Monday 29th January : More preparation for the Boatmen's meeting tomorrow night and revising  a section for the  RTC's annual report on the sizes of fish caught last season. Just out of curiosity I do something very obvious that I have never done with catch records before - calculate an average weight of fish caught over a whole season. Have always split things up by Salmon / Grilse; Spring/Summer/Autumn etc. etc. before. Do this for a  Middle Tweed series that runs from 1887 to 1997, from a single fishery that has not changed in size and am very surprised by the result - a massive drop in average size from the 1940's to the 1960's - largely stable before and after though. It looks like the changeover from Spring to Autumn in the mid 1960's has rather taken attention away from this other, major, change. It is largely due, it seems, to a swing towards Grilse as the Spring Salmon faded away and larger Autumn fish became scarcer. Up till the 1940's there were many  more Salmon than Grilse in the Autumn. Looking at this and some Upper  Tweed data that shows the same thing, seem to see Grilse as rather a "new" phenomenon in Autumn on the Tweed rather than, as I had always assumed before, a constant feature.

Tuesday 30th January : Most of the day getting ready for the Boatmens Meeting tonight at Kelso. Printing out the sheets for them to record damage to fish on - this is a way of seeing what level of seal or other damage there might be. The results for the last time, in 2005, showed higher levels earlier on in the season, possibly because smaller numbers of fish are more vulnerable. The meeting has a good turn out though the news about the trend towards smaller fish gets an understandably glum reception.

Wednesday 31st January : More random bits of paperwork. Big rush at the end to get the article on scale reading for RAFTS sent off

Thursday 1st February : Off to Peebles early to give the trap its weekly clean. In my absence, it transpires, those in the office do a frantic search of my computer to find the article on scale reading as it turns out that it was not actually attached to the e-mail I sent off last night. In the afternoon, meet with the volunteer who is going to try and write up a short history of the RTC for the Bicentennial Meeting this September. Give her what I have on the early days and point out various sources. The RTC records go right back to the private commitee that was set up in 1805 to agitate for better fisheries legislation for the Tweed, their efforts resulting in the Act of 1807 that set up the Commission. Almost needless to say the Commission started on Day 1 in 1807 with an investigation of the caulds on the river and 200 years on, caulds are still a major issue

Friday 2nd February : The regular monthly all-staff meeting, with both Foundation and Baillifs. No big issues. More admin and paperwork. The annual RTC dinner in the evening.