I always hate doing this, but it has to be done.
We can’t take any more orders for delivery this side of Christmas. Our order book is full – well the order book is never full, but we have orders for everything that we can smoke between now and Christmas.
Sorry.
But we are taking orders for delivery in 2007!
There have been years when I thought that we would run out of wild salmon before Christmas, but we never have until now.
It is with regret that we have had to close our order books for Smoked Wild Salmon as from yesterday, November 28th. Hopefully we have sufficient stock to meet our existing orders, but there will be disappointed customers who have, every year over the last twenty or thirty years, enjoyed Ummera Smoked Wild Salmon at Christmas time.
We do have our very successful Smoked Organic Salmon to replace the wild salmon, so all is not lost.
It is our hope that, by leaving the wild salmon alone for a while, there will be significant increase in the numbers of salmon returning to spawn in the rivers and thus restoring the salmon stocks.
I have had suggested to me that maybe we could by wild salmon from elsewhere, Alaska for instance, or Norway, but we have always smoked Irish Salmon and we are very careful about the provenance of our products. Why ship salmon all the way from Alaska to smoke here? Air miles?
Of course this brings back the question: Is it Smoked Irish Salmon or Irish Smoked Salmon? So much of the salmon that purports to be Irish is more than likely to have been salmon farmed in Scotland, the Shetlands, Norway and probably even Chile.
We can vouch for the fact that our organic salmon comes from Clare Island in Clew Bay, Co. Mayo and our wild salmon came from fishermen in West Cork.
Sunday Business Post 5th November 2006 – Extract from article by Adam McGuire
But some producers are supportive of the new legislation.
Anthony Creswell, owner of Ummera Smokehouse in Timoleague, Co Cork, said he welcomed the government’s decision, but said that if it had followed scientific recommendations before now, a ban on drift-net fishing might not have been necessary.
‘‘It’s probably the best thing the department has done in a long time. The government has spent too long taking political, rather than realistic, decisions,” said Creswell.
He said his company had put more emphasis on organic salmon long before now, due to the inevitable decline of salmon stocks. Over the past three years, the company has slowly shifted its production to organic. He said the ban would have little impact on business.
End Quote
By way of clarification, we have do have smoked wild salmon available, and we very much hope to be smoking Irish Wild Salmon in the years ahead – but only from sustainably caught stock.
The recommendations of the Three Wise Men on proposals for the wild salmon fishery that have been adopted by the Irish Government can be read/downloaded at:
It is 100 pages in length, but the Executive Summary (7 pages) is worth a read. The rest will be of interest to those more closely involved.
The newly appointed Minister of Marine, John Browne TD, has announced that he is adopting the recommendations of the National Salmon Commission.
The full announcement can be read at: Minister’s Announcement
Ummera welcomes the contents of this announcement as it at last gives some encouragement to those who have been concerned about the dramatically declining stocks of wild salmon in Irish waters.
It will undoubtedly have a serious impact on our business from next year, but I would prefer that than see salmon stocks declining to the point of extinction. I am sure that there will be wild salmon available in the future for us to smoke, but it may take several years before it can make a viable business. In the meantime, we are much encouraged by the response to our smoked organic salmon, our smoked chicken and smoked dry cured bacon rashers.
There has been far too much hot air and unsubstantiated statements from both sides, and both anglers and commercial fishermen are as guilty as each other. I trust that the anglers will not now cheer at the sufferings of the drift netsmen; they have to remember that, for the anglers, it is a hobby, but for the netsmen, it is part of their livelihood. For the drift netsmen, they must accept that they are part of the reason why stocks have declined so much recently – not the sole reason, but still an important part; those 100,000 fish that will be spared the net next year and thereafter will provide the basis on which our salmon stocks will start to grow once again.
The anglers have now to demonstrate their belief in conservation, by ensuring that catch and release is practiced wherever and whenever as witness of their concern for salmon stocks, especially in those rivers which are deemed to have stocks below the conservation limit.
A good day for the salmon – at long last.
The Irish opposition party, Fine Gael, have come out with their policy regarding wild salmon stocks; I have yet to see a copy but it will contribute, I’m sure, to the debate which is going to intensify over the next few months. Hopefully, commonsense will prevail and we will be able to have a sustainable fishery this year. I don’t really want to see this blog developing into a platform for this debate, but as there is so much mis-information and ignorance about, I will gladly help to provide answers to your questions.
