Allan Sefton questions whether it is right to blame natural predators for the decline of Atlantic salmon
THIS IS GOING TO UPSET A lot of people, but here goes…
We are obsessed with predators and predation. TV nature programmes are mostly animals eating each other. Big cats, birds of prey and whales command our attention. I suppose we can add marlin, pike, and salmon to that list of apex predators. Does it come from deep inside us? We know we are, and have been, the most damaging and the most unthinking mass killer of wildlife the world has ever seen.
Salmon numbers are declining. Many salmon anglers passionately believe fish-eating birds, grey seals and other natural predators, as well as mythical human predators using invisible Atlantic trawlers, are to blame.
I beg to differ.
Let’s start with the goosander “problem” highlighted by Lord Carlisle KC in the Soapbox column, T&S November. I greatly respect the noble lord’s political and legal expertise but question his ecological credentials.
I also question articles on predation by grey seals in another magazine by a respected, retired academic. In my opinion these were misleading because highly respected, published scientific papers on the subject were ignored.
Gamekeepers who release naïve pheasants and those of us that keep a few chickens know that foxes eat birds. Lord Carlisle provided evidence that goosanders eat small fish. I have seen a grey seal eight miles from the sea, upstream of two large waterfalls in my favourite salmon river. It was not there to enjoy the scenery.
We know goosanders and seals eat salmon. The question is: what is their impact on the numbers, and health of, in-river populations of returning adults?
Biologists have always been fascinated by the predator-prey relationship. Laboratory and field work on this topic is notoriously difficult, especially in wild, natural habitats.
A famous predator-prey “experiment” in a pristine environment was not an experiment at all, but it had all the discipline, accuracy and monitoring that science demands. Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries there was an insatiable demand for fur in Europe. Much of it was supplied by the Hudson Bay Company, based in London, which operated animal trapping stations in Northern Canada. Thousands of “trap-lines” and areas were allocated to hardy trappers who inspected the lines constantly, re-set the traps and prepared the furs. This carried on unchanged for many decades. The number of each species of animal trapped, and their source, was meticulously recorded. After all, trappers were paid for every valuable pelt they delivered to the trading stations. The Hudson Bay Company’s London records, in neat copperplate handwriting in leather-bound books, provided an unquestionably accurate picture of the ch
