Jeremy Paxman & the demise of Loch Maree

Jeremy Paxman endorses S&TC Scotland's seminal Loch Maree film. If the recommendations in the Scottish Parliament's Rural Economy Committee's recent damning report on salmon farming are adopted in full, then the outlook for Loch Maree's sea trout (and wild fish generally in the west Highlands and Islands) will be considerably improved.
Picture / film credits:
James Merryweather
Gairloch Heritage Museum
NJFF-Hordaland/Gisle Sverdrup (under water sea trout footage)
Alv Arne Lyse (sea trout pictures and farmed salmon)
With thanks to:
Inveran Estate
Wester Ross Area Salmon Fisheries Board
Wester Ross Fisheries Trust
Jane Grant

[@loupgaroux9587]

My only criticism is that this does not go far enough. The Salmon produced by farming are also completely toxic (for the same reasons) and unfit for consumption. This is an environmental disaster.

[@greenleaves3637]

Thank you for highlighting this, fully support this campaign. More on our channel, thank you

[@ozzy5520]

As someone whose family has frequented the highlands most years for generations it is really sad hearing how these salmon populations have almost disappeared, my grandparents used to fish on a little stream near little loch broom further north of maree and they would see salmon swimming through their little stream whenever they were there but now ,after going to an area just south of loch broom for nearly 15 years I have only ever seen one salmon in my entire life. So sad how these salmon farms hurt the population.

[@mcdeadcat]

Cannot believe this has been allowed to happen in this day and age... Scottish government make your money some other way..

[@dantheman9228]

not the Scottish governments fault you want a culprit look at Westminster.

[@mcdeadcat]

@@dantheman9228 All the decisions about this are completely in the hands of the Scottish Parliament.

[@dantheman9228]

@@mcdeadcat If you are Scottish you should be ashamed at your ignorance.

[@mcdeadcat]

@@dantheman9228 LOL! No-one made the Scottish allow Northern European companies to do this, the Norwegians and the Swedes won't have them in their waters, so they proposed them to Scotland because Jimmie Krankie needed to make it look like Scotland could be independent financially. Westminster does not have fish scales on its hands over this one. Do your research. Look at all the bodies and agencies asking the Scottish parliament to STOP - FOR YEARS! They won't.

[@angusmcangus7914]

A tragedy. When I was a youngster Fishing Loch Maree was something I hoped I’d be able to do one day. That’s salmon off the menu.

[@bollob9777]

A great film which covers all the points well. The very sad fact though is that nobody but fishermen care. Everyone including the fish farmers know the issues. If closed containment doesn't work out then the only thing that will end fish farms is when its not commercially viable. That would only happen when the cost of the fish (turned into feed) needed to produce a Kilo of farmed salmon was prohibitive.

[@rokerlad49]

Disgusting....breaks your heart

[@waterboy8999]

Marine Harvest are now called Mowi ASA. they are all over the west coast.

[@dantheman9228]

Get these out of our lochs if they want to farm salmon make them build tanks on the land.

[@paul5403]

This problem needs great attention and should be a priority .

[@PatMo1888]

A hard watch, but a vital one. I find it hard to believe that anyone stills eats the produce of these farms.

[@skunkhead2007]

well fish stocks here in the north east are on the up in a massive way,once from the river tweed we has the tweed aln couet wear and whitby esk now we have the tyne and tees back but further down the mighty humber which feeds the trent and yorks ouse now that is operational meaning not just ouse/ure wharfe getting fish but every river now that covers from almost cumbria to the middlands and stoke on trent way derbyshire...this wasnt the case say 20 yrs ago now it is so thats great news,river wear now a full on salmon river with some of the vey best catches per day coming from a free section thats always been good for st which have declined but salmon wow off the scale that many fish- i fished the river swale for as long as i can remember never seen a salmon yet but five seasons back in may at topcliffe i went for look off the bridge to watch the shoals of chub seen 7 salmon four of them were the biggest salmon i ever seeen in 46 yrs at the time...the river mersey now gets a ever increasing run so too the yorkshire don which again is part of the ouse was once part of trent but was diverte many yrs back....but that means places like wait for it doncaster rotherham sheffield yes sheffield all get salmon runs,seen some betling fish on the don at sheffield a few seasons back side of M1 south bound near power station thousands of them....first time i think in 400 yrs salmon have run the don was once the most polluted river in europe leeds also see salmon runs have been seeing a steady increase for about 20 yrs same story on the calder at wakefield and surrounding areas ......the fish can almost reacch manchseter from the calder saddleworth area i think off tghe top of me heed.....so when all said and done we here on the north east ie digger land aint doing to bad we even have small streams that run to the sea between saltburn and whitby they all get hellsih runs of sea trout some streams are no more than 10 miles long others lot longer ....so what we doing the rest arnt? ok ure has a stocking rpgramme so does tyne cos of some old e/u law .....cos of the rezzy.....other than that our rivers sorry to say are top river tyne and wear rated No 1 and 2 in wales and england and to be fair they both beat a few scots rivers......ouse is the up and coming york tidal section wow fish land there in janaury on a tidal section 33 miles long then it meets the humber which is about 30 miles long so over 60 miles of tidal water the wear is only 58 miles long top to bottom and tidal ouse has many many major rivers flowing to it and above in the freshwater and all them rivers have rivers etc now the cleveland hills york side hambleton to say pickering flamingoland all have salmon runs one river the rye that runs to derwent that runs to ouse has st in may now this has to be some where around 100 + miles up river the wear not too far away never reall see sea trout in april and its 58 miles long dont forget what one weir to contend with to get to say durham these rye fish have passed through a feew rivers to get to whats basically october if yer lucky sort late fioshing places but they there in may....now salmon and sea trout have populated every stream going withing their reach both sides of the cleveland hills ie north pennines

