Kit Dunne from Wicklow Boat Charters reports that the angling season is in full swing now as happy punters on his boat have helped themselves to some great fishing in the past week.
Mixing it up between fishing inshore for Tope and Smoothies and heading further afield to target some wrecks for quality Pollack, it seems that all Kit’s anglers went home with smiles on their faces and a couple of them even managed a specimen sized fish or two.
1 of 6
Go Fishing
Angling Charters are offered on a full-day, half-day and evening trip basis and can be tailored to suit your needs. Two boats available – Lisin and Castle Maiden. All levels of anglers are catered for. Anglers will benefit from your skipper’s angling experience and local knowledge with advice and guidance on-hand at all times.
SPECIALIST ANGLING CHARTERS
Specialist Angling Charters are offered for those who wish to target specific species, specimen fish or try new methods of angling.
ANGLING COACHING
Whether you’re a Club, Individual, School or Junior you can have an angling coaching session or programme tailored to suit your needs.
The Irish Federation of Sea Angling Clubs (IFSA) are running a monthly Fish of the Month competition this summer, with the winners of each category winning a €50 voucher for one of the supporting tackle shops around the country. There are 4 categories – Senior Shore, Senior Boat, Junior Shore and Junior Boat. The competition is open to all IFSA members.
May
The winners for May were as follows:
Senior Shore – Brian Reidy, with a fine shore-caught spurdog from a west coast mark
A nice spurdog for Brian
Senior Boat – Mark Cahill with a beautiful 88cm smooth hound caught off Co. Dublin
Mark Cahill with his 88cm smooth hound
Junior Shore – Max Roche with a cracking shore-caught tope
A fine tope for young Max Roche
Junior Boat – Jack Walsh with a lovely wrasse
Jack Walsh shows off his great wrasse
The winners of the Senior Shore and Junior Boat will receive a €5- voucher for Halway Angling – a great tackle shop run by Dan Lynch in Halfway, Co. Cork, with an online shop at www.tackledirectireland.ie
The Senior Boat and Junior Shore winners both receive a €50 voucher for Southside Angling – one of the best tackle shops in Dublin. Check out their great online shop here at www.southsideangling.ie
Well done to all the winners, and a big thank you to the tackle shops involved for sponsoring the competition.
Get Involved
If you are a member of an IFSA club why not get involved and submit your own fish pic. Check out the great promo video from IFSA member Lisa Gormley below! And if you’re not a member but love sea fishing and want to get involved, find your local sea angling club on www.ifsa.ie
junior anglers from Newport Sea Angling Club in County Mayo
Pictured are junior anglers from Newport Sea Angling Club in County Mayo. The youth angling initiative received funding under the Inland Fisheries Ireland Sponsorship Programme
Inland Fisheries Ireland is launching its Sponsorship Programme for 2021 this week and is open for applications at 9am this Friday, 11th of June from organisers of eligible angling events and initiatives nationwide. The programme, which is one of the main funding mechanisms of Inland Fisheries Ireland, awarded funding to 87 angling events and initiatives across the country during 2019, resulting in an investment of €30,000 to support novice anglers and angling tourism in Ireland.
Due to public health guidelines around the Covid-19 pandemic, the Sponsorship Programme didn’t go ahead in 2020 but in 2019, it supported 45 angling competitions to showcase Ireland’s angling resource and contribution to local economies. Over 800 anglers travelled from outside Ireland to participate in these competitions, such as the Lough Ree International Pike Classic and International Coarse Fishing Festivals (Longford/Roscommon), the Arvagh International Coarse Fishing Festival (Cavan) and the Irish Winter Shore Angling Festival (Wexford).
A total of 37 Coaching and Juvenile events, aimed at novice and young anglers with a view to increasing participation in the sport, along with five public awareness events and angling-related initiatives were supported in 2019. In total, over 600 juvenile and novice anglers participated in these initiatives, which included a Juvenile Angling competition held by Killaloe Ballina and District Anglers (Offaly/Tipperary), Easter and Summer Angling Camps for Children organised by the Trout Angling Federation of Ireland (Cork) and a Youth Initiative Day- Ulster organised by the Irish Federation of Sea Angling (Donegal).
Eligible events and categories in the 2021 Inland Fisheries Ireland Sponsorship Programme are as follows:
Large international competitions held in Ireland which showcase Ireland’s angling resources and contribution to local economies, supporting jobs and businesses (maximum sponsorship available is €3,000 per event).
Novice angler events and training courses which increase participation in angling including funding of transport hire for participants to facilitate attendance at novice angler events. Minimum of 20 novice angler participants required (maximum sponsorship available is €500 per event or course).
Information dissemination or initiatives to promote fisheries awareness, conservation and protection of the inland fisheries and sea angling resource; promotion of angling as a key Irish tourism activity e.g. Production of high quality angling promotional videos, seminars, coaching, training or workshops (maximum sponsorship available is €1,000 per event).
Juvenile and minority angling teams representing Ireland at international events both home and abroad (maximum sponsorship available is €500 per team).
junior anglers from Newport Sea Angling Club in County Mayo
Applications for funding from the Sponsorship Programme are now invited from angling clubs, associations or any local group organising an angling initiative. The programme will remain open for funding applications until the 25th of June 2021 with applications for equipment, staff support and biosecurity assistance available throughout the year.
The application process opens at 9am this Friday, 11th of June. To find out more and to apply, visit https://ifi.smartsimple.ie/s_Login.jsp. Applicants will have to register to apply or if they are already registered, just log in and fill in the application form. Awards will be subject to budget availability and adherence to the programme requirements.
