Ronan Cusack says reports have been very good from Mask this week, as we head towards the middle of September.
The Licenced Vintner’s Federation of Ireland held their annual 2 day competition recently, which was supported by 128 anglers from across the country. Conditions on the first day were difficult, with low pressure and virtually no wind, resulting in only 13 trout being weighed in. Fresher conditions on the second day saw an improvement, with the deep producing some impressive bags. This year’s top rod went to Donal Forrest from Cork with 4 fish for 2.116kgs. In second place was Eddie Gibbons from Tourmakeady, who also had 4 fish for 2.116Kgs kgs. The organizing committee made the decision to award first prize to the angler with the heaviest individual fish. In third place was Patrick Molloy from Oughterard with 4 fish for 2.079kgs. Heaviest fish went to John Murray from Sligo with a trout of 1.366kgs. This year’s winning team was Kevin Cremin, Patsy Tracy, Eddie Gibbons and Michael O’Leary with a total of 12 trout for 6.355kgs.
Local Ballinrobe angler Peadar Jennings had 6 good fish from the deep on Thursday evening last pulling wet flies (best fish 1.75lbs, all returned). John Brennan and Kieran Newman from Longford fished Mask on Saturday last and they reported landing and returning approximately 15 fish over the 13” limit for the day (best fish 1.75lbs). Billy Graham from Northern Ireland also fished on Saturday and he had 6 good fish from the deep on wets (best fish 2.5lbs). Kieran Biggins from Ballinrobe had 2 trout in the shallows on Saturday evening (best fish 1.5lbs). Kevin Egan and Michael Vahey from Ballinrobe fished for a half day on Saturday and they finished with 7 on a combination of wets and dries (best fish 1.75lbs, all returned). Overall Mask is fishing well and worth a visit.
We would like to remind anglers that have not seen their boats on Mask recently to do so, as water levels have risen quite a bit in the last 2 weeks and boats need to be pulled up the shore a bit.
