Lough Arrow Anglers report that the hatch has been fantastic this year, but like most of our lakes, the weather just didn’t suit mayfly fishing for most of the time…
Overall it must be said that this year’s mayfly has been very disappointing from a fishing point of view. The cuckoo, the swallow, the whitethorn and the lilac all arrived early, as did the mayfly. There were very few trout caught on the dap or on green fly patterns due to the sunny, calm days. In the early days of the hatch you need a nice wind, with the odd shower thrown in, to keep the fly on the water.
On a positive note, we did have very good spent fishing in the evening. While most evenings we had a breeze from the NE or the NW, making it very difficult to see your fly while looking into the glaring sun in the western sky, this meant that you could fish right up until darkness fell. It’s hard to gauge the number of flies that hatch during sunny days like these, because they don’t stay on the water, heading straight for the trees instead. Judging by the incredible amount of shucks on the surface, and the sheer numbers of spent, the hatch this year on Lough Arrow was outstanding.
Reports of fish caught over the last couple of weeks include :
Fishing out of John Hargadon’s: –
John and his son-in-law Brian had a few fine trout on spent.
David Flynn had 11 over 2 days, 7 on spent and 4 on nymphs.
Philip Frei from Berne, Switzerland had 2.
Fishing out of Lough Arrow Caravan Park:-
Ken Murray, Philip Brown and Mark Duncan reported catches on various nights.
Fishing out of Finian Dodd’s:-
Many anglers over the mayfly season reported varying degrees of success.
Local anglers Tom Reilly, Paul McTiernan and Oliver Wall reported fish caught on spent.
While there was no Duffer’s Fortnight on Lough Arrow this year, the going was tough on other lakes too. There’s a hard day ahead when an angler is putting on more Factor 50 than flies!
Tight lines and bent rods!
Spanish flyfishing filmmaker Alvaro was on the lake recently for 2 days with Jim Curry from Guideline Flyfishing, and local guide Jackie Mahon. Alvaro will be producing a destination video for Lough Arrow, but he published a short snippet of spent mayfly on the water that we loved.
