Salmon Habitat

Any River will be limited in its ability to produce salmon by the amount of habitat available to salmon in the various life cycle stages.

Egg, Alevin, Fry, Parr, Smolt, and Adult fish.

Riffles Glydes water flows, river bed substrate, bankside vegetation erosion,depositions, gradients, pollution all have an impact.

In addition to clean freely flowing water a river needs to provide the following habitats.

Spawning Areas
Nursery areas
Holding Areas.

The productive capacity of any particular river will depend upon the availability of all these and will be limited by the absence of one. The careful use of hatcheries have a vital role to play by assisting nature to take advantage of any nursery space and enhance the productive capacity of the stream. Scientist state 5- 10 alevins per square meter of good habitat.

Much of the natural spawning habitat has been degraded over the years due to drainage schemes and general mismanagement of rivers as an asset for producingAtlantic salmon. Over the generations salmon will evolve to have certain characteristics best suited to the particular steam they belong to. It is therefore crucially important to ensure that the remnant stock produced form any wild self sustaining population are given the best chance to survive naturally.

Basically that means ensuring that stocking only takes place in those areas where natural spawning recruitment is absent.

Sadly there are only about 2 miles of the the Glenshesk river where the gravel depositions are suitable for salmon to lay their eggs naturally.

There are still some places on the river Cary where salmon spawn naturally.

However both rivers have excellent nursery habitat and this can be fully utilised to produce a good number of healthy smolts, and it is these nursery areas without the attendant spawning areas that are stocked yearly from the hatchery. 

It is an important managerial task to ensure that such habitats are monitored year on year to produce an insight into how best to manage these rivers to ensure the sustainability of Atlantic salmon and Sea trout.

Ballycasltle angling club aims to continue to develop these rivers to ensure the best possible sustainable salmon run for future generations.