The town stretch of the Daingean canal well known for large weights of skimmers and tench normally the early wides are the best often throwing up around 20 lb
The Leinster Coarse Fishing Federation’s 2025 outings concluded last Sunday with the Leinster Fur & Feather match held on the Grand Canal at Daingean. Likely due to the threatening forecasts, only seven anglers attended, and while the heavy rain stayed away until after the weigh-in, very strong winds made conditions difficult. A small number of fish were caught, but no photographs were taken due to the weather.
In the overall results, Caullum Pickard finished first with a weight of 2.15, followed closely by Aidan Gill in second with 2.13. Section A was won by Colin Oliver with 2.10, and Section B by Donal McGuirk with 2.05, both by default.
The next event will be the Leinster Pairs, beginning on 4 January, with bookings through Sean Ward. The Leinster Federation extended its thanks to all who have supported the organisation over the years, with special appreciation to Brendan and the staff of the Blackthorn Pub in Daingean for their continued hospitality. Christmas and New Year greetings were also conveyed to all members.
On Saturday we held the final leg of the Munster Shore League, which also incorporated the Munster Open Shore Gold. The Slob Bank, Youghal was the venue, with fishing from 10:00am–3:00pm.
Fish showed from the very first cast, with several anglers hitting triple shots early on, and it was great to see some quality flounder showing on the bank throughout the day.
Brian Mansfield was very unlucky not to take the flatfish pool, landing two superb 38cm flounder. However, the flatfish pool went to Alan Mulcahy with a cracking 39cm flounder.
It was also great to see day-ticket holder Kenneth Barry take the round fish pool with a 35cm coalfish. Well done lads
Brian Mansfiled with a lovely 38cm flounder
Zone A proved to be the slower zone on the day, but JP Molloy showed his usual class to take the zone with 18 fish.
In Zone B and Zone C, Stephen O Donovan and Alan Mulcahy were neck and neck all day. Going into the final hour it was still too close to call, but a late burst of fish saw Mully edge ahead, finishing on 27 fish, with Stephen close behind on 25 fish to win the title.
Well done Mully.
Results
Top 3 on the Day
Alan Mulcahy
Stephen O’Donovan
Darren Ryan
League winners
Alan Mulchahy
Troy Francis
Richard Gormley
James Ryan
Darren Ryan
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Congratulations Alan Mulchay
A massive well done again to Alan Mulcahy on an unbelievable season. Alan completed a clean sweep by winning the Munster Shore League, the Munster Shore Closed Gold, and the Munster Open Shore Gold.
Rumour has it he’s getting new shelves fitted at home to make room for the silverware.
Junior & Ladies Champions.
A big well done to Mochara Fraher on winning the Junior section of the league, and congratulations to Fiona Ryan on taking the Ladies title — two outstanding performances over the season.
Fiona RyanMochara Fraher
This was our first year running the league, and we’d like to sincerely thank every single angler who supported it. In total, 79 anglers fished the league this year, and it’s safe to say it was a huge success.
We are absolutely delighted to welcome Ultima as our new league sponsors. For the 2026 season, the league will now be known as the Ultima Munster Shore League.
A huge thank you to Ultima for their generous sponsorship and support.
For 2026, the league will move to five legs, giving anglers the opportunity to drop one result.
Legs 1–4 will count towards the Munster Closed Shore Gold, with an angler’s best 3 results to count.
Legs 1–5 will make up the Munster Shore League, with an angler’s best 4 results to count.
Leg 5 will also incorporate the Munster Open Shore Gold.
Legs 4 and 5 will be announced during the year once national fixtures become available, as we are doing our best to avoid any clashes.
Des Bridgette reports on the latest round of the Athy & District Anglers Winter League which was fished on Sunday…
Athy Anglers held their match in the marina on Sunday. Some good bags of fish were caught.
Well done to all who competed. No blanks, everyone caught.
1st Dean Murray, 25lb 9ozs
2nd Barry Maher, 17lb 7ozs
3rd Chris Lawlor, 16lb 4ozs
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Dean Murray
Barry Maher
Chris Lawlor
This match was sponsored by Clive Dunne of Elk Recruitment, many thanks Clive much appreciated
Marina will be closed next Saturday for a match sorry for any inconvenience
Go fishing…
Athy and District Anglers
If you’d like to fish the Marina Club Grounds or get involved with the club and fish matches like these, then click the links below!
Athy & District Anglers Club was formed in 1959 and to this day they continue to pursue their goals of protecting, maintaining and encouraging the sport of angling in the greater Athy area. The club works with local authorities to improve and maintain local fishing areas as well as organizing events and matches for local and national anglers. Athy & District Anglers Club welcomes all new members and all age groups to the sport! If you’d like to get involved, please check out the Getting Involved section of their website.
