I found this online and think you should take a read. Sea trout are still under huge pressure due to the filthy business of salmon farming and these wonderful sporting fish are now extremely rare in most west coast rivers.
I fish the Bunowen sometimes, a classic spate river which should provide good sport after a spell of rain. I didn’t bother fishing it last season though as stocks of both salmon and sea trout were at an all time low. Locals who know every stone on the bottom of the river saw few fish and despite some perfect spates the fish simply did not appear. Until the fish farms are removed our sea trout will continue to suffer from sea lice attack. Eaten alive at sea they die before reaching the river. Those that do make it back to fresh water are lean and scarred, dreadfully weakened and susceptible to disease. The Irish government don’t want to hear about this, big business is never challenged in this country.
I don’t know if I will bother fishing the Bunowen this coming season. I suspect there will be no sea trout again this year and it is depressing swinging flies through the runs and pools when they are devoid of life. only when the accursed cages with their filth and poison and lice are consigned to history will the silvery trout come back. We are a long, long way from that happy day……………….
Claretbumbler 
We have the same problems with farmed salmon here as you do there.
It seems to be an issue worldwide!
Our government is just as guilty of allowing this travesty.
Recent info. I came across stated that somewhere about 850k farmed salmon have escaped since this stupid farming has been here and genetic evidence of interbreeding with our wild fish has been discovered in several wild populations in some of our rivers. Our salmon preservation is an issue which is brought up and the scientific evidence is ignored! Not sure when they will wake up to this distructive practice and ban it! Keep up the fight and hope it is banned before it is too late!
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WE have suffered numerous escapes, some are locally attributed to insurance claims by the farmers! A few years ago the rivers suddenly filled with large (4 – 6 pound) rainbow trout. Thousands of them ran the rivers and stream, displacing native salmon and trout. we pulled out as many as possible but the salmon runs have never really been the same since that happened. This is the first I have heard of evidence of interbreeding between wild and farmed salmon, we are always told the farmed fish are sterile.
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