‘Screaming Reels’ from Rosie’s sea angling club in Cork won the 26TH Rosslare Small Boats competition, which was held from 10-16th September with 26 different species of fish in what was a very tight competition, beating 35 other boats from Ireland and the UK.
Sponsored by Inland Fisheries Ireland, Failte Ireland, Daiwa Sports UK and Sea Angler magazine, the event attracted more than 100 anglers from the Isle of Wight, Southport, Liverpool, Blackpool, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. All anglers stayed locally for up to two weeks. Weather conditions for the competition were extremely challenging with hurricanes blowing early in the week making boat fishing impossible. However as the week wore on, conditions improved and competitors managed to fish the normally four day competition in three days by launching their boats once from Kilrane in Rosslare and twice from Kilmore Quay and fishing restricted areas along the Wexford Coast. The fishing was excellent with a total of 33 different species recorded!
The competition was exciting from start to finish due to the close results each day. The overall results demonstrated this with first place going to ‘Screaming Reels’ (Martyn Rayner, Seirt Shults, Neville Murphy, Rosie’s Sea Angling club in Cork) with 26 species for 31.16 kilos. This is a fantastic achievement for this team of anglers who have won the competition three times in the last four years.
This was followed closely in second place by ‘Nirvana’ (Richie Stead, Keith Pemberton from the Wirral boat angling club) with 26 species for 19.20 kilos. In third place was ‘Rogie’s Girl’ (Mark Rogan, Jake Rogan, Darren Leatherbarrow, Mike Woods from Southport boat angling club) with 24 species for 19.88 kilos. Jake Rogan aged 15 was also the winning junior of the competition and it is the second time he has fished it with his Dad, Mark Rogan.
A great variety of fish were recorded during the week with 33 different types of species including coalfish, dogfish, dab, flounder, pollack, ray, wrasse and many mini species such as corkwing wrasse, dragonet and sea scorpion. There were some fantastic specimen fish caught during the week with two specimen ballan wrasse caught, one weighing 2.36 kilos caught by John Holmes from Blackpool and the other weighing 2.20 kilos caught by Phil Dawson from Lincolnshire. There were two other specimen fish recorded, one a fine specimen bull huss of 7.92 kilos caught by John Williams on board the boat ‘Uptide Girl’ from Wallasey. Stefan Young on board the boat ‘Northern Lights’ from Wigan caught a rockling of 0.82 kilos. (All specimen fish have to be verified by the ISFC).
The heaviest round fish was a conger weighing 8.78 kilos caught by the boat Cod ‘n’ Bass and the heaviest flat fish was a flounder weighing 0.40 kilos caught by the boat ‘Reel Action’. The best female angler was Sue Tait from the boat ‘Predator 2’, from Cork who had 24 species for 16.40 kilos.
‘Redmond’s The Bay’ in Rosslare Strand hosted the prizegiving for the first time in the history of this competition which was a great success, the hospitality of John Redmond and his staff was outstanding. Prizes were awarded in a variety of categories including the best specimen, heaviest flat fish, heaviest round fish, winners from each day as well as the overall winners. The prizes were presented by Josie Mahon, Inspector, Inland Fisheries Ireland, Blackrock.
The total prize fund for the competition was €14,000 and consisted of a variety of prizes including fishing equipment products as well as substantial monetary prizes and engraved trophies. Sponsors for the competition in the UK are Daiwa Sports Ltd and Sea Angler magazine and in Ireland, sponsors included Inland Fisheries Ireland, Failte Ireland and the Kilmore Quay Harbour office.
Josie Mahon
Inspector – Eastern River Basin District
Tel +353 (0)1 278 7022
Email [email protected]