Munster Coarse Anglers fished the fifth match of their winter series at Obriensbridge at the weekend. Kevin Leahy reports…
Almost a full turn out for the last league match of 2025 and we competed for the Fur and Feather to boot.
We finally got to fish the rowing course at Obriensbridge after a long absence. With a few more upstream pegs to try, thanks to the hard work of Ian and Morgan, every one was hoping for the best. Although with a strong South Westerly and a lot of rain forecast it was a case of make your self comfortable and strap everything down for the 5 hours!
As you can see from the result sheet it was good and bad with the fish in some pegs and not in others also the size of the fish varied from peg to peg. The 2 end pegs took the honours, Steve Grogan taking top spot with 7lb 0oz.
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 sport. www.ncffi.ie
High wind and high rainfall were the weather headlines in the early part of the week, as Storm Bram paid a visit and brought with it orange wind warnings covering the whole of the country, with red warnings for inshore areas. Rainfall was also up to 230% of normal. Together with the high wind and high rain were high temperatures, as the southerly source of the storm brought a brief spell of relative warmth, and parts of the east rose to over 17°C – the highest December temperatures ever recorded for parts of the country.
A week of unusual weather, which actually began with a recorded gust of nearly 300kph in Ringaskiddy – that was before Storm Bram even made landfall. Not a whole lot of fishing done this week then, as one would expect, but the usual hardy anglers did get a cast or two in before the weather went too wild…
While the trout fishing at this time of year is confined to commercial fisheries, the clubs on waters that are currently closed have plenty of time to plan for the season ahead; that is what the Milford and District Anglers, the Loughanure Anglers and the Lough Arrow Anglers have all been doing, as they have planned their competition calendars for 2026 already.
Finally, we would like to once again draw your attention to a brand-new book on sea trout by retired fishery scientist and angler Dr. Paddy Gargan. At 368 pages, The Connemara Sea-Trout Fisheries offers a comprehensive and engaging history of these iconic fisheries, richly illustrated with atmospheric photographs, detailed maps, and informative diagrams—a great Christmas gift for anyone with an interest in these iconic fisheries.
Other news
A reminder that the Department of Climate, Energy and the Environment is running a public consultation on the Wild Salmon and Sea Trout Tagging Scheme (Amendment) Regulations 2025 and Conservation Measures for 2026. Details of the proposed regulations and information on how to make a submission are available here: Wild Salmon and Sea Trout Regs and Conservation Measures for the 2026 Season announced. The closing date for submissions is 5.30pm on 20 December 2025.
And now the weather
It will be mostly dry on Friday night with clear spells and a few western showers, turning cloudier later and coldest in the east, with lows of 0–5°C. Saturday starts dry before rain spreads southeast, becoming windy with coastal gales and highs of 8–12°C. Saturday night stays wet and blustery but mild with lows of 10–12°C. Sunday begins wet and windy, with rain clearing the west by evening but lingering longest in Munster and south Leinster. Highs of 11–13°C. Rain clears further Sunday night with scattered showers and milder conditions, and Monday looks brighter for most with isolated showers, though rain may persist in the southeast.
Don’t forget to double-check the forecast before heading off, and if you’re going to sea, check the tides.
With our wild trout rivers and lakes closed until the spring and many rivers and streams swollen from recent rains, there is little to do for trout clubs other than plan for the season ahead.
Three clubs who have done just that are the Milford and District Fly Angling Club, the Loughanure Anglers and the Lough Arrow Anglers, who have all named dates for their competition calendars in 2026.
The Milford club will kick off on May 3rd and run a full schedule of events.
Loughanure get started even earlier, on April 12th, then hold an event every month and two in September.
The Lough Arrow club will hold their Stream Development Competition on April 25th, with all proceeds from the event going towards stream rehabilitation projects within the catchment. First prize there will be an 18ft Ganly boat and Bradley trailer. The single longest fish will take the honours there.
The CM Lakelands Feeder Club had to cancel their Round 3 league match last weekend because of flooding on Lough Muckno. They decided to go to Annahierin instead and just have an ordinary match, which 16 anglers fished.
The fishing was extremely hard, with a few skimmers caught in certain areas.
1st overall was Neil Mazurick with just under 3kg of small skimmers.
2nd was Alan Larkin with 2.625kg of small skimmers.
3rd overall was Steven Whyte with just under 2kg of perch and small skimmers.
Section winners were Darren Fairhurst and Mariusz Kilian.
This report from the Carrick Beach and Rockers SAC:
Firstly I would like to thank P&O Ferries for their continued support and generous sponsorship of the main prize in this annual event. I would also like to thank Johnny of the Mariner Bar Waterfoot for letting us use their facilities; Stuart and Richard of the Bait and Tackle Hut Carrickfergus for their continued support and sponsorship; Josie McLaughlin for his sponsorship of a prize; and James Raymond, who donated a very generous prize of a day’s guided fishing around the Tralee area. Lastly, I would like to thank all those who attended and made this competition a great success for another year, and we look forward to seeing you all again next year.
