ANGLING NOTES:THE Central Fisheries Board has published the Wild Salmon and Sea Trout Statistics Reportfor 2008. The report provides information to the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources and helps shape policies aimed at conserving salmon and sea trout stocks.
Angling statistics are important from a marketing perspective in that they show angling trends and so inform strategies aimed at developing new initiatives.
Total number of salmon harvested by all methods was 31,118. This is a drop of 88 per cent in the number harvested from 2001 to 2008 and an increase of 10 per cent since 2007.
The commercial harvest was 8,903 salmon and 59 sea trout (over 40cm). This is 52 per cent of the total allowable catch allocated to this sector.
The recreational harvest amounted to 22,215, an increase of 2,785 on the 2007 figures. The total number of salmon caught and released was 11,977, a decrease of 1,023.
Some 20,061 rod licenses were issued to anglers from 50 nationalities – 62 per cent of whom were from the Republic, 12 per cent from the North and 14 per cent from Britain.
- At Limerick District Court last Friday week a man was successfully prosecuted by the Shannon Regional Fisheries Board (ShRFB) for poaching salmon on spawning grounds in the Mulkear River at Cappamore, Co Limerick.
Fisheries officers on night patrol last winter encountered a group of poachers with spears and lamps taking salmon illegally by spearing them as they moved onto gravel beds to spawn.
After giving chase one of the gang was caught and later charged. The fishery officers’ action was part of the board’s intensive spawning surveillance operations at certain locations.
The Mulkear is one of only two rivers to meet its conservation limit in the Shannon region and is managed by the Mulkear River Fishery Partnership.
Eamon Cusack, ShRFB chief officer, said: “To be taking salmon in this way is appalling. Poachers attempt to sell these salmon and the board urge people to be vigilant to these activities and not contribute to the decline in our native salmon.”
Anyone with information on such illegal activity are requested to report details to ShRFB officers at 061-300238.
- The fourth-heaviest recorded ling to be caught in Irish waters in the past 10 years was boated recently by Declan Gaffney while wreck-fishing 20 miles off the Cork coast aboard Lagosta II, now skippered by Alan Kennedy.
The magnificent fish, which opted for a mackerel flapper and weighed 21kg (46lb), was short of the Irish record by 9lb (4.1kg), which set by Ailbhe O’Sullivan in 2004 and caught in Cork Harbour. Details of the catch have been sent to the Irish Specimen Fish Committee for ratification.
- Annamoe Trout Fishery, near Roundwood, Co Wicklow, will host a charity competition on Sunday. The event is organised by Dunganstown parish in aid of African Enterprise, Malawi. Entries to David Dobbs at addobbs@eircom.net or 087-9673111.
angling@irishtimes.com