The magnificent Atlantic salmon is a miracle of nature, crossing the Atlantic to breed in Mayo’s rivers and streams, often in the very spot where it was hatched. Now the EU is funding genetic research in the Marine Institute in Newport in an effort to halt the mysterious decline in the numbers of this king of fish.
SALSEA-Merge is a project in Newport which is benefiting from funding under the largest European R&D funding programme ever created, called the Seventh EU Framework Programme.
The Irish team, led by Dr Ken Whelan, in partnership with UCC’s department of zoology, ecology, and plant science, is using specialist genetic fingerprinting techniques, developed in UCC, to increase our understanding of how stocks of salmon from different regions and individual rivers vary in growth, condition, and survival.
“North Atlantic salmon have declined significantly in the past 20 years largely resulting from unexplained mortalities at sea,” Dr Whelan said. “The work being done by the team in Mayo and Cork, with the support of the EU, is working to increase our understanding of why this is happening so that efforts in salmon conservation can be successful.
“Some of the best salmon rivers in Ireland are in Mayo including the River Moy, Owenmore, Owenduff, and Glenamoy. My own research station in Mayo is based on the Burrishoole system (a mixture of lakes and rivers ) which is an index system for salmon and has been studied since 1955. From the Burrishoole we can tell how many salmon go to sea as young smolts, and how many come back as adults. We are currently searching at sea for salmon from all of the Mayo rivers as part of the SALSEA programme.”
In the first two years of the EU Research Framework, which is co-ordinated by Enterprise Ireland, researchers from Irish companies and higher education institutions received funding totalling €107 million for collaborative research projects in areas like ICT, health, nanotechnology, and energy research.
