 1866-09-29 00:00:00

SALMON BREEDING IN IRELAND.

If Ireland is behind us in some branches of industry, in
one at least she is before us, viz., in the cultivation of her
salmon fisheries. No people have fought so hard or so
successfully to rescue their salmon fisheries from the de-
struction that threatened them from the employment of
impassable weirs and nets, which, by obstructing the pas-
sage of the salmon to their spawning beds, would soonhave
made their rivers barren altogether. That the more en-
lightened part of the Irish community, backed in their
efforts by the poor fishermen themselves, have succeeded
in removing.these fatal obstructions-to a large extent is
solely due to a strict unity and a sturdy perseverance ;
and if all Irish difficulties were dealt with as this has boon,
there would soon be little talk of injustice to Ireland. But
the Irish have gone far beyond this, and by the ingenuity
perseverance, and judicious speculation of various owners
of fisheries, they have carried out some of the most
striking works for the enouragement of salmon breeding
to be seen, not only in the kingdom, but in the world.
When M. Crume§ made his tour of inspection of our
salmon fisheries on behalf of the French Government
some years since, the work which he thought most worthy
of notice was the formation of the salmon ladders on the
Callooney River near Sligo. Here there are throe falls, one
of which is about 30ft. fn depth, and over these no salmon
could possibly pass, the consequence being that two fine
rivers and a chain of large and impoitant lakes remained
entirely unproductive. The later Mr. Cooper, of Markree
Castle, Sligo, however, conceived a plan for making these
fine waters a noble salmon fishery ; and, having obtained
an act of Parliament to insure the possession of that which
might result from his skill and labour, he set to work to
render the falls passable to the salmon. Two simple lad-
ders wore applied to the smaller falls without difficulty—
the highest, hOwever, required much care and labour; and
after many failures he contrived, by means of a double
ladder or a flight of stairs with a resting pond in the
middle, to render the fall practicable to salmon ; then by
stocking the river above with breeding fish he in a very
few years became the owner of a fine salmon fishery worth
many thousands of pounds a year.
Some time afterwards, Mr. Boswell came into possession
of a group of stnall lakes near the sea coast in Connemara,
not far from Clifden. At a place called Doohullah, a small
obstructed passage permitted the overflow of these lakes
to find its way to the sea. Mr. Boswell, by advice of Mr.
Ffennell (the present inspector of salmon fisheries for
England, who at that time was inspector for Ireland),
cleared out this passage and made it a practicable stream
to tho.sea. He next connected several of the lakes by cut-
ting channels botwoore thorn so as to combine them together
into ono fishory. He then stocked the head waters with the
ova of the salmon.trout, a fish in value only second to the
salmon ; and in duo time had the satisfaction of finding
himself the proprietor of an astonishingly prolific salmon
trout fishery, in which it had been no uncommon thing for
one boat to take 1 cwt. of fish to a couple of rods in the day.
The.fishery then passed into the hands of the present pro-
prietors, who conceived the desire to convert it into a'
salmon fishery, and, under the care.of Mr. Remsbottom, of
Clitheroe, whose son is so successfully conducting thogreat
experiments in Australia, they contrived to stock the head
waters with a large quantity of salmon ova. It was thought
for some time that the experiment had failed, but at length
the happy day arrived when a fine shoal of grilse ran into
the lakes and took up their abode there, and since that time
the fishery has flourished and increased in value. Many
important and perplexing points in the history of tho sai-
mon were solved in the course of this experiment. •
About the same time Messrs. Ashworth bought the far-
famed Galway fishery. Its fortunes were at a very low
ebb when they bought it, but by opening the weir to the
passage of salmon and by judicious preservation of the tri-
butary breeding streams, Messrs. Ashworth increased the
production of the river to an anormous extent. It is now
one of tho most valuable in Ireland ; and perhaps 'no more
striking sight can be seen in its way than to stand on the
bridge at Galway and net the salmon lying in shoals below.
The-water is extremely clear, the channel rocky, and the
salmon within a space of 100 yards or so may be seen of all
sizes, from 61b. weight up to 101 b. or 201 b., in shoals to the
number of from 300 to 500; a most astonishing sight, and
worth a journey thither to behold. The upper water of the
Galway fishery consists of a larga lake, Lough Corrib, but
there aro few breeding streams running into it, 'and there-
fore the produce of the fishery is to some extent limited.
Situate at the head of Lough Corrib is another largo lake,
Lough Mark, which sends its water into Lough Corrib
by a semi-underground passage, impracticable to fish.
Many fine breeding streams fall into Lough Mark and
other small lakes connected with it. It was there-
fore an object of great importance to the fishery
to render the passage between the lakes practicable.
During the famine an attempt was made to run a canal be-
tween them, but it failed, and by using this partially Messrs.
Ashworth attempted to construct a pass for the salmon.
But though this answered in the winter, when the water
was high, the pass was all but dry in the summer, and
some other means had tb be attempted. At length, by
great labour and perseverance, and by cutting through
much of the rock, Messrs. Ashworth have contrived, after
an expenditure of between £2,004 and £3,000 to make a
new pass.some 50 yards in length into that part of the
canal which can be made serviceable, and thus the diffi-
culty has at length been overcome. This great 'under-
taki►ng will have the effect of throwing open to the salmon
apAstrict of between 30 and 40 miles square; which abounds
in Sue breeding streams never yet tenanted by salmon ;
and the result in a few years will probably be to make
Messrs. Ashworth's fishery the most prolific in the world.
And well do they de:sot:ye such a reward. It is by steady
penieverance in works like this that Ireland may hope to
raise herself from poverty and discontent ; and it is to be
hoped that these brilliant examples of what can be done in
salmon breeding will not be lost upon ourselves. Pall
Mall Gazette.