This year’s competition has seen a bit of a change-up with the scoring system. Adopting a points/cm style approach. This system rewards quantity with fish points and quality through extra score points and keeps the match competitive all along the beach regardless of whether you have the numbers of fish in front of you or if you have several decent fish and nothing much else.
Showing up at the venue yesterday morning, it wasn’t looking good, with huge piles of weed sitting just above the tide line and visible weed turning over along the waterline. Luckily, as the tide started to drop before the competition, a lot of the weed was deposited along the sand and after the 1st hour of fishing, most of the weed was left high and dry and the fishing wasn’t too uncomfortable.
Fishing got off to a slow start on the top pegs with very few flatfish about during the daylight, but the light was dropping fast, and the casts began going longer as anglers started hammering the whiting hoards when they got on the feed. Young club member Layton Finlay was steadily plucking out fish after fish, having seemingly found the sweet spot. This resulted in fish on almost every cast or every other cast, finishing up with 22ish and a hefty scorecard for a junior. Karl on the end peg was steadily lifting a few after finding them at distance and managing to find the dogfish for the big points in the new scoring system.
Some of the fish landed
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Reports along the beach were a little sketchy, as it’s hard to tell how anyone else is doing purely by fish numbers, which keeps things interesting. Just past the halfway point, Karl thought he was doing well with 9 fish, including a few of the high-scoring dogfish. Reports filtered through that Paul Beggs was on the fish and was currently sitting with 17 fish on the middle of the beach, with Sammy Stirling also hitting good numbers. Jonny Gilbert was in the thick of the fish on the middle pegs also and was matching the guys around him for fish count when he decided to gamble and start thumping it out for dogs; unfortunately, they just weren’t there around the middle pegs, and Jonny lost valuable time as the anglers around him kept plugging away at the whiting, with Dodgy also dropping a bass at his feet in the breaking waves.
Greame Ruddy, on the higher 1/3 of the beach, noticed a few others had found the odd dog here and there around him but decided to stay on the constant stream of smaller fish which were thick on the ground in front of him; in hindsight, this proved to have possibly cost him a better result than the 5th position in which he finished. Over 30 fish, but too many with minimal points to put a dent on the podium finish.
Final results were tallied up, and Paul Beggs took overall 1st place with an impressive card of 44 fish and taking the cash prize and the P&O crossing along with a cash prize.
The Killybegs Mariners’ daylight league outing took place on Saturday at one of their favourite locations along the Donegal coast—the beautiful Silver Strand at Malin Beg.
The drive along the road at Malin Beg was spectacular, as the wild Atlantic was crashing into the sky as it collided with the reef-strewn shore in the sound of Rathlin O’Birne.
The strand is surrounded by towering cliffs on three sides, and, on the day, there was a big surf crashing onto the shore. Fishing took place from 11am to 3pm, and the first casts had fish for a few anglers. Getting on the scoreboard early were Pat, Cara and Shane with turbots and flounders up to 27 cm, but as the tide turned, the fish switched off and things got quiet.
A late double haul of a turbot and a decent flounder of 30 cm was enough to nudge the new league leader, Darren Rawdon, into first place to take the win on the day with 102 pts, winning €54.
In 2nd place with a weaver and a last-cast turbot for 60 points was Pat Cunningham, winning €27.
And longest flattie outside the top 2 was won by Cara Boyle with a 27 cm flounder for €27.
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Well done to all; it was an enjoyable location for a quiet day’s fishing. The next league outing is scheduled for next Friday at Rossnowlagh south side.
The 4th round of the Ger Hennesy Winter league was fished on Sunday at Oaklands.
Miserable weather all day for the boy’s & lady fair play too them for sticking it out.
Top senior on the day was John Browne with 22.500 kg for Feeder caught carp.
Top Junior and 2nd on the day was Finn McCarthy with 12.690kg. That’s two wins in a row for Finn and his 3rd top 3 finish.
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Finn McCarthy
John Browne
Today’s Results
Seniors
1st John Browne 22.500 kg
2nd Kirean Reeves 9.710 kg
3rd Gavin Roe 8.260 kg
Juniors
1st Finn Mccarthy 12.960 kg
2nd Flynn Caufield 6.540 kg
3rd Ruairi Manley Murphy 5.670 kg
Thanks very much to all that turned out, next match December 21st.
A very popular carp fishery. Popular with competition anglers and novices alike. Alway a great chance of a bumper bag here. Friendly staff more than happy to advise beginner anglers. Caters to all sorts of clubs and groups.
Anyone who would like to fish the Munster Coarse Anglers Winter League can contact us by 
