Fiona Kelly

• BSc, PhD
• Senior Research Officer at Inland Fisheries Ireland

A visualisation of upstream and downstream salmonid migrations incorporating water levels, rainfall, air and water temperature relationships from The National Salmonid Index Catchment, River Erriff for 2024. Data from Inland Fisheries Ireland, Met Éireann and the Office of Public Works.

A visualisation of upstream and downstream salmonid migrations incorporating water levels, rainfall, air and water temperature relationships from The National Salmonid Index Catchment, River Erriff for 2023. Data from Inland Fisheries Ireland, Met Éireann and the Office of Public Works.

A visualisation of upstream and downstream salmonid migrations incorporating water levels, rainfall, air and water temperature relationships from The National Salmonid Index Catchment, River Erriff for 2022. Data from Inland Fisheries Ireland, Met Éireann and the Office of Public Works.

A visualisation of upstream and downstream salmonid migrations incorporating water levels, rainfall, air and water temperature relationships from the National Salmonid Index Catchment, River Erriff for 2020. Data from Inland Fisheries Ireland, Met Éireann and the Office of Public Works.

A visualisation of upstream and downstream salmonid migrations incorporating water levels, rainfall, air and water temperature relationships from the National Salmonid Index Catchment, River Erriff for 2021. Data from Inland Fisheries Ireland, Met Éireann and the Office of Public Works.

According to differences in life history and species niches, community assembly processes are predicted to differ between common and rare species. While neutral processes, in particular dispersal, should contribute strongly to assembly of rare species, environmental filtering (species sorting) should dominate the community assembly of common specie...

Gargan et al. (2016; Aquacult Environ Interact 8:675-689) used a time series of 15 life history descriptors to demonstrate that the population dynamics of a wild sea trout population could change markedly over a short time period. O’Farrell (2025; Aquacult Environ Interact 17:21-26) subsequently noted certain errors in the data used in Gargan et al...

Streamflow, dissolved oxygen, and water temperature underpin stream fish habitat suitability, so climate change could cause widespread habitat deterioration. Identifying stream characteristics that mediate habitat resilience to heatwaves will allow conservation effort prioritisation. Here, a set of readily applied metrics were used to assess hydrol...

This report aims to inform and support the on-going Lagarosiphon major management activities in Lough Corrib, a large freshwater lake in Ireland. Research Questions addressed in this final project report are; Establish the current distribution and extent of colonisation of L. major in L. Corrib. Determine the influence of habitat and environmen...

Climate change can affect fish species directly (e.g. through physiological stress) or indirectly (e.g. species interactions). Whether individual species will experience net benefits or net losses is important to understand from a fisheries management perspective. Ireland has a unique freshwater fish community that faces considerable uncertainty in...

Models of ecological response to multiple stressors and of the consequences for ecosystem services (ES) delivery are scarce. This paper describes a methodology for constructing a BBN combining catchment and water quality model output, data, and expert knowledge that can support the integration of ES into water resources management. It proposes “sma...

Настоящий документ является техническим документом, способствующим достижению региональных результатов в рамках проекта программы технического сотрудничества ФАО (TCP/RER/3701) «Системы и методологии сбора данных о рыболовстве во внутренних водоемах Европы», финансируемого Региональным отделением ФАО для Европы и Центральной Азии. Данная работа осу...

Aim We tested whether there is a strong effect of species interactions on assembly of local lake fish communities, in addition to environmental filters and dispersal. Location Seven hundred and seventy‐two European lakes and reservoirs. Time period 1993–2012. Major taxa studied Nineteen species of freshwater fishes. Methods We applied a latent...

This chapter provides an overview of climate change impacts on freshwater fish and the inland fisheries they support. Concepts cover general responses of inland fish habitat to climate change (e.g. temperature and oxygen) and specific responses of rivers, floodplains and lakes relevant to fish ecology. Disparate vulnerabilities among species and po...

This guidance document describes an evidence-based assessment process for undertaking river restoration works. This is not a detailed manual or a technical engineering design guide but describes a framework to plan, design, implement and monitor river restoration projects A list of best practice riparian and instream measures are presented alongsid...

This chapter describes the natural history, origin and distribution of fish in Ireland's rivers. It also gives and overview of some of their lifecyles, genetics and their movements. The chapter also describes the main pressures affecting fish in Irish rivers today.

