Ronan's Report

If something is a year late it’s on time again, right?.. well, maybe not, but this kind of is! This is last years Ireland report and a little on fly-fishing in Jordan. It all happened a year ago so its current again! How things have changed. In the past, I lived in Ireland and came to NZ to Holiday / fish (of course it was just fishing – every day!). Now I work in NZ and holiday in Ireland, where I won’t fish every day, but I will certainly fish a lot. Last year I was at home for about 30 days over July and August. I had the best fishing for Atlantic Salmon on Lough Inagh that I ever had. In 3 days on the lake we had 6 grilse up to 7lbs and a few browns and seatrout for good measure. From what I hear this season is going very well. Similar salmon numbers to last year but more seatrout and way more quality browns (up to 9lbs). This is great news for me because Inagh is one of my favourite places in the world to fish. You never know what you might catch during a day on Inagh; a grilse, a spring salmon, an Arctic char, a ferox, a brownie or a seatrout are all on the cards.. and now perch too but efforts are being made to remove this recent invader. At the end of the day on the lake a pint in the lodge always goes down well, especially if Colin is there to tell you why you didn’t catch a few more. You should listen to him, he’s often right (not always though!). Give Colin a call if you fancy getting out on Inagh or any of the river beats. 003539534706 or visit the website http://www.loughinaghlodgehotel.ie

Kylemore Lough is another favourite haunt of mine. It’s different to inagh in my experience in that its less lively in general but when it turns on it really turns on. I remember fishing it a number of years ago with my good friend Fuzz. It was dead quiet all day and then in the space of 20 minutes we landed a grilse, lost a salmon and rose a few more and saw many grilse rolling. Then all went quiet again. You need to make hay when the sun shines on Kylemore Lough. Dad and I fished it a couple of times last season. On our first day on it dad hooked into a big fish at the end of a drift, both of us assumed salmon, then it jumped. “Its a seatrout” I said.. Even in the good old days of seatrout fishing in the west of Ireland a fish of over 4lbs was considered a really outstanding catch. This fish was 5lbs at least. It was a real pleasure to see such a fish. We landed a few more over the 2 days, with browns up to a pound and other seatrout up to 3lbs. I hope this is a sign of thing to come. I’ll be out there again in a few weeks to find out.(https://www.sexyloops.com/blog/2011/07/17/kylemore-lough-in-a-howling-gale/)For bookings contact Nancy on 003539541143 or http://www.kylemorehouse.net

I also spent some time fishing the Renvile lakes for salmon. Namely loughs Muc and Fee. Both stunning lakes where the angler has a chance at a really big salmon, although the run is predominantly 3-5lb grilse. Over the few days out there dad landed a couple while I lost a some. One of the days on Muc & Fee was for a local fishing competition. Dad and I did no good but the weigh in was pretty funny. One competitor left his first salmon behind him on the bank while he continued fishing. Later on he got another and when he went to leave it beside the first one he noticed it had been half eaten by a cat. He had to weigh in half a salmon. He still won!! Only in Ireland I hear you say? Quite possibly!

After Ireland, Iza and I went to Jordan for 2 really incredible weeks. What a country to visit! Jordan has 24ks of coastline on the Red Sea. We spent 5 nights in Aqaba to make the most of it. Fishing from the shore is not allowed so every day was spent diving and snorkelling. However, I managed to get out on the water for a few hours on our last day there. We hired a glass bottomed boat to take us out. With the majority of the boat covered over this was far from a fly-fishing boat but it was the best I could find! It’s worth mentioning that nobody uses fishing rods in the Red Sea in Jordan, It’s all about the hand line. Apparently I just missed a bumper sailfish season. Everyone catching 5 per day they said. It should be firing right now if this season is like the last. Our 2 boatmen took us to some water they knew well. They were dragging hand-lines while I attempted to stand up on the bow and cast as they trolled along. This was extremely hard to do in the big rolling wave!! Imagine River Dance on top of a bucking bronco, well that was me.. Iza caught a few on the hand-line as did the boatmen but I struggled with the fly rod, I struggled just to stand. Of course I could have trolled the flies but thats not fly-fishing. In the end I asked to be taken to the sheltered water close to shore where I had seen fish break the surface from the dive boat a few days prior. Here, for about the last 1.5hours, I had a chance. I had 3 chances to be precise. I cast in the vicinity of two mahi-mahi and had a follow right to the boat but no eat. Then a follow from a skipjack tuna, then my best chance, all I had to do was cast 70 feet to a breaking shoal of skipjack. The line wrapped around the anchor and the fly fell short. That was my last chance. I was pretty gutted not to catch a fish in Jordan. There are no fly guides operating out of Aqaba so if you find yourself there you’ll have to do what I did. Hopefully you’ll do better. The place has potential! Feel free to drop me an email if you have any questions.

Tomorrow morning I’m off to india for 12 days then on to Ireland for a month. I’ll carry a fly-rod in India but I don’t think there is anything to catch between Delhi and Mumbai at this time of year (but there must be!!). If you know something please let me know! I have a one week window at the end of the trip where I could possibly squeeze in a fly-fishing destination other than Ireland. India is all about hanging out with and travelling with my brother..

