This article is from page 13 of the 2011-08-30 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 13 JPG
AN ENNIS company has manufactured a new fish pass which could save a number of endangered species of fish from the threat of extinction.
Enform Plastics Limited, which is based in the Doora Industrial Estate, has played a major role in the development of Ireland’s first ever plastic fish pass. The company, which was selected by the MulkearLIFE, helped design and manufacture a series of hardened ABS plastic sheets, each containing of pegs, which would aid the passage of fish upstream.
The project is focussed on helping to preserve the stock of Sea Lamprey in the Shannon but the design could have far-reaching implications for other rivers and other breeds of fish.
“This is a revolutionary design – it is the first time that a plastic fish pass has been designed which can be easily attached to barriers to allow fish like these massive Sea Lamprey to pass successfully upstream,” said Ruairí Ó Conchúir, Project manager with the MulkearLIFE Project.
“Sea Lamprey are under serious threat at the moment and the River Shannon as well as rivers like the Fergus are very important for them. They have suffered a 50 per cent decline in their population numbers and one of the reason for this is man-made barriers which have prevented them from accessing their traditional spawning grounds.”
MulkearLIFE is a new € 1.75 million European Commission funded project which is focussed on the Lower Shannon Special Area of Conservation. An initial instalment of the passes has proved to be a great success in recent months.
“We have worked with researchers in America, Canada and France to develop the design that would work best for the Sea Lamprey. The easiest way of describing the design is like an inverted egg-box made out of a special type of plastic. Enform Plastic worked with us on the design and manufactured the sheets for us and so far it has proved to be a great success,” continued Ruairí.
“This is a unique design and the first time anything like this has been used in Ireland. We have been making night-time and early morning observations of weirs and that is what proved to us that the design have been very successful. On one of the most recent counts we recorded 170 fish used the wire itself and 140 of them used the fish passes. We are confident that this is proving to be a big success. We know that we can easily adapt this to other rivers.”