Ronan Cusack reports that the heavy rain over the past 7 days has raised water levels on Lough Mask significantly. Any anglers who may not have seen their boat recently may be advised to do so.

As World Cup fever builds, recent reports indicate that angling this week has been mixed, depending on weather conditions. Fly hatches have been good with plenty of sedge and good hatches of late mayfly around the southern end over the weekend.

Andrew Boyd from Galway fished with Stan McCart, Northern Ireland on Sunday and they finished with 2 trout for the day (best fish 1.75lbs). Regular Mask anglers John Brennan and Kieran Newman from Longford fished Mask in torrential rain on Saturday last and they had 3 keepable fish and a few undersize for the day (best fish 1.5lbs, all returned). Brian McInerney and Darin Gardiner from Co. Clare fished out of Dringeen on Sunday and they had 4 fish on a combination of wets and dries (best fish 3lbs). John Burke from Tourmakeady has a group of UK anglers staying with him at the moment and they have an average of 2 trout per day over the past 2 weeks on wet flies.

The outlook for the coming week is for more broken weather, so it looks like an exciting build up to the 2015 World Cup.

Ronan also guides on Mask and can be contacted at [email protected]