John Bailey: Why reintroduction of burbot would be done to please fishery scientists alone

I was on a quite horrendous film recce with a team of Germans in the far east of that blighted land and we began to run out of food. We ate what we could catch, which wasn’t much, so we began to lay nets and, lo and behold, hauled out a 5lb burbot. We fell on it like ravening wolves, but no matter how the ugly critter was cooked, it still tasted like wood pulp with the texture of oft-chewed gum. I decided that if any fish had to become extinct in East Anglia, then the burbot was as a good a candidate as you could find.

Did I catch the last burbot?

Indeed, burbot, eel pout, whatever you want to call the squat, brown, mottled horrors, died out here half a century ago and were incredibly rare in the 30 years before that. There were rumours of them surviving in the Thet perhaps as late as the 1980s, but as far as I know these were largely unconfirmed. Almost certainly, dredging mid-last century destroyed burbot spawning habitat and populations spiralled into oblivion. Agricultural run-off probably didn’t help and warmer winters might have hammered in the last nail.

But today I receive an email from the excellent Richard Jones who has worked in conservation and spotted an article in The Guardian which reported that Natural England are hoping to bring back the burbot.

Woohoo! Or not? Richard writes: “You’ll have seen Guardian reports on returning burbot to Norfolk? Surely Natural England should find out why burbot died out initially? And why introduce another predator when all Norfolk rivers are suffering a predator glut anyway? Shouldn’t the focus of attention be on understanding why iconic species like roach are in such decline rather than diverting energies and money onto lost causes? And have you ever caught a Norfolk burbot yourself, John?” (How blooming old does he think I am!?).

Well, Richard and readers, is there a single angler, and tax payer, who would rather see money spent on bringing back burbot ahead of desirable species like grayling or barbel? Any reintroduction of burbot would be done to please fishery scientists alone and as a frivolous academic exercise. This is the sort of meaningless PR that we see eternally from the authorities who seek a catchy headline to divert us from the real challenges that need to be addressed. Outside Norfolk, it’s rather like the Environment Agency bleating on about returning salmon to the Thames when the reality is much of that river is on its knees.

I have talked with supporters of this ludicrous proposal. They have suggested that if burbot are reintroduced and fail to establish themselves, then we will know that our rivers have problems. Er? Ask any single river angler in Norfolk and I think he or she knows the answer to that one and does not need a burbot to explain it. Rather like canaries in a mine, burbot did sing out in the 30s, were ignored and died off as a result. We hardly need to ask for an encore nigh on a century later.

There are plenty of evergreens like me who are profoundly depressed by the way angling has gone since 1970. Within half a century, natural fishing has all but been replaced by artificial fishing. Waters in demand today are those which get deliveries from a fish farm and those where you can drive a car right up to your chosen swim. River skills that were so central to the sport in the 1960s have all but died away for the simple reason that river fish populations have withered and died too.

Can Richard Jones and I and all the rest of us oldies suggest to Natural England that their time would be better spent reinvigorating those upper rivers of Norfolk and Suffolk that were once the glory of the angling nation? If they stopped bugging (or a word very close to that) around with burbot and actually investigated the real challenges our rivers face, then we might get somewhere. Get roach populations vibrant again and sparkling gravels carpeted with near pound dace, Natural England, and then we can talk about burbot!