Performing Acclimatisation: The Agency of Trout Fishing in Postcolonial Australia

This paper investigates the manner in which species acclimatisation takes place in new landscapes. Taking the example of mid-nineteenth-century Tasmania, Australia, where the Acclimatisation Society was a major, high-status institution involving the governing classes, scientists, major landowners and officials, the paper investigates how the successful acclimatisation of the brown trout (Salmo trutta) actually took place. It argues that is was not merely a question of introducing the animal into a new environment. Part of the agency of acclimatisation was enacted by trouts themselves, although this rarely figures in narratives of acclimatisation. The paper shows how trout agency was deployed to evolve a new way of life in the new landscape that had a profound impact on their relationship with human anglers and angling culture in Tasmania.