From our Chairman

We are aware scientific feeling is generally anti-hatchery but their is a growing belief amongst grass root anglers, riparian owners and noted angling journalists that the hatchery still has a large part to play if the Atlantic Salmon is going to have any chance in the future at all. One noted scientist is quoted as saying that re-stocking young fish into areas already carrying their full compliment is at best a waste of time and may be positively counter productive! This may be very well, but can anyone who fished the Derwent twenty years ago truly believe that today's stocks are anything like their full complement - I think not.

Many streams in the upper catchment that once held prodigious stocks of spawning Salmon are now empty and it is is these that the K.A.A. hope to improve. A large proportion of salmon that now run the Derwent seem to spawn in the main river downstream of Bassenthwaite Lake with all the problems associated with it - is this gravel in the lower river giving our brood stock the best chance of success? A term used is TOTAL CATCHMENT MANAGEMENT. This literally means managing the river from sea to source, and surely must be the only way forward. Alongside the Derwent Owners/Planning Board Habitat Improvement Scheme and buy out of nets, Keswick Anglers Association hope to do their part to ensure the survival of the Salmon in the River Derwent. As you can imagine the reinstatement and running of the hatchery is not cheap, so any donations would be very welcome.

Jim Miller, Chairman K.A.A.

Habitat Improvement

Keswick Anglers Association fully recognises that stocking alone will never reinstate numbers of the Atlantic Salmon in the Derwent system to their former levels. Restocking has to take place in conjunction with habitat improvement schemes. To that intent any funds raised by us may be used to assist with the funding of habitat improvement schemes funded by the Derwent Owners Association, English Nature and Environment Agency, River Derwent Partnership. Such schemes being generally, beneficial to a variety of wildlife, including Kingfisher's, Sand Martins, Otters, other mammals and birds.

Setting up the Hatchery

In October 1998 Keswick Anglers leased a building at the Old Windebrowe Stables which originally had been a hatchery of sorts some forty years ago. Abstraction and discharge licences were applied for and were granted by the Environment Agency. Spring water was then brought from a source on Latrigg by laying underground a 3 inch alcathene pipe some 300 metres in length, part of which had to run under the A66 trunk road via a culvert. The building was then fitted with a new door and windows, the interior walls were removed to make a single room and it was painted. Plumbing was then carried out and four hatching troughs set up providing a capacity of 120,000 eggs. There was also a 2 metre tank purchased and installed for rearing and bringing fry up to fingerling size. A filtration system was designed by us and fitted to the outfall from the hatchery to ensure an environmentally friendly discharge from the building. Aeration equipment was also installed.