Munster Coarse Anglers fished the final match of their winter series in O’Briensbridge at the weekend. Kevin Leahy reports…
Return of Magnificent Seven to O’Briensbridge
Well that’s it for another year. The 34th Munster Coarse Anglers Winter League is now over. With all the lakes of East Clare flooded it was back to O’Briensbridge for the final. The venue has not been particularly kind to us this year but on Sunday all was forgotten as “The Bridge” became our most favourite venue in the whole wide world again.
Downstream at rowing course was the area chosen to fish, and fish it did with almost every peg producing double figure weighs. Although the fish were small there was plenty of them.
Coming out on top was..
Steve 17lb 13oz 176 fish
Kevin 16lb 13oz 202 fish
Ian 13lb 7oz (not sure how many fish but he assured me he would have won the pike match if it was one)
The worthy champion of the 2023 winter league is the ever consistent Steve Grogan who always managed to find those few extra fish.
Runner up was last year champion Richard Bedford who challenged right up to the last match.
Steve Grogan is presented the winners shield
I would like to thank the “Magnificent Seven ” who took part in this year’s league throughout those cold wet and fishless Sundays you know it was still great craic,
Hopefully see you all for the 35th winter league
Munster Coarse Angling Club are affiliated to the National Coarse Fishing Federation of Ireland, NCFFI the National Governing body for coarse and predator fishing and casting. www.ncffi.ie
Frankie McPhillips – how he was nearly lost to newspapers instead of fly tying
Daire and Tom turn their attention to fly tying for this week’s episode of Ireland on the Fly and their guest is a bit of a legend in Irish fly tying circles it has to be said.
Yet his flies might never have graced our waters and caught so many fish if it wasn’t for a sliding doors moment in the life of Frankie McPhillips when he was looking for work…..
Frankie describes a different time in the 1970s and 1980s when good, quality flies were hard to come by and how after 45 years he’s still as much in demand.
Looking back on his fly fishing life, Frankie talks about friendship and fishing with Ted Malone who was still casting and catching on Lough Corrib up until the age of 96.
Frankie has also written a poem called, ‘Under Tattenweir Bridge’ which he reads out on the podcast.
Listen and follow the Ireland on the Fly podcast on Apple or Spotify:
The VDE Baggers club had made the short trip to the Carrickmacross area to fish their first match of the season on Annaghieran Lake last weekend. This is the first open match of the season, and anglers were in high spirits with plenty of craic, banter and laughs. 19 anglers took part, and top weight on the day went to Charlie Richards with 7.58kg. Their next match is don’t he Newry Canal on 16th April and they are open to new members looking for a bit of competition angling.
Some of the catches for the VDE Baggers first match of the season
There was a great patch of catches on the Upper Caragh Fishery late last week and over the weekend.
Mike O’Shea had another fish on the 22nd and fishery boss, Ralph Doppler and his second of the season on the 23rd. Mike was back in action again on the 24th, this time with the first hatchery fish of the season.
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Mike O'Shea 22 March 2023, Caragh River
Ralph Doppler. 23 March 2023, Upper Caragh Fishery
Mike with a hatchery fish from the Upeer Caragh Fishery ranching programme
On Saturday, 25 March, Nick Skilton and Paul Osborne had a fish each from the river. Both salmon were returned safely. On Sunday John Painter landed a cracker from the flag pool.
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another Caragh salmon, 25 March
John Painter landed this cracker on sunday from the flag pool
The fishing continued on Monday and Paul Osborne had a beautiful fresh sea liced fish from pool 10, his second of the week. Nick Skilton also had a fish on Monday. His came from the boat pool and was safely released.
Paul Osborne with a beautiful fresh sea liced fish from pool 10
The Upper Caragh Fishery is a very well-developed fishery. It has fantastic access with stiles and footbridges along the full length of the fishery. It has well maintained banks and anglers’ huts are provided on many of the beats. The Upper River Caragh can be fished from both boat and bank. Fishing is also available on Cloon Lough and the fishery provides access for anglers with reduced mobility. Boats for hire and guide services are available at the fishery.
Many pike angling clubs will have concluded their winter leagues at this stage and some are now embarking on their spring/summer competition programme. The Leinster Pike Angling Club held their first new season competition last weekend as the fished a couple for lakes in the Cavan area. Luke O’Ciaran had the heaviest bag of 35lb 5oz while Fran Crosbie had the heaviest fish of 11lb 5oz.
Leinster PAC kick of their new season league
Meanwhile Whitewood Pike Anglers had their first competition of 2023 as 22 anglers fished two lakes in Co. Monaghan. The caught an impressive 87 pike between them with Tucker McCabe topping the table with 16 fish for over 40lb.