Inland fisheries can support complex social-ecological systems and contribute to food security. However, many target stocks lack monitoring and quantitative assessment. There may be scope to apply current data-limited assessment models in these fisheries. The Length-Based Spawning Potential Ratio (LB-SPR) model requires only fish length data and in...

The ESManage project tested an eight-step methodological framework to help embed ecosystem services and the ecosystem services approach into policy and decision-making for the sustainable management of water resources, as required by the Water Framework Directive (WFD).

This document is a technical paper contributing to the regional results under an FAO Technical Cooperation Programme project (TCP/RER/3701) on “Systems and methodologies of data collection in inland fisheries of Europe”, financed by the FAO Regional Office for Europe and Central Asia (REU). This work is facilitated by the European Inland Fisheries...

Riparian tree cover has been widely proposed as a key climate change adaptation and mitigation strategy for stream temperature management. Riparian tree cover moderates stream temperature by intercepting solar radiation, a significant heat source in affected systems. However, many aspects of hydromorphological state can shape the realised temperatu...

Determining the age of fish is a core tool for fishery scientists. Age determination is essential for knowledge of recruitment frequency and hence population trends and stability. This manual is aimed as a starter for scientists setting out to determine the age of individual Irish fresh water fish, and sets out the methods, from fish in the hand to...

There is a need to develop comparable data collection and analysis systems for better implementation of management programs and to evaluate environmental, social and economic values of fisheries in inland waters.

This chapter covers Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales), Ireland (Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland), Iceland, the Faroe Islands, and Greenland. Brown Trout Salmo trutta, which belongs to the Eurasian and North African species complex, is native to all regions in the North Atlantic Isles (NAI) with the exception of Greenland. Arctic Char...

Estuaries represent important transitional waters where marine and freshwater ecosystems meet and mix. Estuaries are dynamic systems due to their tidal nature and their ecology is expected to shift with climate change and the arrival of new species. Spatially extensive descriptive studies that provide temporal baselines for species distribution and...

Keywords: Predator-prey interaction Size-based population model Fisheries management Model uncertainty Pike and trout Management action evaluation A B S T R A C T When one wild species is food for another and both have their hunting enthusiasts, then conflict can arise. This is particularly true and complicated in fishing, where trophic links are s...

The Water Framework Directive was widely welcomed because it sought to integrate chemical and biological elements of aquatic ecosystems to achieve ‘good ecological status’, reflecting at most slight anthropogenic impact. However, implementation has been criticised because of the failure to adequately integrate these elements and assess status of th...

Roach is an invasive cyprinid fish species that has been introduced to many Irish lakes, causing broad changes in fish community dynamics. This paper examines whether roach invasion is associated with temporal change in the diet of pike in colonised systems. The seasonal diet of pike in three Irish lakes was compared between a historical (pre-roach...

Climate change has been identified as a global threat to Arctic char Salvelinus alpinus L. populations. Bayesian statistical models were used to identify important physical and ecological factors explaining Arctic char presence and persistence in Irish lakes. Maximum lake depth and the presence of mixed fish communities (i.e. including non‐salmonid...

This study investigated interactions between eco‐hydromorphological state, riparian vegetation cover, water temperature and fish community composition in lowland rivers in Ireland. Physical habitat modification of study sites corresponded with degraded eco‐hydromorphological state (degree of ecological and physical modification) and reduced thermal...

This study finds that non‐native species and warming temperatures have significant negative effects on Arctic char Salvelinus alpinus abundance in Irish lakes. Eutrophication was not important at the range of total phosphorus tested (0.005–0.023 mg l⁻¹). Model results predict that S. alpinus occur across the temperature range sampled (8.2–19.7°C) w...

Culling predators is a traditional tool in inland fisheries management. There is a long history of removing northern pike Esox lucius from certain Irish lakes in an attempt to enhance brown trout Salmo trutta fisheries. In recent decades, some of these systems have experienced on‐going warming, eutrophication and the establishment of large populati...

An environmental study of pike Esox lucius recorded their presence in 522 Irish lakes and that they coexisted with brown trout Salmo trutta in 97 of these. Statistical models, accounting for spatial non‐independence among lakes, suggested that lakes with greater area, maximum depth and stream connectivity show a higher probability of coexistence. I...

