Saturday 15th May: On traps, 36 at Tweedsmuir, the biggest number so far this year, but the sort of daily total we would have expected since early March. No rise in the water, but the rain might have freshened the flow. Find another example of a fish with a "U"-shaped bite from below (see attachments), which was very useful. On the Yarrow, such marks could have been made by predators in the loch such as Pike or Perch, but on this burn, there can only be Trout and Eels. Trout are more mid-water predators, so an attack from below suggests Eel although there there is no reason why a large trout in a deep pool on this burn (there are a couple) should not attack from below. Equally, there is an amazing bit of film on the Philiphaugh Viewing Centre's DVD of highlights from the underwater cameras there of an Eel swimming rather clumsily in mid-water towards a shoal of Baggies, grabbing one and diving to the bottom. However, that sort of mid-water predation by Eels could only be in slack water - its swimming powers were not great. It could be relevent that the study on the Conon from which I've taken the various categories of damage types was made at a smolt trap at a hydro-dam, so Eels could have been absent from that system. That could explain why this very distinctive damage pattern was not listed in that study.

Monday 17th May: In the office all day, e-mails and inputting trap data. More smolts acoustic tagged at the weekend, but on the Gala Water this time. All but one of the Yarrow smolts released on Friday had passed through the first pool downstream by Saturday morning.

Tuesday 18th May: Data entry in the morning, then out to the Philiphaugh Salmon Viewing Centre to give a talk on salmon, demonstrate the fish counter and do some electric-fishing, as an event for the Borders Biodiversity Week. Despite the brochures for this, got an audience of precisely one! Some years ago we did an electric-fishing demonstration on the Ettrick in Selkirk as one  of the local Countryside Ranger Service's events, and got no-one at all, so today was, at least, a 100% improvement on that. However, our singular audience was very interested and the electric-fishing produced newly emerged Fry as well as one and two year old parr and a couple of semi-smolts. Also got a couple of fully mature Brook Lamprey, which must have had a spawning site close by - this is their breeding season.

Wednesday 19th May: Bird count in the morning & then downloading acoustic listening stations. The leading Smolt (Sea-trout) passed Sprouston on the 13th, having been released on the 30th April, so just under two weeks to get from about one third of the way up the Yarrow to there. It also passed Cornhill a couple of days ago and should soon be in the sea. Some others now getting beyond the Philiphaugh Cauld, including one that spent almost two weeks there, but is now past Mertoun. Interestingly, most records have the fish near the listening stations for only 10 to 30 mins, then getting out of range, so progress is steady, though one fish did stop for around 3 hours at the Makerstoun station.  When downloading at Mertoun, saw a fish jump in the fast water just below the slap, then a brown back breaking the surface which I though must be an Otter, so got the camera and went closer. No sign of any Otter, but in the backwater beyond the current, the smolts went crazy, exploding out and skittering over the surface. May have been a big Brownie, rather than an Otter, but something was certainly frightening them. Kenny on traps today and phoned in to say over 100 each in the Tweedsmuir and Yarrow traps. We've not had a 100 or more in the Yarrow trap later than the 1st of May before now and Tweedsmuir normally gets them in the hundreds from March onwards. A new speed record worked out for an acoustic tagged smolt -from the Yarrow trap to Philiphaugh, 7kms approx,  in two and a quarter hours, so they can do that stretch quickly if they want to - or perhaps it's the effect of the water finally warming up.

Thursday 20th May:  Out to do the traps, not my week, but I had maintenance work & repairs to do. I've been caught out the last couple of years, waiting till August for low water levels and then being flooded out, so getting things done during this low flow period. Over 50 at Tweedsmuir, so the fish are definitely leaving despite the low flows, starting 2 months late. Will be interesting to see how long they carry on migrating in to June. Despite all the reports I've had from the lower river about the high number of smolts being seen this year, the trap on the Yarrow is only now hitting its full stride in terms of numbers, so there are still a lot to come from the headwaters. In the evening, down to the Till with Niall to instal an acoustic listening station near its foot. This is for the second part of the tracking work, checking on how many adults are lost in the main river due to causes other than angling. The ordinary tagging we've been doing for years tells us how many anglers catch, but we don't have a figure for the  non-angler mortality. It won't be high, but we need to know what it is, to improve our estimates of angler catch rates. If this drought goes on though, we may be able to ask extra questions about what Salmon and Sea-trout do when flows are very low in Summer.

Friday 21st May:  Weekly meeting in the morning, then all sorts of admin and e-mails in the afternoon. Niall reports that we still have no examples of the smolts coming down the Yarrow & Ettrick sticking in any of the natural pools we check, it's just the area behind the cauld in which we find them. There are still some that haven't turned up at Philiphaugh, so the river will be have to be walked in full to find out where they are, since they are not in any of the obvious places / pools.