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dam-l France: more flying dams..SECOND DAM DEMOLISHED FOR SALMON



06.11.98: LOIRE BASIN (France) : More flying dams.. !

SECOND DAM DEMOLISHED FOR SALMON 


(Photos will be avaiabel very soon on this webpage !)


The Vienne river, the second most important tributary of the Loire river after the Allier,

is flowing freely again in the area where it was blocked by the Maisons-Rouges dam. 

The demolition of this 3,80 meter-high and  60 m long dam is indeed almost over and 

the Vienne has regained the level it had before the dam was built in 1923. 


Salmon "Salmo salar" http://www.rivernet.org/saumo1_e.htm and other migratory fish

such as eels and shads will again be able to swim upriver and reach their former

spawning grounds on the Vienne river basin, which represents a fifth of the whole Loire basin.


The works, which were decided as part of « the Plan Loire Grandeur Nature » 

( http://www.rivernet.org/plgn.htm) in January 1994 inspired by the campaign led by the

Loire Vivante network, were launched in the middle of June 1998, after a few years of 

conflicts due to local political opposition. The destruction of the right part of the dam allowed 

the reservoir to be emptied and the river to flow freely ; it was finished in mid-September. 

The demolition of the rest of the dam - its left part, consisting in various inefficient fishladders

and the hydroelectric buildings - will be over at the end of the year. 

End of September, a program for the restoration of the riverbanks was launched, 

which  required 45,000 m3 of backfill and 7,500 tons of rocks. This will be followed 

by a phase of plantation which will give their natural character back to the banks. 


The works, amounting to FF10 million (about $1.6 million), have been supervized by

EDF (the French state-owned electricity utility), as was the case with the demolition

of the 18 m high Saint-Etienne-du-Vigan dam ( http://www.rivernet.org/stedvig.htm ) 

on the Upper Allier, which has also been dismantled as part of the salmon restoration

program of the « Plan Loire Grandeur Nature ». The same amount will be spent on

measures  meant to replace professional taxes formerly paid by EDF. 

Blueprints for economic, touristic or environmental development projects

have been formulated, but no decision has been taken yet. 


This operation should enable salmon and other migratory fish to come back on 

the Vienne river and its tributaries. At the end of the XIXth century, salmon had

about 800 hectares of spawning grounds on the Vienne basin.

The 365-km-long Vienne has tributaries which are ideal for 

salmon, notably the Creuse which itself receives the Gartempe. 

An important salmon restoration program was launched on the Gartempe in 1975, 

but it has had very few positive results because of the inefficiency of the

Maisons-Rouges fishladders. 


The demolition of the Maisons-Rouges dam, together with that of the

Saint-Etienne-du-Vigan dam, the construction of an efficient fishladder on the

Vichy dam and the efforts undertaken to improve other small obstacles to 

salmon migration, indicate the program to save the Loire and 

Allier salmon is under way. However, the species will be saved only

when the salmon hatchery programmed on the Upper Allier, which is several

years late, is built. In 1997, only 389 salmon were counted on the middle Allier river,

the sole tributary of the Loire were salmon still returned to spawn before

Maisons-Rouges was destroyed. 

* Rate used : 1 $ = 6 FF 


for more information contact:



<bold><bigger>Roberto A. EPPLE

</bigger></bold>Executive Director, ERN-European Rivers Network

e-mail : ern@rivernet.org       website: http://www.rivernet.org


<italic><underline>Main & Westeuropean Office:

</underline></italic>8 Rue Crozatier,  43000 Le Puy,  France  

Tel +33 (0) 471 02 08 14    Fax  +33 (0) 471 02 60 99

<italic><underline>North-European Office:

</underline></italic>Poststrasse 7 c/o Projekt Lebendige Elbe, DUH

D - 06366 Koethen, Deutschland

Tel +49 (0) 3496 21 00 09  Fax +49 (0) 3496 21 00 08