Pollan, Coregonus autumnalis pollan Thompson, requires an appropriate standardised sampling protocol for conservation assessments. The suitability of hydroacoustics with gillnetting was evaluated, and the effects of sampling design, effort and statistical analysis on the repeatability of results were tested. Summer hydroacoustic surveys appear appr...

Invasion of non-native species is considered a major threat to global biodiversity. Here we present a comprehensive overview of the occurrence, richness and biomass contribution of non-native fish species in 1943 standing water bodies from 14 countries of the Western Palearctic, based on standardised fish catches by multi-mesh gillnetting. We expec...

Trochine et al. 2018 (Ecosystems) ESM

Aim To construct a classification system for Irish aquatic river vegetation that is directly comparable to European aquatic vegetation classification units. Location A total of 2,415 river vegetation plots with a wide geographic distribution across both the Republic and Northern Ireland. Methods The plots were recorded from a range of river types...

The study of river vegetation for the purposes of macrophyte community classification has often been neglected by vegetation scientists. There is little detail available on appropriate survey methods for classification of aquatic river communities and their suitability to the task in hand. There is great variation in river macrophyte surveying tech...

Area-delineated multiple-pass depletion electrofishing (ADEF) can be resource-intensive. It may not capture fish community state when resource limitations mean that the number of sites sampled in a system is insufficient to account for ecological heterogeneity. Rapid assessment techniques such as single-pass timed electrofishing could be more effic...

Here we provide the metadata for an overview on fish species presence/absence in 1943 Palearctic (Europe + Turkey) lakes and reservoirs. The data have been obtained by standardized multi-mesh gillnet fishing, primarily to fulfill the requirements of the European Water Framework Directive (WFD). The species list encompasses about 100 species, a few...

In the simplest of terms, ecosystem services are defined as “the contributions that ecosystems make to human well-being”. Ecosystem services and the ecosystem services framework are considered a means of embedding biological and ecological thinking into policy and practice. The framework is seen as an effective means of communicating to all stakeho...

In order to incorporate the ecosystem services framework into policy related to the management of freshwater resources the full range of Ireland’s freshwater ecosystems and their underlying biological resources must be identified. This report consolidates this knowledge and outlines current pressures and management structures relating to freshwater...

Identify Pressures Ireland’s freshwaters are among the best in Europe. However, they are under increasing pressure from a range of land-use and other anthropogenic pressures, especially from elevated nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and sediment inputs, but also increasingly from pesticides, water abstractions, and invasive species. The continui...

The objective of this study was to provide fisheries researchers with a cost-effective solution to estimate the weight of a particular fish species from the hypothesis that length and weight are strongly correlated. The aim was to estimate the weight from a given length through a length–weight relationship/regression equation. Length–weight (L–W) r...

The demographic and life history characteristics of sea trout populations can be changed by a range of pressures in both freshwater and marine environments. There are few long-term monitoring programmes in place to assess temporal change in population dynamics. We analysed a 20-year time series (1985-2004) using 14 sea trout Salmo trutta L. populat...

Identify pressures Ireland’s freshwaters are among the best in Europe. However, they are under increasing pressure from a range of land-use and other anthropogenic pressures, especially from elevated nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and sediment inputs. The continuing loss of high status waters is a key concern. Planned future land-use intensif...

A simple procedure to harmonise and intercalibrate eight national methods classifying the ecological status using fish in transitional waters of the North East Atlantic is described. These methods were initially intercalibrated and a new method recently developed was added to this exercise. A common human pressure index pre-classified the status of...

The identification of ecosystem services (ES) and their valuation for potential use in environmental, social and political decision making is a fast growing research area. The ES literature is growing exponentially from less than 200 papers per year at the beginning of the Millennium to over 1600 per annum at the moment. While the ability to ide...

This study investigates temporal stability in the scale microchemistry of brown trout Salmo trutta in feeder streams of a large heterogeneous lake catchment and rates of change after migration into the lake. Laser-ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry was used to quantify the elemental concentrations of Na, Mg, Mn, Cu, Zn, Ba and Sr...

