National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland (2018) Site Locations

What is it: 

The National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland provides the data necessary to assess the status of Scotland’s juvenile salmon stocks using electrofishing data.

Electrofishing surveys are undertaken by fisheries managers, scientists and regulators to capture and count juvenile fish, primarily in rivers. Where electrofishing is performed according to carefully defined standard operating procedures (SOPs) and combined with appropriate statistical analysis, it is possible to estimate the number of fish in a particular section of a river, or by upscaling, the total production of fish in a river or region.

MS Maps NMPI shows two layers:

  1. Final site locations for the National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland (NEPS) (2018)
  2. Final site locations for the Electrofishing Programme for west coast SAC rivers (2018)

Sites are displayed by the number of passes – 1 or 3. Single-pass electrofishing is completed once through the site’s river section during the survey visit, while multi-pass electrofishing is completed three times through the site during a survey visit. The standard operating procedures undertaken for Marine Scotland’s programme at these sites can be found at the link shown in the Additional Information tab below.

Links to Scotland's Marine Atlas: 
Chapter 5: Salmon and Sea Trout Fishing
Data originators: 
Scottish Government (Marine Directorate)
This information page is part of the theme: 
Salmon and Sea Trout Fishing
Site locations for the National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland (NEPS) (2018) © Marine Scotland
More Information: 

Multi-pass (passes = 3) does not mean going back to the site on three separate occasions, but fishing the same section of river three times on a single visit. Multi-pass fishing allows more statistical analyses and better prediction of salmon numbers than single pass fishing. However multi-pass takes longer to complete as a break is required between the fishings to allow the river section and its fish to return to ‘normal’  before the next pass is done. If sites are close enough together it is possible to complete 4 single-pass fishings in a day. The number of sites completed per day is more likely to be 2 for multi-pass fishings – hence more single pass sites in the programme.

The Conservation of Salmon (Scotland) Regulations 2016 were introduced to manage the killing of Atlantic salmon in inland waters based on an annual assessment of the conservation status of stocks. Conservation Status is determined using an adult based assessment method. However, there is increasing interest in developing a new juvenile assessment method to complement the existing approach. Electrofishing surveys provide this.

Electrofishing data are one of the most commonly collected sources of information on the status of freshwater fish populations. However, they are not currently used to assess the status of salmon stocks at a national level because (1) until 2018 there has been no strategic, statistically designed national electrofishing programme, and (2) the analysis and interpretation of electrofishing data is associated with substantial technical challenges.

Marine Scotland has undertaken a programme of research to address these challenges, with the overall aim of developing a juvenile assessment method that can be used to determine the status of salmon populations at a range of spatial scales, from individual electrofishing sites to catchments and regions. For more about Marine Scotland’s salmon programme see link in 'Data Sources' and 'Additional Information' tables below.

This page was last modified on : 
Thursday, December 20, 2018 - 14:58

Links and Resources

Map Type Click title for metadata and licence informationsort descending Date of data View Map
Map Layers (NMPi) Final site locations for the Electrofishing Programme for west coast SAC rivers (2018) Access this map on NMPi
Map Layers (NMPi) Final site locations for the National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland (NEPS) (2018) Access this map on NMPi
Type Link Titlesort descending External Link
Marine Scotland Data Portal Site locations for the National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland (NEPS) and west coast SAC rivers (2018) data.marine.gov.scot
Type Title External link
Web link National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland Standard Operating Procedures www.gov.scot
Web link National Electrofishing Programme for Scotland www.gov.scot
Web link Conservation Measures to Control the Killing of Wild Salmon - 2018 Assessment www.gov.scot