A fish today from the Rectory for WUFs Tony Norman at 8lbs.
Richard Norman (son) also had a 20lb plus fish from the Spreadeagle.

Also heard rumours of a couple of fish from Lysdinam taken sopinning yesterday but to be confirmed.
15lb fish from Whitney court of fly to Mr S Printer.

LATEST.  THREE FISH FROM WINFORTON.

Mike Price and Dave Lloyd had three fish between them at Winforton today.

Mike had a fish of about 12lbs on a flying C
Dave Lloyd had a one of around 11lbs and another cracker of a fish at 26lb.both on a Rapala.   I hope to have a photograph of this bigger fish later.
One the down side the 12lb fish had head lesions similar but not as bad as the recently reported fish.
All three were safely returned.

Below the picture of the superb sparkling fresh 26lb springer by Dave Lloyd.

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Some pretty depressing stuff regarding the Swansea Bay Lagoon.

.Tidal Lagoon presentation

9/5/2015 @ Ross on Wye

There were four presentations at the meeting yesterday by:

(a) Phil Jones – Pontardawe & Swansea Angling Society – Report re: Work done to date by themselves and other local angling clubs and AT/FL.
(b) Guy Mawle – Director of the AT/FL and retired EA fisheries scientist – Report on possible impact on fish stocks,
(c) Andrew Kelton – Solicitor for Fish Legal – Report about law, consents and licences re: lagoon proposals and
(d) Mark Lloyd – CEO of AT/FL – Report re: Work to date; followed by a Q&A session.

Phil Jones gave an excellent presentation about all the work done to date in opposing the Swansea Bay tidal lagoon and gave out a lot of technical information about it. The vast majority of all the information supplied for the meeting can be found on their website: www.pasas.org.uk It is well worth a look. They have a very detailed section devoted purely to the tidal lagoon proposal. The decision about the Swansea Bay tidal lagoon application / proposal will be known by 10th June but, unfortunately, it is expected to be sanctioned / approved. (The Swansea Bay lagoon would have multiple 7 metre wide turbines that will operate between 30-67 rpm and generate power for approximately 14 hours during every 24 hour period. The Cardiff lagoon would be much bigger (25km long and with 60-90 turbines operating at between 30-95 rpm and with 20-30 sluices)).

Guy Mawle gave a detailed presentation outlining the possible impacts on fish stocks in the Bristol Channel / Severn Estuary. He pointed out that up to 110 species of fish could be affected by the proposals and stated that the EU Eel Directive needs to be considered as well. Barrages are on the back-burner for the time being but tidal lagoons are considered to be the way forward for power generation in some parts of the UK. According to the Scoping Report for the Cardiff tidal lagoon (now referred to as the TLC) the application for this proposal could be submitted on or before Q2/2017. Guy confirmed that the EA, NRW and DECC are still keeping their cards close to their chest but have recently commented or confirmed the following: (a) DECC (2010 study) ‘potential for population collapse, and effectively extinction, of ………..the salmon population’ and (b) NRW ‘we support the conclusions of the DECC (2010) studies (for migratory fish) until we are supplied with authoritative data that enables us to draw a different conclusion’.

Andrew Kelton gave a very detailed presentation about the legal position relating to the proposals (e.g. law, consents, licences, etc, etc). He explained that it had been very difficult and time consuming to try to defeat the Swansea Bay proposal. The fact that there are no SAC / SSSI in the area did not help their cause. However, the fact that there are numerous SAC / SSSI in the Usk, Wye and Severn catchments could work in our favour. In the Environmental Statement produced by the proposer(s) in their Environmental Impact Assessments they must show that they will ‘prevent, reduce and where possible offset any significant effect on the environment …………….as well as having in place a suitable monitoring plan’. The EU Habitats Directive (92/43/EEC) could be used to our advantage to try to protect the SAC / SSSI sites in the Usk, Wye and Severn catchments (including the estuaries). Article 6 (Section 3) of the Directive states that there should be detailed screening tests and appropriate environment assessments in place and the Waddensee Case (2004) could possibly be applied because any actions taken ‘must not adversely affect the integrity of a SAC’. However, Article 6 (Section 4) of the Directive states that it is possible to override Section 3 if there are ‘imperative reasons of overriding public interest (IROPI)’ and compensatory measures may then be necessary (e.g. Natura 2000, etc,etc). Sadly, this has been used on a number of occasions in the past by governments and other sanctioning authorities to override decisions.

Andrew and Phil said that a huge amount of time, effort and funding will be needed to defeat any proposals to build tidal lagoons at Cardiff, Newport and Bridgwater Bay. Mark Lloyd suggested that ‘committees’ or ‘localised sub-committees’ possibly be set up to monitor and control developments as things progress in the future.
Mark Lloyd gave a report about progress to date, and plans for the future, regarding opposition to these tidal lagoon proposals; followed by a Q&A session.

• To date the Swansea Bay proposal has been opposed based mostly on fish and fishery issues.
• There is a need to broaden the outlook in future to cover other forms of wildlife (e.g. marine mammals, etc).
• Emphasise the special features of the Severn estuary (e.g. landscape, unique habitats, etc, etc).
• Need to try to protect all Special Areas of Conservation / SSSI at all costs.
• Continue to work with partners (e.g. RSPB, WWF, WWT, Wildlife Trusts, FoE, CPRE, CAB, etc).
• Lots of TV, radio and other media campaigns to date.
• Swansea Bay campaign to date has cost the AT/FL in excess of £20K.
• If any case goes to a Judicial Review then the cost of each case will be an absolute minimum of £35K.
• AT/FL need help to raise £10K as soon as possible to help fight these proposals.
• There is an urgent need to increase the membership of AT/FL (all categories of membership).
•
Mark Lloyd emphasised that Fish Legal can only represent their members in objecting to these proposals. If members (clubs or individuals) are only members of AT then they should upgrade their membership accordingly to include FL as well. Mark says the AT/FL will be targeting fishery owners, riparian owners, clubs and individual anglers in the Usk, Wye and Severn catchments in their endeavour to raise the £10K they urgently need to fight these proposals.

All told, not a lot of good news came out of the meeting.