Monday 8th October : The annual joint meeting of the RTC Committee and Tweed Foundation Trustees to hear a report on last year's work and debate & decide options and priorities for next year. After the meeting, Kenny goes off to do more trap building with Steven, who spent the morning counting the eggs from the moribund fish handed in from Boleside last week.  James spends the rest of the day preparing the PowerPoint presentation of the items for auction in tomorrow night's Wheelieboat function and I get down to drafting a reply to the Strategic Framework for Scottish Freshwater Fisheries consultation paper, a deeply disappointing document that just doesn't focus on (or even seem to be even aware of) the real issues in fisheries management that need sorting out. An e-mail in from the BBC Natural History producer to say that the film they made of spawning salmon in the Ettrick last year will be broadcast on the 31st ("The Nature of Britain" programme) which I am much looking forward to seeing.

Tuesday 9th October : At a meeting of the Fishery Management Planning group of RAFTS (Rivers & Fisheries Trusts of Scotland) in Perth to discuss the progress of the contract with SEERAD to produce Fisheries Management Plans for the country & how these should give rise to research objectives and priorities for the government and university sectors to take on.  We have had a plan since 1990, but they other Trusts are at different stages with their planning. My colleagues from the Spey, Dee & Conon are there (Galloway couldn't make it) and it is chaired by the Director of the Association of Salmon District Fisheries Boards. Good progress made and a useful programme put together for the annual biologists' meeting of the SFCC (the Scottish Fisheries Co-ordination Centre)  later this month. Back down to Drygrange for a quick turn around and off to the Tait Hall in Kelso, with Barry, for the Wheelieboat Trust fund-raising dinner.  James and Barry are running the technology for the "silent auction"; I am wandering around taking the photos and Nick and Fay are keeping the organisation right. It all goes really well, with good entertainment from Chris Tarrant and Mike Osman and the bids roll in. By the end of the night it seems something like £90,000 has been raised.  The clear-up takes a bit of time and I'm not back home till 2.30am.

Wednesday 10th October : Too tired to do much of use in the morning, just a bit of routine data-entry. In the afternoon, go down river to collect up scale packets and look at the work Kenny has done on the trout traps & make a few suggestions. The traps are looking really good but it's not until some water comes and we can see the fish at the traps and see what gets caught that we can really know how they are working. There's no substitute for being at a trap while the fish are running, to see how well it is working though being there at the right time can be difficult. Once back at Drygrange, give the fish in the visitor centre aquarium a dose of treatment for Whitespot, which, as usual, has got in with some new specimens.

Thursday 11th October : Trying to clear the desk of office work to go back onto the Fisheries Management contract next week, with fieldwork now largely finished. Work out a format for writing up the Ettrick and Yarrow temperatures work with Steven, then in the afternoon finish off drafting a response to the consultation document on the Scottish Fisheries Strategic Framework. End the day working through images of fish passing through the Ettrick fish counter identifying Salmon and Sea-trout from the September count. Not a large total in the end, which would explain the big numbers going up in early October - really September fish catching up after the low flows. James is at a meeting at Faskally all day, with the SFCC on databasing and Kenny gets the trap box at Coldstream put in, so that trap is now armed and ready.

Friday 12th October : The weekly staff meeting in the morning, then various bits of admin and writing for the rest of the day. The highlight of the day was a photo of a 48 1/2 lb Salmon poached at Walkerburn in 1986 brought in by one of the bailiffs. The  poacher having died, the news of this fish - and some photos - are coming out into the light. It was taken with the "smiddy fly"  - a name for a cleek that I had not heard before. On adding it to the, doubtless very incomplete list I have of large Tweed Salmon, it comes in at No. 14.