Salmon slaughter

Vaughan Ruckley (Letters, 1 August) accuses the Scottish Government of failing to protect the ecology of Scotland’s marine and inland waters, but he is very selective in the examples he uses to illustrate its failure.

He doesn’t mention that the government has failed to put a stop to the annual butchery of wild salmon that occurs in Scottish rivers every year in the name of sport.

While they are happy to rage about threatened wild salmon populations, anglers have been responsible for the deaths of more than 350,000 breeding salmon.

This represents a loss of an estimated 800 million eggs that could have helped conserve threatened salmon stocks.

(Dr) M R Jaffa

Middleton Road

Manchester

Mr Ruckley’s analysis of marine environmental degradation is a bit fishy as, for example, he fails to mention the fact that wild salmon numbers were in long-term decline for many years before the advent of salmon farming.

He also declines to mention that game-fishing catches have increased inexorably over the past six decades against the background of declining stocks. Fishing for sport is fundamentally unsustainable unless carefully managed.

Contrary to Mr Ruckley’s assertions, salmon farming is a sustainable industry which is delivering new jobs and major investment – it should be 
supported.

Scott Landsburgh

Scottish Salmon 
Producers’ Organisation

Isla Road

Perth