
DAY 1: THE SCIENCE AND POETRY OF THE SALMON
Welcome by John Fanshawe
A short film narrated by Sir David Attenborough for Salmon & Trout Conservation to mark the International Year of the Salmon.
Session One: Understanding the diversity and distribution of salmon species populations
CHAIR: JANINA GRAY
The future of salmon: how to assess species extinction risk according to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species – William Darwall
Listen to Will’s presentation here:
Conserving genetic diversity in Atlantic Salmon: challenges for the chalk stream populations of Southern England – Jamie Stevens
Listen to Jamie’s presentation here:
and view a pdf of his slides here:
Cultivating and classifying salmon: indigenous engagements with Sockeye ( O, nerka) and Dog salmon ( O. keta) in the North Pacific – Thomas F. Thornton

Alaskan postage stamp, 2004
CHAIR: KATERYNA RAKOWSKY
Review of the state of North Atlantic Salmon – Emma Hatfield
The mystery of Atlantic Salmon mortality at sea: the Likely Suspects? – Ken Whelan
Listen to Ken’s presentation here:
Ted Hughes’ s poetic electrons and the salmon’ s freshwater habitat — Nick Measham
Listen to Nick’s presentation here:
and view a pdf of Nick’s slides here:
Being salmon, being human: from enlightenment to enlivenment practices – Martin Lee Mueller
CHAIR: TONY JUNIPER
The oldest animal: Salmon in early Welsh literature – Katherine Robinson
Listen to Katherine’s presentation here:
and view a pdf of Katherine’s slides here:
Katherine Robinson The Oldest Animal slides
“The Mouth of a River” and the fortunes of County Mayo salmon and sea trout – Sean Lysaght
Naen Skeylls: Salmon, Poetry and the Inshore Fishing community of Northumberland – Katrina Porteous
Singing salmon – Sam Lee
CHAIR: IAN COOK
‘Engines of earth’ s renewal’: Ted Hughes and the Torridge and Taw salmon – Yvonne Reddick
Ted Hughes, The Rivers Trust & Salar the salmon – Arlin Rickard
The past, present and future of the Maree catchment and its wild salmonids – Corin Smith
At Pembroke College
ARTIFISHAL: Screening of the Patagonia production, followed by a question and answer session with Mikael Frödin and Kyle Young
Conference Dinner, The Old Library, Pembroke College. Speech by David Profumo
That night, the hostel being full, we slept in a double- bedded room. At the dead hour of twelve I was awakened by loud cries of “ I have him, I have him!” – “ Hold him fast then,” said I, for I thought he had collared a thief; but in truth he had not: he had only got hold of the bell- rope, and was fishing away with it in his dreams, with a salmon, of course, at the end of it.
William Scrope, Days and Nights of Salmon Fishing in the Tweed (1843)
The Salmon Cages
Remember me? I was left behind
Years ago, to farm the cages.
The rest of you went away
To greater things. My friends,
My brothers, there has come a day
When you sit here, like judges,
Looking me over. The mote in the eye
Of Ireland, the umpteenth son
Who minds the mother, stooks the hay
In summer…boredom
And horror, the lie of the country,
Everything can be laid at my door.
Look at them, out there on the water,
Hanging, fathoms deep,
The cages. And the million selves
I might have been, ripe for the slaughter,
Dreaming continental shelves
As the factory-ship
And the ice-plant on the drizzled pier
Digest them, year by year,
Like Jonah. Ptomaine
Dropping, like a slow rain
Of pellets, into the food-chain –
Tell me about it. I live here…
Mother is taken, once a week,
To the clinic. And John,
Arthritic from the cold of Spokane,
Is back with us now, half-witted.
The broken and the terminally sick,
We are growing again
To a kind of family. Grey days
Absorb us. The unbeautiful
Is our element – the way of duty.
No-one speaks of nationhood
Anymore. There is no taste
To the fish, but sales are good.
Harry Clifton
Welcome by Mark Wormald, Pembroke College
CHAIR: PAUL KNIGHT
The history and future of stocking – Kyle Young
Listen to Kyle’s presentation here:
and view a pdf of his slides here:
The political economy of salmon, 2019 – Barbara Bodenhorn
Commercial conservation deals in Greenland and the Faroe Islands, from 1991 to today – Kateryna Rakowsky
The impact of fish farming on wild salmon – Mikael Frödin
Listen to Mikael’s presentation here:
and view a pdf of Mikael’s slides here:
Mikael Frödin Presentation Cambridge English
CHAIR: MARK WORMALD
The Sámi People and the salmon – Jon Petter Gintal
From Polar salmon to ubiquitous Pacific icon: the triumph and tragedy of the steelhead – Ehor Boyanowsky
Ted Hughes justifies fishing – Terry Gifford
CHAIR: JOE CROWLEY
Salmon conservation for long- term sustainability: the Oykel way –Steven MacKenzie
Listen to Steven’s presentation here:
View a pdf of Steven’s presentation here:
Steven MacKenzie PPT Dec 2019 Final
Watch Steven releasing a salmon without touching it, or risking injury to it:
Steven also shared two remarkable short videos of the life of the river Oykel. First, a pair of kingfishers:
And finally, elvers climbing the Oykel falls:
Issues with, and examples of, renewal and sustainability – Ronald Campbell
Listen to Ronald’s presentation here:
and view a pdf of Ronald’s slides here:
Ronald Campbell S+TC panel presentation
The wild salmon proclamation: a global scientific consensus on recovering wild salmon – Kyle Young
Policy, protest and the law: Extinction Rebellion, and a poem from the Taw Estuary – Mark Haworth-Booth
A poem in Northumbrian dialect – Katrina Porteous
A reading of ‘October Salmon’, by Ted Hughes

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