Steel Head or rainbow?

[Malcolm]

Interesting thought Diverdave

But a balanced argument must also look at the fact that both these rivers have their mouths a couple of miles apart, and that pacific salmon, 100% pacific salmon have been caught and studied in the Don, and quite possibly in the Dee. At least one of these fish is believed to be from Russian stock, though i have not seen any evidence of this and do not know how this detail is known. I have some time ago however seen a picture of a pacific from the Don so i am convinced it is true.

We know that the sea temperatures are changing and that fish have to feed in different areas of the sea, but they appear to now be doing this quite successfully. During these potential changes of feeding areas it is likely that fish will meet up with fish destined for different areas, and a dafty or two will join the wrong shoal.

I've wondered the same myself: have we indeed got a small breeding population of steelhead in Scottish waters and are they actually part of a natural expansion or escapes or the progeny of escapes? I've caught a couple of astonishly beautiful rainbows from the Loch Lomond system over the years. These fish looked more like grilse than rainbows. We do know they can breed in Britain - the Derbyshire Wye has resident rainbows. As you say the odd pacific salmon has appeared. There also seems to be a general change in wildlife movement patterns general with quite a few species being recorded more frequently recently. 

[Clan Ford]

I've also wondered about rainbows breeding in Scottish waters.  I'm fairly sure that they do on occasion (I once caught some little rainbow parr from inflow burn at Loganlea) but I doubt it is ever in enough numbers to make a viable population.  I've caught several steelhead like rainbows and several pristine "normal" rainbows from the river Earn but never a parr.  If any river was going to actually sustain a population of rainbows I think the Earn would be a likely candidate - there have been loads of mass escapes from various sources over the years and there is a always a trickle of fish escaping so in effect there are always rainbows in the water.  Some seem to settle in the river and naturalise some seem to run to sea and return as "steelhead".  Most just seem to "disappear" after a while.  I suspect that they do end up in the sea but what happens to them then, I don't know.

Norm

[Wildfisher]

I'm fairly sure if you ask anyone  who has to put up with multitude of escaped rainbows on, for example,  the Earn system they will tell you they are indeed vermin. Masses of them competing with the native trout and salmon in the river and loch. I just hope  that never happens to any of our fine rivers here in  the north east. Famed rainbows should be kept in the dug out stanks where there is no possibility of them escaping into the wild. Fish farms and their retail outlets - the  "fisheries" need to be heavily regulated. It won't happen though, not until there is some kind of catastrophe and then it'll  be a fire fighting exercise. GS was introduced to Norway via commercial rainbow trout which have a resistance to the parasite and make excellent carriers. We should heed the warning, but of course we won't. Incidentally, these travesties  we call rainbow trout bear little resemblance to wild bred fish, native or not. Wild rainbows are wonderful fish.

[Alastair]

It looks like a steelhead fresh from the ocean, within a few days anyway.  Steelhead will stray between river systems, so having a wanderer from somewhere else, while not too common, is not at all unusual.