Catfish, trout and gudgeons are the other victims of the bad weather which hit the Haute-Loire. Three weeks after the flood, the fishing federation monitors the aquatic environment to try to determine the impacts on fish life.
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Difficult to see fish, three weeks after the floods in Haute-Loire. So to assess the state of the fish population, Pierre is already looking for the basis of their food: microscopic invertebrates which nestle under the stones. “We can clearly feel that the river has moved and that bad weather has cleaned the bottom of the river. Even among very small invertebrates, there is a clear decline. Afterwards it comes back quickly, but it will still take time”explains Pierre Roa, technician at the Fishing Federation.
Finally, the flood of October 17 arrived at the right time, just before the trout deposited their eggs in the strips of small pebbles and gravel. Their reproduction should therefore not be too affected by bad weather: “There, we are counting spawning grounds, to see if the spawners are coming to reproduce, this already allows us to have a first approach” says Pierre Roa.
But the flood has caused victims among the fish, by carrying mud, which prevents them from breathing, or by propelling them violently against rocks. “It must kill a few, for us it’s difficult to quantify. What we know today is that there are still some left. Their job will be to repopulate the river. Normally nature is well made so there is a faculty of resilience which is important. It should go well.”hopes Lionel Martin, president of the Haute-Loire fishing federation.
It is important to understand that here, around twenty days ago, the water rose more than five meters. It has necessarily profoundly modified the environment: “We see, for example, a stump that was carried away, deposited in the middle by the flood and in fact, it really has an ecological interest. It will create diversity in the environment, different flows. It also serves as a habitat for fish, to protect themselves from predation or hide, for example, underneath. There is also a good side of floods”adds Pierre Roa. These investigations, supplemented by inventory fishing, should make it possible to know in more detail the population of our rivers. The results and therefore the precise impact of the flood should only be known at the end of summer 2025.
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