A time of uncertainty Things have changed so much in my thirty years that I believe that what used to be as certain as certain can be, with nature as the caveat, can no longer be so. Those 100% prime weeks, no matter where they are, salmon, trout, saltwater, jungle fishing… they are no longer the rock steady certainties they were. On the positive side, the fringe weeks, the weeks that perhaps we would rather not fish but sometimes our purse demands, those weeks are seeing magical ‘unusual’ moments of prime time like they never have before. These changes have led me to question whether we fishermen have to change our perspective and expectations. In 1991, the salmon fishing community was blessed with a reprieve. Although the outlook seems a lot worse now, the feeling then was of impending doom and gloom for Scotland’s Atlantic salmon. Iceland was not a source of lamentation but it did not feature as highly on people’s radars as it does today. Two big
changes happened. The first was the evolution of Atlantic salmon farming which we all believed would save the day for wild Atlantic salmon. (How wrong we were!) The second was the Kola Peninsula burst on to the fishing scene and travelling salmon fishers were blessed with fishing the likes of which only their fathers and grandfathers could have imagined or experienced. Many people were able to learn and take up salmon fishing who had barely set foot in Scotland. Not only did the Kola bring salmon fishing back to life but it encouraged a whole new generation on to the river. On the basic principle that experience makes a very large contribution towards the skill level of a salmon fisher, the Kola also yielded a generation of good fishermen who were broad and open-minded about techniques which were rarely, if ever, tested at home. Scotland and Iceland probably owe the Kola a debt of gratitude because it breathed new life into what appeared to be a dying sport.
