Declan Cooke reports
There hasn’t been a huge amount of angling activity on either Lough Conn or Cullin until last weekend. Those that have ventured out, however, have found excellent trout angling and the first of the season’s mayfly hatches well underway.
On Lough Conn, Ian Wade, operating out of the Cloonamoyne Fishery at Enniscoe House, had two UK based clients out for three days during the week. After much deliberating and head scratching, they calculated that they had caught 164 trout over the 3 days. Although many of these were small (20 – 30cm) there were some fine fish up to 2.5lbs. among them. All fish were caught on wet flies and all but 4 were returned. Best patterns were , International, Green Dabbler, Golden Olive Bumble and Bibio.
At the Weekend, Dublin based anglers Maurice Dallaghan and Conor Donnelly had a very enjoyable two day trip to Lough Conn. They fished at Castlehill Bay, the Abbey Shore and Flannery’s Bay and had 23 trout up to 1.75lbs. in weight. Only three fish were kept and dry fly patterns accounted for most fish. Royal Wulff, Green Wulff and Mosley patterns in sizes 12 – 14 were the most successful flies.
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There were also a handful of local anglers out over the weekend and all reported good hatches and good catches, mainly in the northern half of the lake. The international and the Royal Wulff appear to be the leading patterns.
Adrian Murphy from Cloghans had his two sons, 13 year old Brendan and 11 year old Cormac, out on Cloghans Bay and they had some lovely trout on a variety of wet mayfly patterns, including a fine 1.5 pounder. All fish were released.
![](/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/13-year-old-Brendan-Murphy-with-a-nice-1.5-lbs.-Lough-Conn-brownie-240x366.jpg")
![](/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Brendan-releasing-his-brown-trout-240x313.jpg")
Lough Cullin hosted the two day Albert Berry Cup Competition over the weekend. This is the 27th year in succession that this competition has been fished here, with 42 anglers from both north and south of the border competing for the coveted prize. With challenging conditions on the (catch and release ) Saturday leg, catches were surprisingly good but no big (2lbs.+) fish were landed. However, on the Sunday, the wind shifted to the south and cloud drifted in, making for ideal angling conditions.
