Bobby Aylward (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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1675. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources the current systems in place to measure the volume of salmon in the rivers Barrow, Nore and Suir; if the most recently recorded levels are above or below average in comparison to preceding years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25153/16]

Bobby Aylward (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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1676. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources if he will consider the installation of counters to measure the volume of salmon in the rivers Barrow, Nore and Suir; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25154/16]

Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 1675 and 1676 together.

Inland Fisheries Ireland (IFI) is the state agency responsible for the protection, management, development and conservation of Ireland's inland fisheries.  IFI manages salmon stocks on an individual river basis as each of Ireland’s 147 salmon rivers (including river sections and estuaries) has its own genetically unique stock of salmon

IFI is supported in its management role by a statutorily independent Standing Scientific Committee (SSC) on Salmon comprising scientists from IFI, Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM), the Loughs Agency, the National Parks and Wildlife Service, the Marine Institute, the Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute (AFBI- Northern Ireland) other State bodies and third level institutions.  Scientific and management assessments of each stock including the Suir, Nore and Barrow are carried out every year, with IFI engaged in an extensive stock monitoring which feeds into the scientific committee's annual reviews.

Fish counters are a component element of the national assessment array in use by the scientific committee. In carrying out stock assessments the Committee draws on a number of data sets including rod and commercial catch data, fish counters and catchment wide electro-fishing.

However, the primary index for evaluation of likely returning numbers is the recorded rod (harvest or catch and release) and commercial catch (if any) averaged over the previous 5 years.  The scientific committee applies a range of rod exploitation rates for recreational fishing activity and adds the commercial catch to calculate the total run of salmon. Fish counters are particularly useful in cases where rod or commercial data is not available.  In addition, information on juvenile abundance indices derived from electro-fishing surveys carried out annually by IFI is also evaluated as an indicator of stock status.

For the 2016 season, based on rod catch and exploitation rates, the Suir was estimated to be meeting 68% of its conservation limit (CL). Management advice is that rivers meeting >65% of the CL can be open for catch and release angling. For 2016 the Barrow was meeting 18% of its CL and the Nore was meeting 60% of its CL.

While the Barrow and Nore were deemed not to be meeting >65% of CL based on rod catch, both rivers were open for catch & release angling in 2016 based on salmon fry densities recorded in electro fishing surveys which were above the scientific committee's established threshold.

The estimate of the percentage of the Conservation Limit (CL) achieved on the Barrow, Nore and Suir for the last 5 years is shown in the attached table.

The salmon assessment methodologies used in Ireland are considered internationally as best practice. Many other countries are moving towards the development of similar scientific assessment models for salmon stock conservation.

I am advised that, given the availability of catch records on the majority of rivers, including the Suir, Nore and Barrow, and other indices, the number of fish counters in use is considered sufficient as a component within the array of methodologies available to the Standing Scientific Committee for Salmon.  However the requirement for additional counters is continually reviewed.