Western Lakes

Ronan Cusack reports that Lough Mask has been surprisingly quiet since the World Cup, with few anglers venturing out. Last weekend saw the Partry angling club host their annual pairs development competition. Despite these recessionary times, this year's event had a record entry of 166 anglers participating on the day. As always in this particular competition, anglers have the choice of fishing either Lough Carra or Mask. Lough Carra came up trumps on the day, producing both first and second prize winners. In first place were Brian McNerny and Seamus O'Loughlin from Ennis, who had a cracking bag of five trout for 11.04lbs. Second were Eddie Hynes and Brian Madden with four trout for 8.07lbs again from Lough Carra. Third place went to Jimmy Acton and Declan Martyn from Tuam with two fine Lough Mask trout for 7.12lbs. Jimmy is a long supporter of this competition and regularly features well in the event. Heaviest fish went to Tom Byrne, Partry, and his boat partner Kevin Bradley, Fermanagh, with a fine Carra trout for 3.04lbs. Partry club also raffled a magnificent 19ft Anglers fancy on the day, and this was won by local angler Vincent Horan. There were a total of 70 trout weighed in on the day for 166 anglers.

John Walsh reports that fishing on Corrib is slow enough at the moment, with 18 anglers reporting 25 trout in 37 rod-days, with all methods, wetfly, dry fly and dapping producing fish, mainly to mayfly patterns and natural grasshoppers. Mayfly are still hatching during the day, but sedge hatches have slowed down, probably due to the cool evenings. Peter McGuinness and PJ Walshe landed 5 trout for 6.5lbs for a day's fishing, while Gerry Kenny landed a nice fish of 2.5lbs for his day. A Garda competition fished out of Greenfields was won by Gerry Feeney from Dublin, with 1 trout for 2.25lbs, while Seamus Kelly was 2nd, with a trout of 1.5lbs. The Kilbeg Anglers held a competition on Sunday, with JJ Egan taking top honours with 2 fish for 4.5lbs, including a trout of 3.25lbs taken on the dap. Bill Toole was 2nd with 3 fish for 3.5lbs, taken trolling.

Galway Fishery

Young Finlay Caffrey with his first ever salmon.

Water levels remained perfect in Galway this week, but the number of salmon running the river has slowed down a lot, and there were just 21 fish landed this week. Christian Kelly landed 2 nice grilse of about 5lbs each on fly, while Northern Irish visitor Jimmy Davison landed 2 grilse on fly and shrimp. Alan Carthy from Dublin took a nice 6.5lbs grilse on fly, while Eddie Corry from Clare landed 2 grilse to 6lbs on fly. Gerry McDonnell landed 2 grilse to 6lbs on shrimp, while Gareth Byrne and Brian Howard, both from Dublin, had a 5lbs grilse each on fly. John Connolly from Clare landed a 5.5lbs grilse on fly as well.

With the run slowing down, a good head of resident fish has built up in the river, and while fresh fish off the tide are fewer, there are plenty of fish to cast a fly over at the moment, and fishing prospects remain pretty good for the next week.

Connemara

A prolonged dry spell was well and truly broken last week, with heavy rain on several days bringing big floods to the Connemara rivers, and thousands of salmon and sea trout that had been held back by low water were able to move upstream, giving a big boost to anglers.

Erriff

Jane Beattie with a nice Erriff fish.

Fishery manager Jim Stafford reports from the River Erriff on fishing up to Saturday last, which was the best week recorded for many years on the fishery. Water levels were recorded at 0.9m on Sunday the 7th, and with good angling conditions rods there was fantastic fishing, with rods catching 18 salmon that day. Water levels and angling conditions remained good for the following two days and a further 10 fish were caught. Levels were recorded again at 0.8m at 8a.m. on the morning of the 10th, however the weather pattern changed dramatically and by 9.30a.m. with extreme heavy rainfall the river level rose to 1.8m. The spate peaked at 2.1m a few hours later and water levels remained high for a number of days falling slowly to 1.0m by the end of the week. With suitable water levels a great run of fresh fish entered the river.