Whitewood PAC back on the banks again
O’Caseys Pike Angling Club have already left the traps and hosted the second of their 2023 competition up in Cavan last weekend. Dylan Farell was the top angler on the day with a bag of 6 fish for 23lb 13oz and he also managed to scoop the heaviest fish prize with a pike of 11lb 12oz.
O’Caseys PAC fished round two of their 2023 competition
The Erne Anglers wrapped up their winter league last weekend as 32 anglers turned out for the final match. The river was running high and coloured but that wasn’t anything the anglers weren’t used to after battling it out in all sorts of conditions over the previous nine matches of the league. Paul Smith caught some nice bream to put himself at the top of the table on the day with a catch of just over 9kg.
But it was Mick Mahoney who was celebrating the league win, finishing up with 47 points. The top 18 in the league placings will be fishing the Winter League final next week, so let’s hope they get some good fishing.
Lough Sheelin angling report March 13th – March 26th 2023
‘I think, therefore I am’
Rene Descartes
The shimmer of Sheelin gold
Right now, it feels as if Spring and Winter are in a custody battle. The weather over these past two weeks has been full of meteorological contradictions as temperatures fluctuated madly between a minus 4 to a high of 16 degrees. Met Eireann have recorded 179.7 ml of rainfall for this month, over four times higher than for March 2022 (39ml). Heavy rain has caused lake levels inevitably to rise, making that washed out hemline look along our shoreline, which was in evidence for the first week, to disappear in a flood of reeds and foam. The term El Nino (Spanish for ‘the Christ Child’) was bandied about, basically this term refers to a warming of the ocean surface or above-average sea surface temperatures. The use of this term was due to the unseasonably high temperatures and would be associated with global warming.
Water temperatures have risen slightly to 8 degrees which is good news for trout movement as 7 is deemed to be that magic number to incentivise trout to move upwards.
Wicklow angler, Craig Newsome with some Sheelin magic
Lough Sheelin has been busy, with seldom a day blanking for boats. The lures – Humungous, Minkies and Snakes are still achieving the best results. Trout don’t seem to be stuck to the bottom regions as much, and anglers have reported some surface ‘tossing’ on the warmer days. Heat at mid-day and early afternoon produced small hatches of duckfly, twirling like little spinning tops above the surface. These welcome little chironomids are still not in big numbers and are mainly confined to the sheltered areas and shorelines. Old favourites like the Bumbles, Dabblers, Sooty Olives, Black Pennells and Wickhams Fancy are starting to reappear on lines.
The local angling club – The LSTPA hosted their first competition of the new season – the Kilroy cup on March 17th. Despite heavy rainfall, a great day was had by all. Forty-five anglers fished with an impressive nineteen fish landed, fourteen of which were over 3lbs. The winner was Sligo native – Trevor Goulden with a lovely trout of over 8lbs caught on a Colga Bumble, a fly which was originally invented for Lough Mask. Northern Ireland angler, Cathal Rush had an impressive day with a bag of two trout at over 4lbs each.
The weekends here were the busiest, with the past few weeks attracting over forty boats per day. Winds were predominantly southerly, with a few days where north easterlies crept in. Mostly the wind strengths were manageable, with gusty and strong glueing the anglers into the coves and sheltered areas. If the wind behaves itself, the best areas for results were Chambers Bay, Kilnahard and down along Merry Point, Walkers Bay and across to Stony Island. The shallows were the best place to fish. Shallow water warms the quickest and this is where the greatest abundance of trout food is – shrimp and hog louse. Some anglers reported catches carrying passengers of leeches which would indicate again that the predominance of fish are still flush with the lake bed. Trout are still after the big meal as small silver lures, imitating bait fish, were achieving the biggest successes.
Slab of gold
It would be remiss of me not to mention the death of Sheelin fishing legend John Murphy which occurred on March 12th. John lived most of his life on the shores of Lough Sheelin, down at Crover. There really wasn’t anything that he didn’t know about the ebb and flow of fishing and flies on this lake, and his passion and love of this place was inspiring. He used to dive in his younger days, with a trophy steering wheel retrieved from a ship wreck from one of his diving expeditions, displayed in his sitting room. He told me that women made better divers and then promptly burst my bubble by following on to say that this was because they have an extra layer of fat… He taught me how to fish, we walked our dogs together around the lake, and he will be forever associated with the early season Sooty Olive as this was the only one he managed to teach me how to tie. Requiesce in pace John.
Whether the weather
The quote at the beginning of this report by french philosopher Rene Descartes is a phrase seen as the first step towards attainment of knowledge, and there is no better place than Sheelin to test and increase our knowledge.
