It is interesting if one looks at fishpal and the catches on the main rivers in that for instance this week the heaviest fish caught on the Dee each day has been in excess of 20lbs. In fact the range has been 23-32lbs! Meanwhile the Tay is 14-19lbs and the Tweed 12-19lbs. In the past the big fish tended to be associated with the Tay but there defenitely appears to be a move towrds the Dee. It may be temporary but I wonder if this is due to c&r being introduced more early on the Dee and so chance of more multi sea winter fish coming back?

Very interesting post Salmo and a subject which has long intrigued me. I used to fish mainly on the lower Test for salmon and was told by the Nursling keeper that 99% of chalkstream salmon are maiden fish - only returning to the river one time (whether Grilse or multi sea winter) to spawn and then dying.
Much monitoring work has been done over the last twenty years on the lower Test with scale samples and tagging etc etc and only one or two salmon have ever been found to be "second time returners." Many people wrongly think that salmon return every year. Why some choose to return as Grilse and others return as mighty four sea winter fish is of course a mystery.
Catch and release has been practised on the lower Test for many years now but because most of the spawners die would make very little difference to bigger fish returning - unless of course there is something that is generically passed on by the multi sea fish into their offspring?
Interesting but bloody confusing.

Reg Wyatt

Not actually true.
Dee is famed for big spring fish, from opening day to end of may, historically always bigger than anywhere else.
Tweed and Tay are famed for bigger back end fish, from august till end of season.
However a quick snap shot on fishpal site shows one of 30lbs on tay and one of 32 on dee, nothing unusual in that, but the average as you say, is a lot higher on dee, as is the norm, but this will change towards autumn, when tay and tweed will take over.
regards
bert

A study of many thousands of scales from the Wye showed that no more than 4% were second time spawners and I think only one fish had spawned twice before.

The answer to the size of the Dee fish is that, as Aenoon says, the Dee has a stock of spring fish that spend 3SW (or more) at sea and these are the 30lbers. The Tay and Tweed springers are 2SW fish. These will all substantially be maiden fish.

The other thing the Wye study showed is that fish returning a second time are not necessarily very big and only recover their lost weight plus a bit more in the extra period of sea feeding that might be as little as 6 or 7 months.

__________________
“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