A simple procedure to harmonise and intercalibrate eight national methods classifying the ecological status using fish in transitional waters of the North East Atlantic is described. These methods were initially intercalibrated and a new method recently developed was added to this exercise. A common human pressure index pre-classified the status of...

The Water Framework Directive (WFD) has established the concept of ecological quality as a method to improve European Union (EU) surface and ground waters. Ecological quality status is based on the composition and abundance of different biological quality elements, including fish fauna, with the supporting elements of hydromorphology and chemical a...

The current national surface water monitoring programme in Ireland includes 224 lakes. Monitoring data from the period 2012–14 are used to evaluate the performance of ecological assessment metrics in responding to eutrophication pressure, as indicated by average total phosphorus concentration (TP). For 70 surveillance lakes, the r2 or relationships...

As part of the national monitoring programme under the Water Framework Directive (WFD), seine, trawl and fyke net samples were taken of fish from thirteen locations in Tidal Freshwater Transitional Waters (TFTW) around Ireland. The results were highly variable, with some hauls completely empty while others returned high numbers of individuals, usua...

A Plan for developing a Classification Tool for Fish in lakes appropriate for the water Framework Directive is presented

The Development of Targeted Ecological Modelling Tools for Lake Management (DOLMANT) project was funded by INTERREG IVA. Project partners were The Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute (lead partner), University of Ulster, Trinity College Dublin, Inland Fisheries Ireland, The Irish Environmental Protection Agency and the Northern Ireland Environmenta...

One of the key actions identified by the Water Framework Directive (WFD; 2000/60/EC) is to develop ecological assessment tools and carry out a European intercalibration (IC) exercise. The aim of the Intercalibration is to ensure that the values assigned by each Member State to the good ecological class boundaries are consistent with the Directive’s...

This study is the first comprehensive documentation of the geographical range of Anguillicola crassus in its host, the European eel Anguilla anguilla, in the Republic of Ireland. The prevalence and intensity of infections across 234 sites and 93 river basins in Ireland comprising rivers, lakes and transitional waters (estuaries) were analysed. Whil...

Little is known about the structural composition of macrophytic communities in Irish small streams and headwaters, despite their important influence on the biological integrity of the river catchment as a whole. A subset of 103 small stream and headwater vegetation plots were extracted from the River Macrophyte Database (RMD) with the aim of identi...

Little is known about the structural composition of macrophytic communities in Irish small streams and headwaters, despite their important influence on the biological integrity of the river catchment as a whole. A subset of 103 small stream and headwater vegetation plots were extracted from the River Macrophyte Database (RMD) with the aim of identi...

1. We aimed to distinguish the relative contributions of natural and anthropogenic local factors on patterns of fish diversity in European lakes at different geographical scales. 2. We compiled data from standardised fish monitoring using multimesh benthic gill nets, information on lake morphometry and on geographical, climatic and anthropogenic pr...

A classification tool suitable for establishing the ecological status of lakes based on fish population parameters has been developed for the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland (EU Water Framework Directive Ecoregion 17). A lake typology relevant to fish populations in lakes from Ecoregion 17 was produced as part of the ecological classificat...

The Irish pollan Coregonus autumnalis pollan is a unique and threatened freshwater fish species endemic to the island of Ireland, with its current known distribution limited to five lakes; Lough Neagh, Lower Lough Erne, Lough Allen, Lough Ree and Lough Derg. The Lough Neagh pollan are still relatively abundant, contributing approximately 25% of the...

The use of the CEN (European Committee for Standardization) standard method for sampling fish in lakes using multi-mesh gillnets allowed the collection of fish assemblages of 445 European lakes in 12 countries. The lakes were additionally characterised by environmental drivers and eutrophication proxies. Following a site-specific approach including...

The Irish Pollan Coregonus autumnalis Pallas is unique in western Europe, with its current known distribution being limited to four lakes in Ireland; Lough Neagh and Lower Lough Erne in Northern Ireland and Lough Ree and Lough Derg in the Republic of Ireland. In this paper we report the first authenticated record of pollan in a fifth Irish lake—Lou...

Many countries, including Ireland, were ill-prepared for the requirements of the Water Frame- work Directive (WFD) regarding the use of fi sh as a biological element. Examination of archival data proved uninformative. Details of species composition, distribution and density were frag- mented and non-standard. No monitoring programme or strategic st...