CM Lakelands Feeder Club held a club match over the weekend with 23 anglers competing in two rotations; A on Loughs Skeagh and Drumkeary with B on Barnagrove lake.
The best fishing over the two days was on the Skeagh/Drumkeary rotation, with the bigger bags caught on Saturday, best of which was the 10.440kg caught by Steve Whyte. On Barnagrove the fishing was better on Sunday, although the best weight was only 3.580kg for Joe Nolan.
Saturday’s top 2 overall drew very near to each other on Barnagrove, with Brenton Sweeney eventually overtaking Steve Whyte by just 1kg to take the overall title by just over 200grms.
The prizegiving
Section winners Saturday:
Stevie Whyte
Seamus Winters
Nigel Houldsworth
Rimantas Kondrackas
Niall McKitterick
Darren Fairhurst.
Section winners Sunday:
Rimantas Kondrackas
Neil Mazurick
Darren Fairhurst
Brenton Sweeney
Seamus Winters
Joe Nolan
Top 5 overall was paid out
1st Brenton Sweeney 12.430kg
2nd Steve Whyte 12.170kg
3rd Darren Fairhurst 10.280kg
4th Seamus Winters 7.600kg
5th Andy Chapman 7.530kg
Patrick Monks of Loughshinny Sea Anglers reported some very good sea angling in the past week with a nice range of species being landed including Ray, Smoothound, Haddock, Dogfish, Bullhuss and Whiting.
Dave Edwards from West Cork Charters reports that fishing is warming up nicely with various different species becoming more active in the past couple of weeks. The most notable fish so far this season are a Pollack of 8lbs and a Cod of 11.5lbs, both falling to angler Andrzeg on the same trip.
He expects to be out chasing Blue Shark soon as the water temperatures are warming up nicely.
Go fishing…
West Cork Charters operates the Silver Dawn, a 41′ Rodman 1250 with twin 430 HP Engines out of Courtmacsherry. The range of fishing found within close range of Courtmacsherry is superb, with trips producing anything between 6 and 15 different species as a norm and in excess of 20 is possible if anglers are prepared to change methods and use different baits and lures throughout their trip. As a rule mackerel, pollock, cod and ling are usually encountered but several species of wrasse along with whiting, pouting, coalfish, bull huss, conger and many more are often added to the catch.
If you do choose to head offshore to sample the superb shark fishing available within 10 miles of Courtmacsherry, there is a very strong chance of encountering blue sharks and an increasing chance of bringing a porbeagle shark to the boat.
Shane Buckley sent us in these photos of a magnificent bass he caught yesterday in the capital.
Fishing a Co. Dublin mark, his bait of choice was a peeler crab, fished on a pulley pennell rig. A good choice for big baits. Big baits catch big fish, but even Shane was probably stunned by the magnificent bass he caught, measuring 70cm.
What a fish!
The fish was measured and a quick photo taken before being sportingly released again. Fair play Shane, and what a great catch!
Shane Buckley with his magnificent bass. #CPRSavesFish
After a week of mixed weather, we decided to try for the first shark of the year on Friday 4th June, prompted by Facebook memories of big blues from previous years. Water temperature was low so we headed south in an attempt to find a patch of warmer water. An hour and a half later we decided to deploy the chum bags even though the water temperature was just over 12 degrees Celsius. As expected it turned out to be a slow day and the southerly wind was fast pushing us back towards home but at 2 pm Sean Ward got that first gentle bite of the year that resulted in a 20-minute fight to land the first shark of the year, and his first porbeagle shark of around 70lb.
We also managed to land three Blue Whiting on the same day, which was a first for the boat too and is a rare catch on rod and line.
Go Fishing
Tom Collins, Sea Angling Charters Loch and Iasc
Operates 12 months of the year and specialise in shark fishing. With experienced skipper Tom Collins the Loch an Iasc is a modern charter company which offers a comprehensive range of services to customers and aims to cater for your every need be it Mackerel, Reef, Wreck, Specimen or Shark fishing.
Dublin Angling Initiative, an education and outreach programme run by Inland Fisheries Ireland, is launching its programme for 2021. The initiative is calling on youth clubs, community groups and schools in the Greater Dublin Area to take part in it’s fishing programme. The Dublin Angling Initiative aims to promote, develop and improve angling among children and young people. In 2021 IFI are looking for interested parties for the Summer, Autumn and Winter months to take part in the programme.
In 2019, over 400 children and young people took part in the fishing programme which caters for anyone interested in angling, from the complete novice to the more advanced angler with exposure given to each of the different types of fishing. The initiative offers children and young people an opportunity to take fishing lessons, participate in fishing trips and enjoy family fishing days.
In addition to practical fishing exercises, we also offer fishing presentations and tours providing an insight into fish, their habitat, conservation measures and education regarding local fishing areas. Inland Fisheries Ireland’s Dublin Angling Initiative has seen thousands of young people participate over the past 20 years resulting in the establishment of many new fishing clubs.
The 2021 Dublin Angling Initiative will include coarse, sea and game angling along with educational trips, where Covid-19 public health guidelines allow. Interested groups should contact by email outreach@fisheriesireland.ie or apply here: https://www.fisheriesireland.ie/Education-Outreach/dai.html#contact. For more information, visit www.fisheriesireland.ie.
Ken Whelan and Martin McGarrigle are delighted to announce Water Conservation and Protection Courses across County Roscommon…
Introductory Training in Water Conservation and Protection in County Roscommon
Brought to you by the Roscommon Environmental Network Funded by ROSCOMMON Leader Partnership
All are welcome: Tidy Town members, farmers, anglers, walkers, wildlife groups, teachers and anyone with an interest in water protection, conservation and management.
