The role of stocking in the recovery of the River Tyne salmon fishery

No abstracts are to be cited without prior reference to the author.

The River Tyne in north-east England had severely depleted salmon runs in the 1950s due to estuarine pollution, but now produces the largest rod catch in England and Wales. Water quality improved between the 1960s and 1990s, following reduction in industrial activity and improvements to effluent treatment and disposal. Coincidentally, a salmon stocking programme was started in 1979 as mitigation for lost production resulting from the construction of a reservoir. This paper reviews the role that the stocking programme played in the recovery of the Tyne fishery. The investigation incorporated observed patterns of change in rod catches, records of juvenile abundance, estuarine water quality and returns of stocked fish marked with coded wire microtags. Natural recovery was shown to be the numerically dominant process, but the stocking contribution of first returns, which peaked in 1986, is believed to have accelerated and stabilised stock recovery in its early stages when water quality improvements were still inconsistent. Implications for stocking strategies are discussed.