We are heading towards April – warmer days, lengthening daylight and increasing chironomid activity. The available food density is building up and the trout are switching from bottom feeding to the much easier, and freely available zone feeding on pupae. There’s a lot to look forward to.
Mick McShane big flies for big fish size 6 Humungous variants for Sheelin
Kevin Coyne with his early catchTelling the tail
Please remember anglers to abide by BYE-LAW 949 which strictly prohibits from June 14th, 2017 onwards:
The taking of any brown trout of less than 36 centimeters.
For a person to fish with more than 2 rods at any one time.
To fish with more than 4 rods at any one time when there is more than one person on board the boat concerned.
For a person to take more than 2 trout per day.
All trolling on the lake from March 1st to June 16th (inclusive).
To fish or to attempt to take or to fish for, fish of any kind other than during the period from March 1st to October 12th in any year.
Luring the trout
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Wullie Munn Epoxy Buzzer
Hedgehog
Crossing swords - Wullie Munn, buzzer patterns
Wullie Munn Shipman flavoured pattern
Wullie Munn - scruffy pattern
Mick McShane
Change from lures - Mick McShane
Wullie Munn for early season
Trout treats - Mick McShane
Half circle - Mick McShane
Trout temptation - Mick McShane
McShane flies
Wullie Munn- Owl Snatchers
Mick McShane's alternative to lures
Mick McShane - trout flies
Craig Barr's Damsel snatcher
Black Woolly Bugger by James Stripes
Wullie Munn buzzer style
Sitting pretty
Trevor Goulden with his winning trout of over 8lbs
The Ballinakill Angling Club brought their Winter League to a conclusion at the weekend. After seven matches where anglers endured everything the winter weather could throw at them, it was a dead heat at the top of the table, with Gary Leech and Fint Brennan both finishing on 9 points. So the title went down to total weight, and Gary Leech came out on top with a total weight of 54lb 2oz.
We posted previously about winter maintenance for charter skippers, and featured John Fleming who had his boat up on the hard for the last couple of months doing an extensive refit. The Brazen Hussy II is now back in the water and she looks a million dollars!
You could eat your dinner off that!
The Hussy sparkling in the sun as she is lifted back in.
The Brazen Hussy II is now back in her home waters in Galway Bay and ready for business. If you’re looking for a great charter trip with a knowledgeable skipper, look no further!
Leaca Rua
Another Galway boat in for a refit, and now under new ownership, is the Leaca Rua. This traditional wooden-built boat has had a new deck and caulking, new injectors and a lick of paint to have her looking good as new and performing better than ever. New skipper Julian Dusso is looking forward to the season ahead fishing the productive waters of Galway Bay.
The Leaca Rua
Go Fishing
Brazen Hussy II
To book fishing with John aboard the Brazen Hussy II, give him a call on 087 7571320
A regular day is between 9am- 6pm from either Rossaveal, Spiddal or Galway depending on species being sought after. Fishing on the inshore reefs for pollock, cod, ling, wrasse, conger eel and mackerel can be reached in 10 minutes from departure, while our offshore reef marks are within 45 minutes of departure. Our ground fishing for tope, spurdog, ray, bullhuss, turbot, plaice and the giant common skate can all be reached within the hour which ensures the most amount of time is spent fishing.
The shark season usually starts at the end of June and runs into late October, this is the ultimate angling adrenaline rush with these hard fighting blue and porbeagle sharks all being tagged and released safely.
Package deals available
Visiting anglers from distant shores got to grips with some early-season trout fishing on the lakes of the Boyne Valley region.
Jaden and his wife Regina, recently arrived from Singapore, had never fished in Ireland before and were keen to learn how to catch our native species. They teamed up with Chris Barry of GoFishing Ireland.
Despite difficult high water conditions, Jaden hooked and landed a lovely 48cm brown trout. Regina also caught some nice fish too. They’re now hooked on fishing in Ireland and looking forward to trying some salmon fishing.
Arriving from the other side of the globe, Kyle and Susan from Florida, USA bore the brunt of some inhospitable March weather, but Kyle still managed to catch his first-ever Irish brown trout. He landed a few nice pike as well on the same trip, which more than made up for the drenching!
March can be tough going on an Irish lough but when that elusive first trout finally comes along, the clouds are quickly forgotten.
Contact Chris in Co. Meath for Fly fishing lessons, angling tuition and boat fishing trips in Ireland’s east. “Our mission is to get you fishing successfully and confidently. Learn all the essential skills and the watercraft needed to catch big fish regularly”.
