Paper long abstract:

This paper considers the nature of salmon as a companion species, constituted in human-salmon relations in the River Tana, the third largest salmon river in the Northern Hemisphere. Here, different kinds of fishermen, compete to attract the salmon. Salmon is a boundary object, displaying different characteristics and forms of agency. The subjectivity and agency of fish and fishermen become together. In these relations, salmon is called on by use of different technologies. Fishing technologies articulate particular trajectories of human fish-relations. Exploring multiple fishing practices engaged in along the River Tana, I consider the cleverness of salmon. I propose that the nature of the fish, as brought about in human-salmon conversations, depends upon the intimacy of the relation, the natureculture salmon is made part of, and finally salmon materiality, whether human interact with salmon singular or salmon plural, as a steam.