[@paulreid1369]

Just look at all the big dead sea trout surely that is the main reason for the demise of the big fish ? Sea lice and salmon farming are simply the nail in the coffin.

[@johnglaister5851]

I thought the salmon's habitat was protected by European law. Surely fishery owners could take fish farmers to court and sue for damages and get them shut down.

[@alexanderlawson1649]

Fishery owner, net worth 1$, Fish Farmer, net worth $ 1000000000000000, this is capitalism, it has its good points but when it comes to this stuff its BAD, wise up .

[@douglashouston81]

Sad,very sad

[@allancarson5708]

Its kind of hard to be upset about fishing in a Loch where even as a native born Scot you had no chance of being able to afford even a days fishing If you could get one !.

[@Derwentmole]

This could be sorted out in the blink of an eye, but it won’t be, because there’s far too much money in farming poisonous salmon. It is an absolute infuriating disgrace.

[@Fox7466]

Loch Lomond... Its the same everywhere. Fish are getting caught by shore anglers etc.

[@davidgray3321]

Ian the problem is the fish farms

[@susanwill995]

and Loch Long is marked to be next. with its high microplastic content and nuclear effluent. what could possibly go wrong 😵‍💫

[@McConnachy]

The biggest issue in Scotland is land ownership, never talked about because its the British establishments playground and investment, and to get this land, the local population has been marginalised. Globalisation of the Scottish Highlands, local people with no prospects or working on a fish farm for a pittance. If the population had owned any land they would have diversified into other activities, mainly tourism.

[@MADPIKER01]

You know its easy to be blaming aquaculture for the demise of salmon and sea trout, yet can I adjust your attention to 2:40. That is 19 fish that I can see. Sea trout are multi spawning fish so seeing that number from one small party of anglers should have you asking, was this sustainable? I know this was common in its hay days and having lived there for a number of years I also fished for sea trout but I always return my fish. For those that question my fish handling care, I rarely remove them from the water and as a result have caught several fish more than once. The picture painted does not take into account the over fishing in freshwater for the salmon and sea trout as well as the huge fishing efforts at sea. From what I can gather in the past, there used to be a sea farm at the mouth of the River Ewe but was later moved further out. But now that farm is gone altogether and yet the sea trout situation is the same. There are lots of predators around the area and few places to hide as they have to evade in salt and fresh. Maybe the fishery could be regenerated using hatchery techniques? It works in Sweden and has worked for salmon in Scotland.

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

look above at my post, its the food supply of young samionds is gone, the mass decline of the insects

[@MADPIKER01]

@@fredblogsmac.5697 I don’t know much about the state of insect life other than you can say it would be detrimental to the life cycle of any species dependant on them for food. My point was just blaming one cause serves only those with a prescribed agenda. There are so many aspects that are impacting on fish numbers, each of them are critical. I actually enjoyed reading your comments as you come across as someone who thinks for themselves. But I digress a little, the sea trout on Loch Maree have, like the rest around the Uk have been declining for a very long time. Before aquaculture became established in the 80’s and it’s very easy to crop a graph to make it fit the narrative. Fred, do you have any data to support the decline in insect life?

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

@@MADPIKER01 there,s tonn,s of data out there on the impact of the decline of insects, our sky,s here in Scotland used to be full all spring and summer with exclusively insect-eating birds, now a very rare sight, Housemartins, Gone !!! swallows Gone!!! Swifts Gone, and one carter of seatrout that made them very vulnerable to the decline of the insects , in Spring, Seatrout would gather at the estureys of all the big rivers of western Europe for months eating the mass daily hatches of Granamhones and Spinners and Mayflies, because the rivers were a better food supply than the still cold sea,s around west Europe, the salmon Smotls did the same gorging there way down the rivers in spring on the profile hatches of Insects down to the sea, here on the Ness the Fishery Board restocked the upper Ness with Smolts, with a near % 90 wipeout because they had no Insects to eat on there long journey to the sea, here on the Ness we had a %99 decline of Smolts going as far back as 2010, our 10 year average since then has gone from over 400 Salmon to barley over 50 for a session, many of them possibly caught two or three times meaning there may onle be half as many Salmon as the number,s suggest

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

@@MADPIKER01 another point, if it was just fish farms,s blamed for the decline in loch Marie, then loch Marie would be moving with natural wild brown trout, the same species as the Seatrout, but its not. its a desert like all the other lochs, here is some of the wild lochs I used to fish for wild trout, now all deserts kzbin.info/www/bejne/a4DXY4eZZq91o9U kzbin.info/www/bejne/mHm6m4yLYphneK8 kzbin.info/www/bejne/oIXEfpZjrM-hfJI kzbin.info/www/bejne/Z32Zp2ynppyod6s you will notice in these High Summer vid on once prolific wild trout fishery there not a Swift Swolow or Sandmartin to be seen over the water and not a trout to be seen, sad days indeed, id say its chemical air born pollution as there no intense farming here in North Scotland

[@michallowther4160]

If the migratory sea trout population suffers so badly, surely the fish farm stock will suffer the same fate and be unsaleable ?

