Mission impossible

It is 160 years since the first salmon were hatched in the Southern Hemisphere, and it is all thanks to the remarkable perseverance and ingenuity of a retired Australian sheep breeder

- Written by Steve Harris

ABOUT A CENTURY and a half ago, a modest display in the front of The Field's office in The Strand created a sensation. It was a window into a new world for man and salmon. Naturalist Frank Buckland created what The Field described as a 'rude but effective' hatching-apparatus model to provide 'pleasure and amusement [for] many thousands of [British] people who have certainly never seen a salmon alive before'. Buckland, who enjoyed the popularity of a modern-day pop star, wanted to use The Field's window to support his view that the technique of artificial propagation offered the best means to replenish 'salmonless' rivers and provide a healthy, affordable protein boost to a staid and underwhelming British diet.

Artificial propagation was seen as the answer to the crimes of excessive and indiscriminate fishing, and the toxic consequences of industrial and urban development. Charles Dickens warned the cry of 'salmon in danger!' was resounding so much across Britain that a future historian would perhaps record 'the inhabitants of the last century destroyed the salmon'. The Field angling editor Francis Francis was enthralled that a hatchling, this 'delicate... little stranger... helpless little thing', could become a magnificent 20-pounder giving an angler 'a full half-hour's hard work and awful excitement'. Newspapers reported 'wonders will never cease' and urged readers to see The Field's shopfront miracle for themselves. Crowds blocked the road.