David Norris (Independent)
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I am advised by Mr. Nicholas Grubb of Dromana House, County Waterford, that he has isolated a problem concerning salmon breeding in Irish rivers. Today, I am suggesting an environmentally friendly solution to this problem.

Ten years ago the Irish offshore drift net salmon fishing was ceased as a result of complaints from our European neighbours, which I find rather entertaining given the depredation they cause to Irish fish stocks. There was a period of cessation of approximately four years following which the total allowable catch system was introduced, which is based on the stock strengths of various rivers. One would imagine this would result in a considerable increase in fish stocks and a boost to the tourism industry in the context of angling but the reverse has happened in that catches have disimproved. There are a number of reasons given for this, the official one being that there has been an escalating level of sea losses, with smolt going out to the north eastern Atlantic feeding areas not returning in the numbers expected.

According to the fishery scientists, survival is down to around 5% from a level of 40%, which is fairly disastrous. There are five reasons advanced for this, including: climate caused ocean temperature changes, which has resulted in the sand eel and krill moving further north, to which the fish have not yet adjusted; the mass harvesting of krill and sand eel to provide commercial sources for cat food, etc.; salmon being inadvertently caught by trawlers fishing for other species; damage to smolt as they exit the river systems caused by a myriad of sea lice lava coming off the sea cages of the fish forms in the west coast inlets; and attacks by flocks of cormorants, the results of which can be disastrous.

Are these really the reasons for the decrease in the survival rate? A major factor could be that we are not sending out sufficient numbers of strong smolt in the first instance. There are a series of social changes that have affected this, including, for example, the development since the 1950s of rural electrification, gas cylinders and Bord na Móna peat briquettes. In the past in rural areas people went out and gathered firewood from the banks of small rivers and streams, thereby leaving the riverbanks, which were considered public domain, clean. This meant that thousands of miles of small tributaries of the main rivers were open to sunlight and became highly productive nursery areas for trout and salmon. However, the vast majority of these small streams are now completely tunnelled over by Alder and other trees.

It is easy to identify the rivers that are ecologically deficient. They are the ones that have no ranunculus growing alongside. Ranunculus is a long green stringy weed which, if one pulls it up out of the river, will be teaming with lice. Dr. Martin O'Grady, who carried out academic work in this area, reported in 1993 that this over-shadowing of streams reduces their breeding potential by 70%. That is what he reported over 20 years ago. The situation has worsened since then and has been exacerbated by ill-thought out REP schemes and so on. This reputable academic survey concludes that tunnelling reduces breeding potential by 70%. The result of this is the phenomenon of main channel spawning whereby fish are being driven out of the small tributaries and forced to breed and spawn in the main channels. Spawning in the main channels leads to over-competition, excess predation and smaller, weaker smolt being produced, which are easy targets for sea lice infestation. This may also explain why in many Irish rivers the vast bulk of the returning fish are now entering the rivers of origin later in the season.

I now come to the solution. There have been a number of pilot projects involving manual rehabilitation of degraded stretches of dendrite but only a certain amount could be done by hand. However, enough has been done to demonstrate a massive increase in productivity of the stretches concerned. Work on the Kilmanaghan River near Clonmel is a case in point. The reality is that such rivers probably each have 1,000 km of good nursery streams such that an 0.1% improvement will not impact hugely on the situation. The situation involving the farmers, in terms of their being under the umbrella of REPS and AEOS, and as such required to fence-off rivers and streams, makes the problem worse. While this is being done with the best of intentions it is having a harmful effect.

We must also examine whether a few cattle watering gashes are silting up the spawning beds in the first instance. Fifty years ago there were many more such watering places before the advent of the black polythene waterpipe and concerns about TB. Is it not far more likely that the cause is the shading out of light upstream, such that there is no riverweed ranunculus to bind the silts in place? Another issue is that of the lampreys, which stir up the spawning areas and make them appropriate for the fish. We are now told that they cannot get over the weirs. Fifty years ago they got over far higher weirs.

