Monday 7th September:  At the quarterly meeting of the RTC, where the revised policy on fish movements into the catchment was adopted. Getting things sorted for the start of the annual Ettrick electric-fishing in the afternoon.

Tuesday 8th September: Levels rising at the top of the Ettrick, but set out in hope. James and Sean to the top of the Ettrick, myself and Kenny to the Little Yarrow (the main inflow at the top of the Loch of the Lowes).  Intermittent rain squalls, which had to work between. Hadn't anticipated the very strong winds - twice had the little handnet in which I was transferring fry from the bucket to the anaesthetic blown inside out by a gust and the fish scattered all over the ground. Decided to move on to the Douglas Burn, in the hope that it was more sheltered, which it was, and got a couple of samples done. The water rising though, and missing rather too many for good sampling, so called it off. Got a genetics sample taken here, and at both burns, took some samples from "hybrids". When a survey of Scotland was done in the 1980's for salmon/trout hybrids, very few were found, except in the Tweed catchment where at several sites, hybrids were up to 5% of "salmon" fry for all three years of the programme. We find what we call "hybrids" regularly and widely - at the front, they are definitely salmon, but at the back they have red adipose fins and rounded tails, and sometimes, red on the tail as well. The upper Yarrow, below the loch,  regularly has particularly strange looking fry - salmon, but a gold, reddish-yellow all over. We put these down as "x" but don't really know what they are, so am collecting samples when I find them to have them tested. "Hybrid" parr are much less common (or less obvious) and recognisable adults are rare though I've seen them at the Berwick nets and  I remember being told, there, of a local who would buy hybrids from the netsmen at trout prices ("If in doubt, it's a trout") but sell them to hotels etc as Salmon.

Wednesday 9th September: Up to Edinburgh with Nick, for a seminar on the control and reporting of projects funded by the EU Interreg programme. This is what our Sea-trout work in the Living North Seas project comes under and though I'd been warned about the levels of bureaucracy to expect, the harsh reality more than matched down to expectations. Reports have to be about both expenditure and activities, but as the formats for doing these are quite different - and yet they have to match - there's going to be a good deal of puzzlement. As "beneficiaries" (i.e. an organisation actually doing work) we will be monitored by an independent First Level controller. We will report to our lead partner, who will collate the partnership's reports - and they will be monitored by a Second Level controller.  And so on. In the afternoon, join a Workshop on first level control. Find myself surrounded by accountants in sharp suits talking about audit trails and verification. Not my usual habitat at all. Cold, wet and miserable though yesterday was on the Douglas Burn, and warm and comfortable though this meeting's rooms were, I'd rather have the wet and wind any day. At least I'm used to that sort of thing and know how to deal with it.

Thursday 10th September: Out with Barry to try electric-fishing the topmost zones fo the Ettrick, where the water should run off quickest. Did a couple of sites where the river broader and shallower, right up at the top near Potburn, and seemed to get reasonable samples, but narrower and deeper bits not feasible. Moved onto the Tima Water, which hasn't been covered by fry index surveys so far, and selected sites, found out about ownerships and so on. Got some done as well, more trout further up and big Salmon numbers only at the bottom sites.

Friday 11th September: Three teams out today, myself with the Buccleuch Estates boatman to do the Rankle Burn. Again, the fry index surveying only being extended there this year, so new sites to set up. Went as far up the burn as the track would go, and found Salmon still dominant over trout, though not in huge numbers. Abundances increased as we went downstream, getting quite good about half way down, then we hit a "bald" site with very little. In such cases, we do a duplicate sample nearby to check the result and  this was about a hundred m further downstream. This gave about half of what we had been getting elsewhere, and the next site down was a return to more usual levels.  Previous samplings show this zone of the Rankle having poorer results than the areas either upstream or downstream of it, but the question is, of course, Why ? If it was just a single result in a single year, then it could just be chance, but to have a zone that is consistently poorer than either upstream or downstream is a puzzle. There's nothing obvious to see, though it appears to be  a more unstable area than either above or below, but there's obviously something there that either isn't good for juvenile fish or that spawning adults just don't like. The opposite, "hairy" sites with particularly large numbers of fry are also a puzzle as there never seems to be anything very obviously different from sites with normal levels nearby.