Well thats it for now.. I might get a blog out over the next 6 weeks but there are no guarantees! Right, time to pack!

Tight Lines!   Ronan..    ronan@sexyloops.com

John takes us to the top of Lough Inagh...

Nice conditions, wind and wave is good for an Irish grilse..

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Fishing the hot spot.. We had 2 here and another not far away..

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Into my first of 2, There is something uniquely special about catching Atlantic Salmon.

Only have a pic of one fish. John's phone / camera ended up in the lake and my battery ran out!

Only have a pic of one fish. John's phone / camera ended up in the lake and my battery ran out!

Lunch! I bring the flask of tea and John brings the sandwiches!

More cloud! We fish from the drifting boat covering known salmon water..

Putting us on the drift..

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A dark and dreary morning on Kylemore Lough..

The day cleared up quickly. A great place to be!

Dad's into one.. big enough to be a grilse but it's not..

..its a huge seatrout!

Over 5lbs of power from the sea. What a fish!! Even in the good old days this would have been considered a trophy trout.

A little browny for me!

Evening light and we call it a day.. a great day!

A stunning fresh grilse for me!

Then we pulled up the boat and fished the shore. Worth while in high water.

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One for me from the bank! This was great fishing..

I got this sandeel on the sheltered side of the point while Dad was catching 2 grilse on Lough Muc.. I should've joined him!!!

Justin take his rod out of a 2 year sabbatical, 5 minutes later he broke it then a wave crashed onto him so he went golfing.

Gurteen Point for a pollack, but it was too wild to fish with any comfort..

We fished the top of the lake. Here we're passing the Inagh Lodge on the way to the top..

Dad and I on the water again.. this time, Lough Inagh..

Dad works the shore down..

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Lough Muc the next day, but no joy!

Back to Kylemore for another round! Dad into another big seatrout out from Nancy's house..

A 3lber!

Back she goes..

A healthy pounder!

The day brightens up..

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Peat stained water, common in Connemara.

We leave the boat and fish the shore for a while. We had a few wee brownies.

Lough Muc..

The Wild Atlantic Way...

Fishing the shore down on Lough Fee, I had heaps of little browns and lost a grilse at the end of the day..

Sheep!

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Natures concrete!

Unusual rocks beside Lough Fee.

The crew plus attachments!

At the end of the day, a pint with the whole crew! It doesn't happen very often but I'm happy to say we'll all be together again this August!

My only chance to fly-fish in Jordan after a week of snorkelling and diving..

My only chance to fly-fish in Jordan after a week of snorkelling and diving..

Didn't take long for Iza to catch with the hand-line!

Didn't take long for Iza to catch with the hand-line!

Our boatmen also dragged hand-lines...

Illegal to fish this close to the ships, no joy anyway!

This water was pretty manageable and I had a few chances!

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Far from a fly-fishing boat, but a good experience none the less. The potential is there!

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..and then to Inchagoill..

Lots of history here, the limestones is showing its age!

One of many stones surrounding the church.

This is the most interesting one, 1 m tall.. Sorry, not well versed on the history!

A great addition to a day on the water! Such a beautiful island..

Iza on Corrib fishing dries..

A little corrib brown for our 2 hour session..

Lough Corrib limestone

Fuzz pulls in his boat on the running mooring for a day after mackerel.

The bite radius and tooth size matches Tope. We tried to catch one but no luck.

Iza hits the motherload!

A great day to be out! Too rough to go to Inis Shark as planned..

Dinner!!

Shane and Irene.. We all went to school together, that's where it began!

Renvile on the Wild Atlantic Way..

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A private island just off the coast. Mayo territory I believe..

..we went ashore anyway!

Puca, has since gone to heaven! We were always great friends ever since Rory Gallagher Festival many years ago where Fuzz, me and Puca all shared the back of a little (very little) van!

At least 4 were hit by sharks.. Tope we think but not sure.

Shane cleaning the mackerel..

I've never had this happen before!!

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Chillin after a tough day!

Mackerel for dinner, simply seasoned.

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Good friends and good food, hard to beat!

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The blue boat in the foreground was mine.. The Chopper, she saw more wind and waves than most lakeboats.

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Roundstone. Home..

The wall outside O'Dowds with a pint and this view.. one of my favourite things!

Our boatmen..

In Jordan! About to go Diving!

Ready to roll.. Note the arm keeping Iza upright!!

After the first dive.. Very happy!

Shadi, the diveboat captain and I, spy a shoal of skipjack (visible breaking the surface) at the end of a day. I did 3 fantastic dives.

About to go out fly fishing on the Red Sea.. Beautiful day before the wind!

Lion fish..

