We defo get rainbow "parr" from in-stream spawning on the the Don. I don't know if they go on to be able to reproduce themselves though or whether we just get one generation from escaped adult fish (and I'm not sure whether we'll ever be able to do the study!).

My local fishery in Lanarkshire has had them breeding before.

Is there no definative reason then why Rainbow Trout can't spawn/survive in the UK? (the one's that can physically spawn)

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Mae unigedd i'r enaid fel bwyd i'r corff

I think that water temperature has something to do with it as there has to be some physiological reason why so few UK rivers can support successful rainbow spawning and yet elsewhere in the World where they've been introduced it doesn't seem to be such a problem.

---------- Post added at 02:55 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:51 PM ----------

If you're getting parr then the fish are fertile and the parr must be as well (unless the parr are escapees from somewhere).

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“There is no more lovely country than Monmouthshire in early spring. Nowhere do the larks sing quite so passionately, as if somehow inspired by the Welsh themselves. There is a blackbird on every thorn and a cock chaffinch, a twink as they call him there, on every bush...... It moved me profoundly. I had been spared to see another spring, and I thank God for it.”

Oliver Kite
“A Spring Day on the Usk”
A Fisherman’s Diary

The last time I fished the Gwernan Hotel lake, near Dolgellau, about 2002, my
host and I were asked to return any under-sized rainbow trout, as they were progeny of stocked fish. There is a small runner feeding the lake. Any of the Welsh contingent able to confirm that, please? TC

The one river with a population of WRT that has survived over 100 years is the Derbyshire Wye. WRT in that river are the only known population of spring spawners. Anybody think this is just coincidence?

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http://www.thepeacockatrowsley.com/fishing.html

Just slightly different - a wonderfully conditioned rainbow was caught spinning in the Menai Straits below the railway bridge now carrying the A55 - this was observed by an E.A. officer - about 4 years ago if I remember correctly - steelheads next??!!!