What about Coillte, private forestry owners and Bord na Móna in all of this? In the old days, the big rivers, a large proportion of the sources of which are in the midlands bogs, were drained and worked but no provision was made for the excess water. The bogs acted as sponges and provided a far more productive environment for salmonage young. The solution is simple. Each of the bog areas should be filled with a limited number of v-notch weirs. This would also alleviate flooding, which is a topical issue these days. The introduction of the European beaver in Scotland and Wales has been very successful. It would have a significant impact here. Also, special areas of conversation should be under the control of one agency. Under the current arrangement nothing can be done because each Department has regulations which block the other and they apparently take pleasure in doing so. It is a game to them.

Paddy Burke (Fine Gael)
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I must ask the Senator to conclude as he is way over time.

David Norris (Independent)
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It is impossible to work on a riverbank from March to September and from September to March. A grand plan for opening out the dendrites is required. This does not mean 5 km or 10 km per major river. A good start would be to apply the law to Coillte, followed by a reseeding of the dendrites using quick-lock vibred boxes. All of this could be done in conjunction with the Department of Education and Skills and become part of the junior certificate science curriculum. This involves capturing ripe fish in the autumn, stripping them and placing their fertilised ovum in specially designed boxes buried in the gravel. Those fish that return to spawn will seek out the very tributaries they were born in and the cycle will become self perpetuating. Doing this will not affect hatcheries. It is an environmentally friendly system.

I thank the Cathaoirleach for his indulgence.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I thank Senator Norris for raising this Commencement Matter which I am taking on behalf of my colleague, Minister of State, Deputy Joe McHugh, who sends his apologies for not being here but he is currently touring the islands.

David Norris (Independent)
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I am sure the Minister of State, Deputy English, will advise him of the debate.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I will ensure he gets a transcript of it.

The management of wild salmon in Ireland falls within the remit statutory remit of the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources and its State agency, Inland Fisheries Ireland. Salmon is of great economic importance to Ireland as a commercially caught species but more particularly for recreational and tourism angling. The comprehensive national strategy for angling development is currently out to public consultation. It is intended that this strategy will provide for the development of fisheries and fish habitats for the betterment of recreational angling. Salmon stocks in Ireland and other countries are constantly under threat from numerous different sources both in rivers and in the ocean. Salmon spend half of their lives in fresh water and their growing phase at sea, only returning to the river where they were born to spawn after some 15 to 25 months at sea.

Salmon is listed in annex 11 of the habitats directive and as such is afforded special protection not only in special areas of conversation, SACs, but also throughout Ireland. As a consequence a huge amount of scientific and management effort is invested by Inland Fisheries Ireland in protecting and conversing the species in Ireland. Ireland's management of wild salmon, carried out by IFI, is considered exemplary in Europe and fisheries managers from many European countries have visited IFI to study Ireland's management regime. Ireland manages its salmon stocks in each of our 143 salmon rivers on an individual basis as each of these rivers contains a genetically individual stock and annual assessment of stock is carried out on each individual river throughout the year.This assessment process employs a suite of 29 fish counters on rivers nationwide where data on returning salmon are gathered daily and utilised in the management of the resource. In addition, all salmon fishermen and commercial draft-net and snap-net fishermen are obliged to take out salmon licences and must return completed logs of their catches, which are used in an analysis of salmon catch data annually. A large-scale programme of electro-fishing and other scientific assessments also is undertaken. These components contribute to the recognition of Ireland's robust salmon management and scientific assessment system as being world-class. However, despite all the work that is undertaken in the freshwater environment, the key challenge in respect of wild salmon is the failure of fish to survive in adequate numbers in the sea and thereafter return to home rivers. At present, the survival of smolts going to sea returning as grilse and salmon to their natal river to spawn is only 5%, having been as high as 25% only a few decades ago. I acknowledge the Senator raised some concerns regarding this shortage today but I am advised the principal challenges are tied in with much bigger questions, such as changes in ocean currents and temperatures affecting food distributions associated with climate change. There also is significant scientific evidence of major detrimental effects on the survival of wild salmon arising from the impact of sea lice emanating from marine salmon farming.