[@timlewis5096]

I do not eat salmon unless I am certain that the fish is wild caught. If the environmental impact of salmon farming was in the open and available for the public to view all salmon farms would be shut down.

[@davidroby8493]

Tragic. Short-sighted policy to create jobs has devastated a natural resource and led to the loss of jobs that already existed in the tourism and angling-related activities. Who wins?

[@nl4064]

this is the usual snp leading by stupidity while our environmwent dies

[@ericmcwilliams7629]

77 brigade.

[@davidgray3321]

The fish farms are automated and employ very few people but the fly fisherman employed gillies, stay in hotels, buy train tickets and fuel and lots of other things, so why are the Scottish politicians wanting fish farms, we need to be honest , MONEY must be changing hands in brown envelopes , or is it just a hatred of the traditional country estates in the highlands by lowland small minded social SNP type politicians, do not vote SNP it will be the end of rural Scotland.

[@markwilkie3677]

Did you not hear him say this started in the 80s? Tell me how long SNP have been in power? Idiot.

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

iv has seen all the comments below, well here,s an update, I used to fish for salmon and wild trout all over north Scotland, now the wild trout are all but gone in every loch in north Scotland, now all anglers know why wild salmon and wild trout are all but gone, I know salmon farms have problems but the real culprit is something we have all heard about flies all species of flies are near gone and they represent nearly %99 of there food, there,s your real culprit not fish farms kzbin.info/www/bejne/inaom4alhN2Do80 kzbin.info/www/bejne/anecfKJ4oMiWqa8 kzbin.info/www/bejne/bJfSn4mJqKyphbM now if you haven't heard of the decline in insects you have been living in a box, so let's stop blaming one cause [ salmon farms ] and start addressing the real cause of the decline of salmonoids the lack of there food flies,!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@johnbee2175]

Sorry but that is complete bollocks. Wild brown trout stocks in Scottish hill lochs are normal. You’ll be telling is that midgies don’t exist next.

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

@@johnbee2175 Mr Bollocks here,s some fishless lochs im a 55 year old trout and salmon fisherman, all these lochs used to be full of trout kzbin.info/www/bejne/d4esl6SLrLKqsKs kzbin.info/www/bejne/eqCZd2qDls2Vn68 kzbin.info/www/bejne/g4G1XnWfp7-jsLc

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

@@johnbee2175 and Iain the famous retired gullie from the spey agrees with me, and Bob Kiness that restored the Carron on the west coast with smolts realised from the Carron swam through hundreds of salmon farms and returned to the Carron, look and read yourself

[@angussoutter7824]

A bit more than that as Seatrout feed in the sea their young are only in the river for one year the reason there isn’t enough food in the river to feed them so a bit more than just fly life

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

@@angussoutter7824 no there seatrout smolts are two years in the rivers with no depleated insects . Its the same in all the lochs in north scotland there now deserts of fly life now.and the wild trout are near gone in most lochs

[@stephenasbridge878]

Farmed “salmon” is filthy. Never buy it.🎣🎣🎣

[@captainflint89]

The farms should be moved offshore , disgusting

[@tarrasss1]

Disgraceful,

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

how come the seatrout on the tweed tay and dee are all but gone too, those rivers are hundreds of miles from salmon cages, those seatrout probibley live in mid north sea, mabye you should take climate change and other resions into account insteade of slating a main employer in western scotland

[@alexanderlawson1649]

It just shows how long , the arm is , of the fish farming propaganda machine. As if sea trout only live within a small area of their home rivers, that is a myth, most of them do but many spread far and wide, its hard wired into their survival as a species, and also the parasites that live on them. So the toxin spreads and the fish suffer at the exspence of this filthy profit driven industry that cares fuck all for the conseqeunces

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

@@alexanderlawson1649 and whot about the dead mudflats in south wales and the trout that used to over winter there youl find a way to blame that on f,farms to when i was there i flimed it, and its total absence of bird life , it was once thick with birds and trout now its a desert, but lets just blame the fish farms kzbin.info/www/bejne/r6i8l3WGZtBlaZo look at this vid not a wading bird in site ,, its envioremential changes that are doing in the salmon and seatrout , im not saying f,farms are a good thing but the real resion for the decline may be elsewhere

[@fredblogsmac.5697]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/b6PSoKubaNyZhqc

[@redpilledpict2747]

I'm actually old enough to remember salmon stations all round the country.Even Raasay had one in the early nineties !

[@angussoutter7824]

Because i suspect that the seat trout from there go to shetland isles to feed which also has farms