Salmon taking over sea trout rivers?
A 17 pound Geirlandsá sea trout. Photo by Arnar Óskarsson.
One of Iceland's leading fisheries biologists, Guðni Guðbergsson, has told us that “fringe rivers” for salmon have been producing more catches recently, perhaps even at the disposal of other stocks in the rivers, notably sea trout stocks. There may be two main reasons for this.
Guðni stated that the main area for these occurances is the central south and the western part of the southeast, mainly, Iceland's main sea trout region. Close by are also most of the huge smolt releasing projects that have turned previously salmon-barren rivers into world renouned salmon fisheries. Guðni took as an example the river Geirlandsá, close to the southeast village of Kirkjubaejarklaustur. It is a medium sized, strikingly beautiful river known for its outstanding sea trout runs.
Geirlandsá is a very scenic beautiful river. Photo by gg.
It has long been one of Iceland's top sea trout rivers. However salmon runs have been on the up recently while the sea trout runs have been dwindling. Guðni says that he and his colleagues are worried that so many more spawning salmon in the river may well put back the sea trout spawning as well as the salmon juveniles competing for food with their cousins in the rivers ecosystem. “The fact that the salmon seem to be doing better in the river, and others close by, seems to indicate that they are having better luck with their spawing than before. There have always been a few salmon in these rivers but they used to be built for sea trout. The warming over the years in this country may have changed the salmons spawning conditions to the better. In the future people may be asking themselves wheather they want to catch salmon or sea trout,” Guðni said.
Of course catching a salmon will always bring a smile, even if you were expecting a sea trout. This photo is from Geirlandsá neighbour Tungulaekur.
But salmon do not just turn up in rivers in such numbers. Or do they? One would expect that they would have to be the fruit of spawning and several tough years growing up in the rivers….unless they got some help. And help they have been given. Several salmon caught on the nearby Tungufljot turned out to be “lost” smolts from a releasing program on some close by river. That in itself determined that at least part of the increase in salmon runs on these fringe rivers is down to the smolt releasing programs on nearby rivers. So, apparently, two main factors have come together to conspire against the sea trout…..global warming (which is man made) and the man made salmon rivers. While this trend has only been visible over the past two years it is not at the moment considered as a problem. Time will tell if it becomes one and hopefully if it ends in that manner, steps will be taken before it is to late to turn things around.
