Wet and dry?

[springwell]

Is this going to be the third season in a row when we have a dry and hot spring followed by floods in July and August?

Come July and August I'm scratching around trying to find somewhere to fish, past few seasons instead of nice dry fly fishing its been the sea or definitely the last, last alternative stockie bashing in stillwater.

I remember last year at my Dam Social in August, some may have heard of it ::/ the heavens opened on the Friday and Saturday.

Lets wait and see.

Bill

[Glyn]

I recon we will see a flood within 2wks.
Glyn

[Teifi-Terrorist]

Indeed Bill. What gets me worried to be honest is that we repeat last year's performance with the commercial nets with the low flows.

Just had an interesting chat with someone at the EAW this morning, not going to mention a name, no need to really, but he was totally transparent and honest, which was much appreciated.

The nets work with a minimum of a 4" mesh. A 4" mesh does not or should not catch fish under 2.5lbs. Basically is does not catch juvenile fish, it just catches brood stock, or sexually mature fish.

DECLARED (make of this what you wish) catches for the 2010 season, and this is hot off the press, is as follows for the Teifi and Towy:

First column is licences, second is salmon, third is sewin.

Teifi
Seine 2, 56, 222
Coracle 11, 78, 786

Tywi
Seine 3, 20, 311
Coracle 7, 40, 655


Now, both rivers have around the same catch, sewin wise, totalling around a 1,000. However, that's 1,000 carrying a minimum size of 2.5lbs, and that is declared...

Ok, so just making up some stats; more females run than males, and I believe more females make up the bulk of the larger fish than males. As such, let's take 2/3rds of the 1,000 figure as being hen fish, or around 650. Let's then take an average weight of 5lbs, which is totally feasible. Based on salmon stats, there would be 900 eggs per 1lb of weight. So, wait for it! :> 900x5x650 = 2,925,000 eggs being lost from each system!! :} That's nearly 3 million sewin eggs...

Sure, this does not take into account the fish that may have been caught if they had entered the river, winter floods, differentials between salmon vs. sewin eggs per 1lb etc etc. but still a rather startling statistic to look at! That's nearly 3 million more eggs to the Teifi and to the Towy. If a tenth of them hatched, then even 10% of the hatched made it back to the river that would give us an extra 29,250 sewin per year, per river!! And you then have the obvious cycle of more fish creating more fish in future years.

2010 season catch stats, again, fresh off the press! No huge changes in terms of sewin, but notable change in the salmon figures.

Sea-trout
Neath 2009; 492. 2010; 493
Teifi 2009; 2,076. 2010; 2,186 (up 5%)
Towy 2009; 2,845. 2010; 2,770 (down 3%)

Salmon
Neath 2009; 62. 2010; 76.
Teifi 2009; 325. 2010; 922 (up 184%!)
Towy 2009; 441. 2010; 917 (up 108%)

Of interest and thought provoking I hope.

TT.

[Aled]

Gwych on the salmon front Steffan.
Rumours along the lower river Tywi seemed to indicate more salmon around.
Out of interest are these catches available on line? I had a look on the EA site and i could'nt find it.
Tight Lines
Aled

[Teifi-Terrorist]

Out of interest are these catches available on line? I had a look on the EA site and i could'nt find it.
Tight Lines
Aled

Friends in high places Aled :>

They are not to be found online yet. I had a draft version through.

Steff.

[springwell]

Friends in low places too

See you tomorrow.

Bill

[Aled]

Friends in low places too

See you tomorrow.

Bill

Yeah i know Bill, he claims he's a mate of mine as well......LOL:>
(Sorry TT couldnt resist it)


Nice one guys enjoy your day at Bont. |\
Tight Lines
Aled