AFBI Bushmills

It has hatchery facilities for tagging studies and research into salmon ranching, enhancement and stocking techniques. The integration of census data on wild and hatchery salmon, together with tag returns from marine fisheries permits a complete picture of the levels and sources of mortality throughout the life cycle to be obtained.
This programme provides data that are unique within the British Isles in both accuracy and extent and is recognised as making a contribution to salmon conservation and management at an international level. For example, AFBI Bushmill's research on stock/recruitment relationships is at the forefront of international efforts to define salmon spawning targets and test their applicability to salmon management throughout the north-east Atlantic.
Salmon enhancement techniques of habitat improvement and fry stocking which were originally developed on the River Bush are now also being widely applied throughout Northern Ireland. For example, on the River Lagan, where salmon have been extinct for over a century, the foundations of a self-sustaining population have been established, and hundreds of adult salmon are now returning to the river each year.