The weather was very blustery and the start of the week saw the remnants of the hurricane Katia hit the Irish coast as well but Irish anglers still carried on fishing in most instances.  There was low water conditions on many salmon fisheries over the past week but there was some notable fishing.  The Blackwater Lodge reported the best day’s fishing on their beats.  Despite the wind there were some notable catches on Lough Currane where famous flytier, Ally Gowans caught four grilse in a day and a sea trout of 3 lb. on fly.   Most rivers in the Cork Kerry area fished well including the River Laune where there was some fine fish recorded.  Over in Connemara, the hundred salmon of the year was recorded on Lough Inagh and anglers had some excellent fishing at Ballynahinch, Delphi and the Erriff.  Catches on the River Moy are a little slower this year but 334 fish were still reported for the week with most of the fish recorded in the upper stretches of the river.

Trout anglers were well rewarded this week on Lough Sheelin with some lovely fish reported including several fish over five pounds.  There was a good improvement in the trout fishing in the west with better fishing from Corrib, Mask, Carra and Conn.

There are a lot of English visitors over in Ireland enjoying excellent catches of coarse fish particularly at the many fishing festivals being held.  Inniscarra Lake has had quite a few lately and there were superb fishing for bream, rudd and hybrids recorded at the competitions.  The Arvagh Festival attracted 80 anglers and they over 2.7 tonnes of roach, bream and hybrids fishing venues on Lough Gowna, Gulladoo, Rockfield and Glasshouse Loughs.

There are two major Pike festivals coming up now.  Next week the annual European Pike Challenge will take place on Lough Derg at Killaloe and the following weekend a new two day shore competition takes place in Ballinasloe and the venue is the River Suck where many competitors will try the catch the huge fish that live in that river.

The windy weather did curtail sea angling a bit last week but Bill Ryan in clare and his friend Jim O’Malley caught some lovely specimen wrasse from the rocks in clare and Jim won catch of the week with a nice fish of 5 lb. 4 oz.  The annual skate festival is only a week away which is held in Westport and there are still a few places left for anglers to try their luck in catching a big skate.  Up in Sligo shore anglers caught fish in the west coast league from Streedagh Beach in Co. Sligo in harsh conditions.   Another big Porbeagle Shark was recorded by a dutch angler fishing off red bay with charter skipper Hamish Currie.

Paul Bourke
Angling Information Officer.
Catch, Photo, Release.
email: [email protected]

Salmon fishing reports

• Excellent fishing reported at Shean Fishery, Owenduff
• Good salmon fishing reported from most of the smaller rivers in the Cork Kerry region.
• Great fly water on the Laune
• Owenea fishing very well, 50 salmon last week
• River Drowes fished well over the weekend
• Kylmore enjoying a good season with a very good grilse run
• Fishing at Delphi tough over the last couple of weeks
• New records at Inagh with over 100 salmon landed this season
• Mixed weather on the Erriff but some good salmon taken
• Little effort to fish Ballisodare during unfavourable conditions
• Excellent fishing on Glenamoy during dropping spates
• Good fishing on the Owenmore between floods
• Lots of fresh grilse at Lough Furnace, Burrishoole
• Good sport over the past week on the Newport River
• High water levels on the Moy

Trout fishing reports

• Sheelin fished well til gales prevailed
• Lough Melvin quiet, occassional trout over deep water
• Trout fly fishing reasonable on Corrib
• Some cracking trout at Carra on dry fly
• Lough Mask on top form, deep water for best sport
• Wets best bet on Arrow with trout to 3.7lb landed recently
• Trout on fly during lulls in wind on Loughs Conn and Cullin

Coarse angling reports

• Tench to 3.5lb from Inniscarra
• Jack Tisdall announces the Erne Anglers Angling Club Winter League
• Super match results for the Arvagh Festival where there was some excellent catches recorded
• Fantastic coarse angling match results reported at Inniscarra Lake along with excellent pleasure catches of roach, bream, hybrids, rudd and perch
• Good dace fishing for anglers fishing the River Barrow in Carlow town

Pike fishing reports

• Big two day Pike competition on the River Suck on the 24th and 25th of September
• The European Pike Challenge is on Lough Derg from the 19th September

Sea angling reports

• Cobh International Deep Sea Angling Festival results
• The big skate festival is on at Westport on the 1st and 2nd of October
• More porbeagles from the Antrim coast
• Specimen wrasse for Jim O’Malley off the Clare coast
• West Coast Shore League, plenty of surf but few fish