It is also important to note that after 2006, the mixed-stock commercial salmon fishery in the sea was closed following a decision of the Government. Harvesting of salmon commercially is now only permitted in the estuarine and freshwater portions of rivers that have an estimated surplus above the individual river's established conservation limit or in the case of estuaries, all contributing rivers are meeting their individual conservation limits.

Scientific assessments of salmon stocks are carried out by the statutorily independent standing scientific committee on salmon, SSCS, comprising scientists from a range of bodies both North and South. The most recent advice of the aforementioned committee has concluded for 2016, that of Ireland's 143 salmon rivers, 55 rivers are estimated to be meeting biologically-based conservation limits, while 27 more rivers in all probability will be open for catch-and-release angling as assessments indicate either relatively high juvenile densities or the stocks are meeting more than 65% of their conservation limit. A comprehensive public consultation process on the management proposals for 2016 in respect of each river concluded yesterday. I am afraid I do not have the results to hand. The fish counters provide the most direct assessment of salmon stocks status in rivers. The number of counters installed and used in the SSCS stock assessments have increased from nine to 29 since 2009. There has been natural fluctuation in the mean salmon count since 2002, with the highest numbers recorded in 2007, coinciding with the closure of offshore drift-net fisheries, to which I already have referred. However, there has been a marked decline in subsequent salmon counts, with 2014 being the lowest in the time series. These counter data are considered as an index for other rivers nationally and are likely to reflect a general national trend. In the past five years, marine survival of salmon is among the lowest recorded since coded tagging of fish commenced in 1980 and probably since the 1970s, based on a longer time series of information available for the Burrishoole salmon census index site.

Changes in oceanic conditions leading to poor recruitment of salmon have been implicated by the North Atlantic Salmon Conservation Organisation, NASCO, following international investigations into the decline of salmon stocks. Recent stock forecasts from the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea, ICES, for stocks in the southern range of the north-east Atlantic, indicate this low stock situation is likely to persist. Given the current levels of poor survival, ICES recommends that priority should be given to conservation objectives rather than catch increases until there is a noticeable improvement in stock abundance. In this regard, the ongoing management policy of adopting the scientific advice to only allow exploitation on stocks above conservation limit is central to aid the recovery of salmon stocks nationally and with this policy in place, any improvement in marine survival would be reflected in greater numbers of rivers achieving conservation limit. This will contribute to meeting the ICES advice and the NASCO requirements of providing for the diversity and abundance of salmon stocks.

I understand the issues raised by Senator Norris relate specifically to views and observations formed as regards the current situation in the Munster Blackwater where, for the last two years in particular, returns of salmon have decreased. I am advised the suggestion that the current decrease in the wild salmon stocks is significantly as a consequence of overgrowth on river banks and the tunnelling effect on these rivers inhibiting the spawning and development of salmonids does not appear to be supported by the scientific evidence on the ground. I understand the Environmental Protection Agency undertakes an assessment of biological river quality of rivers nationally, including the Munster Blackwater, usually every three years. This assessment is based on the abundance and species composition of insects present at sites both at tributaries and along the main channel of all channels, including the Munster Blackwater. A Q-value of 4 indicates good ecological status, that is, unpolluted and in satisfactory condition. This is derived from a standard survey protocol, which examines the abundance and diversity of the insects and other organisms living in the riverbed. I am advised this constitutes the backbone of the food chain for the juvenile wild salmon and if a figure of 4 is achieved, it indicates, as I stated already, a good ecological status, unpolluted and in satisfactory condition and with a habitat perfectly suitable for wild juvenile salmon production. A total of 26 tributaries of the Munster Blackwater recorded a Q-value of 4 or higher in the most recent assessment of all the sites.