I found myself feeling pissed off at work today. When I thought about exactly why I was feeling that way the answer didn’t make me feel much better. A very good friend of mine in Ireland, Colin Folan, sent me a link to a “Prime Time” episode on RTE covering both sides of the Aran Islands fish farm debate. I’m totally anti fish farming using the methods adopted by the Irish salmon farming industry. I witnessed the decimation of sea-trout populations, mainly through my father’s eyes when I was a child. This collapse coincided with the first farms and within a few years they were all but gone (1271 sea-trout down to 21 in one year on the Lough Inagh Fishery and down to 14 the next). Salmon farms have continued to plague wild salmon and seatrout populations ever since through pollution, disease and huge infestations of sea-lice feeding on farmed salmon but easily latching onto wild salmonids as they pass by. The program on RTE highlighted the fact that now B.I.M ( Bord Iascaigh Mhara, Sea Fisheries Board in English) are behind a proposal to build Europe’s largest salmon farm just off the west coast of Ireland beside the beautiful Aran Islands. If this goes ahead when will it stop? Will the entire west coast be dotted with ugly, polluting cages? Why can’t we learn from our own mistakes or B.C’s or Scotland’s or Norway’s? IFI (Inland Fisheries Ireland) are opposed to the farms due to the threat that farms pose to wild fish and angling tourism. BIM picked a great time to sneak in with their proposal. Ireland needs jobs and the farm could employ lots but at what cost? If the wild fish populations are further reduced on Ireland’s west coast huge numbers of jobs will be lost in angling tourism. If money was put into promotion of angling tourism, preservation of habitat and re-population of wild fish stocks, jobs would be created both in the short and long term And we would have wild fish running our rivers for ever more. One thing that really bothers me in all of this is the fact the entire debate seems to revolve around money and jobs. The welfare of wild salmon and sea-trout for the salmon and sea-trout’s sake has taken a back seat. If you have ever stood beside a river watching wild salmon and trout run up and over a fall you will know what an amazing and utterly captivating sight and experience it is, If you have not and this farm goes ahead you may never witness this on Ireland’s west coast nor will your children. This brings a tear to my eye. The farm has not been given the green light yet so there is still hope. Maybe we will keep this wild fish resource and not give it up like we did our sea fishing rights and our oil.

Below is a link to the episode, Start  17 minutes in.

By the way, The BIM spokesman on the show made reference to the fact that wild salmon and sea-lice have coexisted for millions of years, (which is true in the wild), but he neglected to mention what happens when you pack a million salmon into a little cage. The lice will find it and their population will explode due the amount of available food. Also what happens in the open ocean cannot be accurately compared to the confines of a cage. I could see the No Salmon Farms At Sea spokesman chomping at the bit to retort but he never got a chance! And to Richard from the IFA, “Does it take 3kgs of wild fish to produce 1kg of farmed salmon?” he was asked, “No” he said, “it takes 600gs of protein / fish meal to produce a kg of farmed salmon” Well my question to him is, how many kgs of wild fish does it take to produce 600gs of fish meal??  Dam evasive politics.

http://www.rte.ie/player/nz/show/10146690/

Here is a link to a fact sheet from the I.F.I, Please take 5 minutes to read over it. http://www.fisheriesireland.ie/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_download&gid=330&Itemid

Here are Minister Simon Coveney’s details.. http://www.finegael.ie/our-people/ministers/simon-coveney/

Please sign and share this petition.. https://www.change.org/petitions/simon-coveney-td-minister-for-agriculture-food-and-the-maine-refuse-the-application-from-bim-to-put-salmon-cages-in-galway-bay#share

Stay informed!  Ronan..

Last weekend we had one of or monthly club excursions. We went to Lake Monowai. The fishing was terrible but it really didn’t subtract from what was a great trip. On the way home Mike Bonn and I stopped at Lake Manapouri. We were off Monowai earlier than we thought because neither one of us had a watch. This turned out to be a good thing! We had some very exciting sight fishing on Manapouri not far from where we put in. The photos tell the story. Hard luck on losing that fish on the last cast of the day Mike!

Tomorrow many rivers reopen. I won’t be out because I have to go to work but I don’t mind. My season never ended anyway! I was going to head out tonight at midnight and try to catch the first of the season but its pissin rain now and motivation is failing! Tight lines to all who venture out tomorrow.  Hopefully this rain won’t put the rivers up too much.

As our season is starting The Irish season is closing! I hope it was a great one. Hello to all who fish Lough Inagh today for the last day of the season. Colin, Will, Ulrich, Brian, Thomas, Kevin, Vincent, and the rest, have a Guinness or 6 for me!!

Ronan (Stuntman, C.I., Fishing Host, Joiner)

It’s been a mixed week of fishing. I’ve been doing some guiding for anglers after salmon, chasing pike and trout on Corrib, targeting monster browns on Lough Inagh as well as seatrout, salmon and normal sized browns. One client had an arctic char, they’re very rare over here and usually small, but very pretty and there is something very special about catching them. Unfortunately i didn’t get a pic! In my 16 years fishing Inagh I’ve only had about 7 or 8 char.

I have no idea what’s in store for the next few days.. I might target pollack around the rocks from my boat, might try for a salmon, might be working!

By the way, if anyone wants to hire me as a guide, give me a call! +353 87 770 1986

For info on staying at the Lough Inagh Lodge call Maura on 00353 95 34706 or log on to http://www.loughinaghlodgehotel.ie/

For fishing bookings and info contact Colin Folan on 00353 95 34706 or 00353 86 867 9459

Have a great August bank holiday!

Ronan..