Spring sprung this week, with a lovely weekend of sunshine and light winds finally bringing an end to the long harsh winter. Since then, however, the wind has turned east again, and while temperatures are a lot milder than last month, there is still quite a nip in the air. Duckfly hatches have been in full swing on Corrib, with a hatch of anglers finally surfacing too after the winter! Some good catches have been reported here, while further south duckfly has provided good trout fishing on Currane as well.

Trout
A lough Namona trout

Carrowmore Lake is coming into form, with good numbers of spring salmon landed, while the Drowes is continuing to produce fish most days. Other fisheries are also starting to see fish in better numbers, with springers caught on Lough Gill, Lough Beltra, the Bandon, Delphi, the Feale and the Moy.
Spring salmon
Allen Griffin Jr with his salmon

Coarse fishing is picking up, with more competitions getting going, and some good catches reported. The Erne Easter Festival provided good bags of roach and hybrids, while good conditions on the Lower Bann also gave up good catches on feeder tactics.

Jack pike have been feeding hard on the Suck, providing Patrick Foran with hectic sport, but pike angling generally has been quiet this week, with few reports. Once again its a big trout caught and released by a pike angler that wins Catch of the Week. A trout of nearly 10lb was landed by Daire Coyle on Lough Key. The big brown took half a mackerel.

It was a perfect weekend to get out on the water and charter boat anglers made hay, with some fine skate reported from West Cork, and specimen spurdogs from Wicklow. Bass are starting to appear again, and Tomasz Eckert had a fine specimen fish of 71cm on a soft plastic lure. The longer daylight hours and warmer temperatures will soon see more species being caught, and shore anglers are landing thornback rays again in Donegal, while Richie Ryan is starting to see mullet reappearing in Cork.
Specimen sized bass for Tomasz

And now the weather..

The current easterly airflow should be all gone by the weekend, with the weather coming from the Atlantic by Saturday afternoon and becoming quite unsettled, with rain and strong winds at times for the early part of next week. Temperatures will be mild enough, however, with projections for a warm spell from midweek, but we will wait and see on that one! Either way, water temperatures will be increasing and fish will be starting to show more interest in fly, lure and bait.
Safe fishing to all and tight lines, especially here in Ireland.
Kevin Crowley
Catch, Photo, Release
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