Sea angling in the last couple of weeks has produced some wonderful fish. From light rock fishing in Wexford where two friends learnt new skills under the watchful eye of guide Gerard Doran to the huge porbeagle weighing over 200lbs caught onboard the Predator at the other end of the country in Red Bay. We had sunfish and seatrout reported by Steven Neely and herons catching bass with Richie Ryan, Smoothies and mullet in Wicklow and big blues in Cork. A Dutch angling journalist fly fishing in Killala Bay found that the area is full of potential for the saltwater fly angler. And only minutes from Dublin Gary Robinson showed that kayak angling is great way of getting to fishing that might not be thought possible so close to a European capital.

Potential new Irish, UK and world record spurdog24lb 14oz
Richard from the Netherlands with a potential new Irish, UK and world record spurdog weighing in at 24lb 14oz

When it comes to our ‘Catch of the Week’ we have to turn to a Dutch angler called Richard who hauled a fine 24lb 14oz spurdog onboard Hamish Currie’s boat. Using a full mackerel bait south of Red Bay, Richard has a potential new Irish, UK and world record spurdog. With an abundance of mackerel in the area the crew had a great days fishing including skate, cod and ray.

Salmon fishing was up and down over the last seven days and success very much depended on where you fished as low water levels posed a problem in a lot of areas. One fishery that reported a good week was the Owenwee near Westport where returns to date have been the best since 1997. Ballisodare informs us that fishing is slow but a good number of grilse have been caught. Old faithful herself, the Moy had only 256 salmon reported compared to 1,000 in previous weeks. With low water on the Owenmore small flies were needed to tempt the salmon while sea trout provided sport on Carrowmore. Good fishing was reported at Ballinahinch where good numbers of fish are present. Fishing on the Erriff picked up somewhat as heavy rain increased water levels around mid-week and again towards the end of the week. One angler who brought his own luck was Keith Barry who conjured a fine grilse from Beat 5 after losing two other fish at the bank. At Lough Inagh 9 salmon and 81 sea trout were landed for the week for 50 rod days. Few anglers were out at the Galway fishery although Kevin Crowley reports that conditions are excellent at the moment for the fly. An Italian angler on the Munster Blackwater landed 41 fish to 12lb over 15 days and the river is fishing well when the water is right. The Laune fished a bit up and down last week, though its anglers did better over the weekend.  Jason Nash adapted methods on the Bandon and caught a 5lb sea liced grilse on his size 13 Green Butt Cascade. Paul Hanley too gives us tips from Cork on low water tactics for Salmon on the Lee.

Compared to last week, fishing on Lough Corrib slowed down a bit. However, trout are still taking Mayfly and Murrough patterns and anglers reporting some good catches. Angling on Lough Arrow has continued to be sporadic as the Green Peter fishing is now tailing off. However, dry or wet Daddies should prove effective from now on and through September. The number of anglers fishing Lough Sheelin is increasing as the anglers, a lot of whom last visited the lake during the mayfly, are now returning to this great trout fishery. The trout are steadily moving away from their recent fry feeding frenzy and are now taking sedges and a variety of other insects available to them on and below the surface. Joe Flannelly from Keel River Lodge reports that with lower temperatures and more “normal” summer weather, Lough Carra is beginning to give some action again. Ronan Cusack reports that fishing on Mask this week is beginning to show signs of improvement with a change in weather conditions. The recent rainfall and drop in air temperature has cooled the water slightly, which should encourage the fish to go back on the feed.

Some visiting anglers fishing the Arva area report good bags of fish during the past week and bags to over 100lb were reported from Rosduff. Tourist anglers in the Longford area benefited from heavy prebaiting of their swims and this produced some cracking catches of bream, hybrids, roach and tench on both feeder and float tactics. With 1500kg of fish caught by 42 anglers over 4 days, the 2013 Belturbet Summer Angling Festival proved yet again to be a great success. Congratulations to Bas Smith, the ultimate winner (for the third time) with 52.870kg.  The IADA 5 man team competition on Muckno saw almost 1 Tonne of fish landed.

Propects

Anglers can expect Saturday morning to be bright and sunny, but the afternoon and evening will be cloudier as outbreaks of rain move eastwards. Highest temperatures of 17 to 19 degrees. Sunday will be a bright and fresh day that will be dry most of the time. After a cool start to Sunday morning, temperatures will rise to between 17 and 19 degrees in the early afternoon, with moderate northwesterly breezes. Monday will be a similar sort of day; mainly dry and bright with broken cloud but temperatures a degree or so lower and feeling more autumal. On Monday night rain spreads southwards and then slowly clears during Tuesday morning; the weather being generally dry over the bulk of the country by Tuesday afternoon. The dry weather continues through the middle of next week as high pressure builds across Ireland and good sunshine develops. It will get warmer again and highest temperatures by next Thursday will reach up to 20 degrees in the south of the country.

Tight lines,

Nancy Hearne
Catch, Photo, Release

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