Brian Holloway, a regular U.K. visitor to the Erriff, had a fantastic week landing 11 salmon for the week with most of the catch returned again to the river - best day 4 fish taken on a Hairy Mary & Cascade. Kenneth Mills, U.K., a regular rod on the river in recent years had 9 for the week, mostly taken on an Orange Shrimp pattern. New rods on the river Michael Whitehead and Tom Byam-Cook, U.K. had 2 each and lost several more. Mr. Herve Rodrigue, France had 4, best fish 12.25lbs taken in the Falls Pool on Beat 9. Niall Wickham, Drogheda, Co. Louth caught one of 14.1lbs in the Washing Pool on Beat 4. Dr. Margaret Downes, Dublin had 4 for the week.

Richard Daly, Kevin Glynn and Edward Murphy all from Dublin had 8 fish between them. Cascades and Shrimp patterns in various sizes were the most successful flies and apart from a few fish all the catch was taken on fly. This was the best weeks fishing on the river for many years and it was good to see decent sized grilse up to 7lbs featured in the rod catch. Total catch for the week was 80 salmon and 43 sea trout.

At the time of writing the report the river is in perfect condition after more rain yesterday, and water levels should remain good for fishing for the next few days.
To book fishing or accommodation, contact Jim at Aasleagh Lodge on 095 42252, or email erriff.fish@iol.ie

Inagh
Fishery manager Colin Folan reports from Lough Inagh on fishing up to Sunday: Water, water everywhere!! Thirty six hours of heavy rain ensured the rivers burst their banks. It was the biggest flood all year and there is a major run of salmon at the moment. In the first twenty four hours of big water six hundred Salmon were recorded on the fish counter downstream at Ballynahinch. We are only now able to fish all the river beats and the lake has finally cleared. This week could be a big week for us.

Richard Maguire with a fine sea trout from Inagh.

10 salmon were landed for the week. Mark Serby (UK) landed his first ever salmon, a 5.75lbs fish on a Cascade while fishing the Derryclare Butts. Kevin Kirwan (USA) also landed his first Irish salmon. Kevin caught a silver grilse of 5lbs on a Van-Beck from the Derryclare Butts. Norman Kyle (UK) landed his first Irish salmon after 10 years of visiting Ireland. The fish weighed 6lbs and was caught on the Trout Pool on an Orange bodied Stoat, tied by Norman. Inagh ghillie John O Malley caught and released a grilse of 4lbs on Inagh on a Claret Dabbler. Thomas O Brien (Galway) landed a 5lbs fish on a Blue Delphi on Inagh. Ghillie Ronan Creane had a 6lbs fish from Pine Island on a Sunray. Cian Hanley (Galway) landed 2 fish weighing 4.5lbs and 6lbs from Inagh on a Red Daddy. Peter Walsh (Galway) caught a 5lbs fish on a Daddy on Inagh and Patsy Griffin released a 3lbs fish, caught on a Green Peter on Inagh.

20 sea trout were recorded this week. 7 anglers from Cornamona fished Inagh and recorded 10 sea trout and a few decent brown trout. John Casey (Galway) fished the Glendallogh Butts and had 3 sea trout to 2.5lbs. Richard Maguire (Dublin) had a beautiful sea trout from the Trout Pool estimated at 3lbs on a Silver Stoat, and Karl Empey (USA) fished Inagh for a day and had a 1.5lbs sea trout and a char of 11 inches.

To book fishing or accommodation, call Lough Inagh Lodge Hotel at 095 34706 or check their website at www.loughinaghlodgehotel.ie


Delphi

David McEvoy reports that the dry spell also affected Delphi, but fishing has picked up again with the arrival of the rain. There were 31 fish recorded last week, including 9 on Thursday, and a further 9 on Friday. Among the anglers to score were Gareth Beattie, who had one off the Grilse Pool of 5lbs 12.5oz on a Willie Gunn. His father William had one off the Goat Pool on a Cascade of 1.5lbs. Markus Merz had one off the Turn Pool of 3.5lbs on a Tosh and Urs had a 10lbs springer off the Turn Pool on a Junction Shrimp.
Robert Ganly had one of 8lbs13ozs on a Shrimp fly and Peter Joyce had one of 5lbs13.5ozs on a Silver Grey, both landed on Finlough.

At the time of writing I'm sure Delphi is enjoying all the water they need, and I expect to see good reports of catches from here in the next few days. To book fishing or accommodation at Delphi, contact the lodge on 095 42222, or check www.delphi-salmon.com