Cloan Hatcheries Ltd.

Cloan Hatcheries Ltd. was founded in August 1972 and has a long and proud history. The company has been operating for over 40 years which makes it one of the oldest trout farming companies in Scotland.

Cloan’s first fingerling (5g trout) was sold from the Nether Cloan Hatchery one year after the company was founded. Cloan also built Frandy fish farm in 1974, followed by St. Mungo's Hatchery in 1975. Fossoway Fish Farm and Templeton Hatchery were added to the company in 1993, Fossoway subsequently being re-sold in 1995 and Frandy Fish farm and Templeton Hatchery are currently leased to Dawnfresh Ltd.

In 2005, Cloan grew 10.1 million trout (including its 150 millionth), weighing 350 tonnes. This represented over 25% of the UK requirement for juvenile trout, or roughly 75% of Scotland's.

Since resuming farming in 2013, Cloan has concentrated its efforts on producing lower volumes of re-stocking trout to put maximum focus on producing the highest quality fish possible.

Westmill Farm

Originally built in 1975, Cloan acquired Westmill Farm in 1987. The farm is a mixture of Raceways and Earth Ponds. Over the following years Westmill built a well-regarded reputation for providing top quality, hard fighting, and fully finned fish to fisheries all over Scotland.

At its peak, before leasing the farm initially to Scot Trout and then to Dawnfresh Farming Ltd, Cloan was supplying around 25% of the total re-stocking market. After acquiring Westmill, Cloan largely rebuilt and more than doubled the size of the farm.

In 2004, a substantial rebuild of the 16 raceways was carried out, with further redevelopment of the farm in 2008 with the addition of 3 new ponds.

In 2006, Westmill was leased to Scot Trout and then Dawnfresh Farming Ltd until Cloan resumed farming control of Westmill fish farm on the 9th of July 2013; retaining the services of the existing experienced, highly professional staff.

The farm was subsequently drained down, repaired and upgraded and given a three month fallow and full disinfection. The farm was restocked with Blue, Rainbow and Brown Trout sourced from disease free spring hatcheries in September of 2013.

As a result of low stocking densities and the highest standards of farming techniques, Westmill is now producing the best quality re-stocking fish that Cloan has produced to date.