Rod Robinson has all the news from Lough Currane and the Waterville area…
The last week has seen the return of the ‘Beast from the East’ which again brought freezing conditions to Waterville with substantial further snowfall. Although the Anglers were not amused with the very unpleasant conditions on Lough Currane, the rest of us were enthralled by the highly unusual backdrop of a snow covered mountain overlooking the Lake!
Not only were air temperatures down to well below freezing over the weekend but also the water temperature in the lakes and streams dropped dramatically and this morning were hovering around 5 degrees. Needless to say this rapid drop in water temperature put a stop to both angling effort and the willingness of the fish to take! Up until that point catches had been above average for the time of year, with nine salmon from Lough Currane and four from the Butler pool, since the start of the salmon angling season. All the fish caught so far were reported to be in excellent condition with the best, a three sea winter fish of around 17lbs, which was caught by our own Honorary President! Lets hope that, as the temperatures recover and with the rain forecast for the end of this week, more fish like that will be running into Lough Currane!
Both the anglers and the Trust are anxiously awaiting the beginning of April for the expected return of the multi sea winter sea trout, for which Waterville is famous. These last two years particularly, have shown increasingly diminished runs of these magnificent fish and this, together with a poor spawning effort in our main nursery streams, observed this last winter, has become a cause of great anxiety for us all. These sea trout have been described as the ‘canaries in the mine’ indicating a serious problem in their freshwater and ocean habitats. Without the, formerly substantial, runs of these fish into the catchment, the whole ecosystem becomes at risk.
Of some comfort is the news from our conservation hatchery that, despite the low temperatures, the eggs we have in the trays, from spawning salmon caught up last Christmas, have all now hatched and the alevins are looking very healthy! The Trust has been running the hatchery for the last few years, on a conservation basis, to gather meaningful data on the stock balance of salmon in the Waterville system, which together with our ongoing scale sampling programme, is starting to give some interesting results, which we hope will inform future salmon and sea trout management in the catchment.
We would wish to remind anglers that on all the fisheries which are managed by the Trust, the Cummeragh River and the ‘Upper Lakes’ included, anglers are now required, in 2018, to release unharmed, all sea trout caught, of whatever size, in the interests of the conservation of these very
special fish.
Rod Robinson
Communications
Waterville Lakes & Rivers Trust
