Viking Lars | Saturday, 22 June 2024
I more than hinted to the worrying conditions in Norway in the opening weeks. It’s now 21 days since the season opened and there are still very few salmon migrating up stream. Nobody know why and there’s probably not one explanation or cause. Most likely it’s several colliding. The season is still long and we don’t know what’ll happen.
As it stands now there are not only few salmon in the rivers, salmon are missing from the fjords as well. Sometimes the run has been late, but without worry as salmon were in the fjords, just waiting for the right conditions.
What ever the reasons, the catches are catastrophically low. And furthermore, of the ones that are caught, way too many are being killed. I just wrote with Matt, who reminded me that the same situation occurred in the US a few years ago, where the steelhead seemed on the brink of collapse. They have recovered and according to Matt, the reason for the all times lows was probably warm sea currents from the southern Pacific. Matt told that fisherman were catching mahi-mahi off the coast of Oregon!
Changes in temperatures can change the behaviour of the salmon’s prey and if that’s the reason, I believe they’ll find their prey again. They are after all predators and they are usually good at finding food. We can only hope that the sand eel, krill, herring and sprat that they feed on haven’t been fished up by man.
In Norway there’s another factor putting a severe pressure on the wild populations. The open water salmon pens. They cause several problems, but worst of all are the sea lice. Sea lice are small parasites that attach themselves to sea trout and salmon. They used to be something we were proud of - catching a salmon or a sea trout with lice on the tail is proof that the fish is fresh in the river. Sea lice die in 48-72 hours in fresh water. Sometimes it’s incredible how far up a river you can find a sea liced fish.
There are so many sea lice near the salmon cages that the smolt are simply exposed to such an infestation that they die.
I am sorry for bringing this up again, but it needs attention and not least, if there are some of you heading to Norway, please note that the Norwegian authorities have closed fishing all together in 33 rivers, for two weeks - for now. It seems that my threat of going full camp ninja worked. Maybe the total closing wasn’t the right one. I think it is for now. Follow the situation more closely here.
Have a great weekend!
Lars
PoD: Norwegian for rivers closing - screen shot from the link above.