Six decades of ecological monitoring on a stream close to King Charles' Deeside home is providing the science needed for the fight to preserve one of Scotland's keystone species.
Atlantic salmon have long been identified as a threatened species because they need marine and freshwater habitats during their complex lifecycle and both are being affected by climate change.
To gain a greater understanding of this lifecycle, fish traps were installed in the Girnock Burn in Royal Deeside in 1966 to monitor this salmon population.
Now a research paper led by the University of Aberdeen has highlighted the insights from long-term monitoring at the site – which is sandwiched between the Royal Estates of Birkhall and Balmoral, within the Cairngorms National Park.
Salmon are an iconic species that is important for both conservation and the Scottish rural economy. The River Dee, like many large Scottish rivers, provides a renowned freshwater habitat for Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) and is popular with anglers from all over the world.
The Girnock, draining mountains and moorland, became of interest to scientists when it was identified as having an important population of ‘spring” salmon’ - prized fish that spend more than one year at sea and return to freshwater early in the year coinciding with the start of the fishing season.
The work carried out there as a partnership between the University of Aberdeen, the Marine Directorate of Scottish Government and the Leibniz Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries (IGB) in Germany, is the most detailed, long-term study of an Atlantic salmon population in the world.
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Posted On: 25/03/2024