David Norris (Independent)
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Could the Minister of State repeat that? I could not hear it and I am missing the relevant page.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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While there is a list of them, rather than going through the entire list, I stated that 26 tributaries of the Munster Blackwater were recorded with a Q-value of 4 or higher in the most recent assessment of the sites. They are all detailed for the Senator in the response. As for the main channel of the Blackwater, all sites were described as satisfactory throughout, with high and good ecological quality.

The Blackwater is an extensive catchment and salmon spawning takes place both in the main channel and in the tributaries. While tunnelling can have an impact on the production of juvenile salmonids in certain circumstances, scientific evidence on the ground is it is unlikely this is having a significant effect on juvenile salmon recruitment in a large salmon river such as the Blackwater. It also is important to note that Inland Fisheries Ireland also undertakes electro-fishing of juvenile salmon in many rivers annually, particularly those that are under pressure in respect of salmon numbers such as, for example, within the Blackwater catchment, the River Bride.

Recent electro-fishing of the Bride revealed an electro-fishing average of 18.3 fry per five-minute fishing period, which is above the threshold of 17.0 that the SSCS determines to be the requisite level for a healthy fish stock to be attaining successfully the target conservation limit for salmon. For the coming year of 2016, the SSCS estimates the Munster Blackwater will have a surplus of 3,714 salmon above the spawning requirement conservation limit of 12,024.

I hope that information is useful to the Senator. It certainly has been an education for me on the issue of salmon fishing in Ireland across 143 rivers. The Senator also raised issues that were specific to the Department in which I have responsibility, the Department of Education and Skills. He will be conscious that the junior certificate reform will allow for local courses to be developed and there will be an opportunity for teachers to use their own imagination to work with students to develop short programmes that are significant to their own areas. Certainly, for those schools along the salmon rivers, there would be an opportunity to do that.

David Norris (Independent)
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Perhaps the Minister of State would encourage that.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I certainly will and I will investigate this personally as a contribution. I also will feed back the other issues raised by the Senator to the Minister of State, Deputy McHugh, and will ascertain whether I can feed them into the system as well.

My final point is the Senator raised the issue of trees and I recall that when I was planting trees at my own house, my good friend, Mr. Bill Dallas, as well as two other guys from Coillte gave me advice on planting trees. However, I did not take their advice and planted quite a few of them because I thought they would grow quite quickly and might help to give a bit of cover and in a similar way, they have taken over. Consequently, I can understand what is happening on the rivers. One should always listen to good advice as one goes along.

David Norris (Independent)
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I thank the Minister of State and if I may, I will make a couple of brief comments. First, as there is a page missing from the script as supplied, I missed out on a certain amount of information.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I will get that for the Senator.

David Norris (Independent)
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However, I will pick it up from the blacks. Second, I refer to the part of the response which states "While tunnelling can have an impact on the production of juvenile salmonids in certain circumstances, scientific evidence on the ground is it is unlikely this is having a significant effect on juvenile salmon". This is completely contradicted by the learned academic paper produced by Dr. Martin O'Grady in 1993, which demonstrated there was an impact of 70%. There is a conflict of evidence in this regard and that is important. I ask the Minister of State to take back a suggestion to the Minister of State, Deputy McHugh, that he or his officials or both might meet Mr. Nicholas Grubb to exchange opinions and to develop matters further because he is an example of somebody who has lived all his life in this area, who has recorded the changes and who has a scientific understanding and knowledge of the situation. This could be valuable in informing the Department of this particular problem. I ask that were Mr. Grubb to contact the Department, a meeting might be arranged in order that they could exchange views.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I would be happy to suggest that. I am sure the Minister, Deputy McHugh, would be happy to organise it because it certainly would make sense. It is about sharing information. I am conscious the Senator cited a document from 1993, whereas the research cited here probably is quite up to date. However, I am sure the two can be combined to make sure the best information is gained.

David Norris (Independent)
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I thank the Minister of State.

Paddy Burke (Fine Gael)
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Although the next matter selected is in the name of Senator MacSharry, he does not appear to be in the Chamber.