Salmon conservation on a strange course

DONAL HICKEY wrote about the calls to the EU by Welsh and English anglers to have drift-netting of salmon banned (Irish Examiner, January 9).

I smiled when I read it and would like to reassure those concerned anglers that the Irish authorities are actually not totally passive and disinterested in the ongoing fall of salmon stocks in our seas and rivers.

Many people are aware of my efforts to lay out a golf course on the sand spit at Inch, Aunascaul, Co Kerry.

The Minister for the Environment has the right to decide whether the course goes ahead or not.

In 2003, the National Parks and Wildlife Service prepared a long report for Martin Cullen, then Minister for the Environment, on the likely impact of a golf course on the sand spit. One of the arguments as to why the course should not go ahead was that Castlemaine harbour hosts the following EU species: Lutra lutra, Salmo salar, Petromyzon marinus and Lampetra fluviatilis.

I am still scratching my head as to how a golf course at Inch could affect otters, Atlantic salmon, seawater lampreys and freshwater lampreys.

The EU has warned Ireland to stop drift-net fishing or face prosecution. The EU and the people concerned with the falling numbers of salmon and spawning grounds in rivers in Ireland and Britain might like to know about the above heroic effort on the part of our authorities to protect the stocks.

Never mind that the golf course at Inch would be as beneficial, socio-economically, as a factory to the Corca Dhuíbhne peninsula. Never mind that it would help to prevent the glaringly obvious botanical degradation of the sand spit. Never mind that it would help to address the increasing imbalance in east-west tourism.

Dr Arthur Spring

Strand Street

Tralee

Co Kerry