It only took 6 weeks and about 200 hours of fishing but the Clare River finally gave up a grilse. 5lb on the trusty garden olive. River quiet high and brown, not suitable for fly just yet. Wet and windy rain which we have now won't help the cause.
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Added by Enda Scahill on July 26, 2009 at 7:09pm —
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Annoying, frustrating, irritating, agitating, confusing and confounding. Where are the fish? A bit run went up in the very low water at the end of June but hardly a fish to be found since. A good day on the water is urgently needed or I may have to take up needle work
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Added by Enda Scahill on July 14, 2009 at 9:03pm —
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Fished two sections of the Clare this morning between 6am and 2pm. River has dropped a lot again after the rain during the week. No sign of any salmon. Big rise of fish at 7am but all small fish. Eventually landed a 3lb trout in bright sunshine at around 1.30pm. With a settled weather forecast the next week I can't see a run of fish happening for a while.
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Added by Enda Scahill on June 20, 2009 at 3:36pm —
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Fished the weir in Galway from 1.30-8.30pm on Monday June 8th. Caught a 5lb grilse on the shrimp at around 3.30pm. Did one run down the weir on fly but no touches. A friend, Peter Gaffey caught his first salmon, a 6lb grilse also on shrimp. Not a whole pile of salmon to be seen around, main grilse run just starting.
God help me but BRING ON THE RAIN!!
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Added by Enda Scahill on June 12, 2009 at 4:30pm —
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Caught my first ever springer on the Clare River on 8th May 09. I was unlucky on monday evening hooking a springer in his gill and pulling it completely out when I struck. Went back out today despite the foul weather and strong breeze. The river hadn't risen a whole lot but had browned up a good bit. I had caught and returned a 1lb trout from a good salmon hole on Tuesday so I figured I'd start off there thinking that if the trout was nibbling then the water was clear enough to fish. Literally m…
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Added by Enda Scahill on May 8, 2009 at 7:30pm —
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Not a bad start to the season, 5.6lb specimen trout in mint condition, very well mended, on worm from the pool in the town. Gorgeous golden trout with red spotting. Tons of kelts have come over the traps in the flood water over winter and are now trapped in the canal. Some guys fishing there were catching them and throwing them back over the weir so they've some chance at the sea. They're a nuisance fishing for trout as they take very readily and there's a big risk of exhausting them and killing…
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Added by Enda Scahill on March 18, 2009 at 7:28pm —
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Got out really early on March 1st to the Clare River. I had started fishing by 8am. Beautiful morning, if anything a little too sunny. Water levels are definitely low for this time of year as we haven't had any serious rain for a good month. I fished for about 4-5 hours, caught and returned 2 1lb trout and lost what looked like a celt. I had bought a new Hardy rod over the winter and it's really nice but took a lot of getting used to as it's much more responsive than the cheaper Leeda that I'd b…
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Added by Enda Scahill on March 2, 2009 at 6:27pm —
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The Clare River opens on Sunday March 1st for trout. It's been open for Salmon since Feb 1st.
Can't wait - it's been a long winter!
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Added by Enda Scahill on February 27, 2009 at 12:43pm —
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Rain, rain, rain, rain. Started at 6.30am at Fahy's bridge. Didn't even bother to bring the fly rod out the water was so high and so brown. Interestingly the All Ireland Fly Fishing Final was on the Clare on saturday - about 80 anglers from the 4 provinces. They started at 11.30am and by 1pm only 1 trout had been landed - about 1/4lb! I was chucking in the trusty worm, the only "fly" to use in this water!! At 8.20am I decided to lob in a 30g jumping jack and set the rod up with a few rocks to ho…
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Added by Enda Scahill on September 2, 2008 at 6:04pm —
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Landed 4lb trout on Sunday 29th June. Got totally covered in cow s*#t as I slipped on my ass in a mucky cowdrink whilst netting him! Got one other 1lb trout which was the tastiest I've caught yet!
Fished Clare river Thursday evening after catching a 4lb grilse in Cong on worm at lunchtime. River was brown but clear and dropping and also very very quiet. Caught a ton of sprat and slamon par and few half pounders all on Silver Invicta. No rise worth speaking of.
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Added by Enda Scahill on July 4, 2008 at 6:18pm —
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Fished the Ridge Pool on June 4th. Bright day, warm. There were a few fish showing but nothing coming to fly for any of the anglers. High tide was a big one and was in at 5.30 so the slot 2pm-sunset was cut very short. Perhaps a novice mistake but certainly one to learn from as €100 for a few hours fishing was pretty steep and sore on the pocket.
Caught a 5lb grilse on Galway weir saturday evening on prawn, sharing a rod (sortof!) with Shane Keane. High tide was at 8.45pm so fresh fish started s…
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Added by Enda Scahill on June 9, 2008 at 10:06am —
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Got a 6am to 1pm slot on Galway Weir on June 1st. Water is lovely and low and perfect for wading amateurs like myself. Only have a single handed rod and although I can cast a decent distance the strong current and long casting and hauling made it an exhausting business, especially as it was 20oC by 8am!
Spent 2.5hrs fly fishing and then stopped for breakfast. Shane had the camper van so we had the full works in the sunshine!
Switched to prawn and jumping jacks after the grub as the thought of ge…
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Added by Enda Scahill on June 2, 2008 at 2:48pm —
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Clare River running extremely low. Went out to fish it yesterday purely to get out into the river and splash around. Brought the 11'3 rod in case there were any lying salmon. Tied on 6lb froghair (class tippet material) and 3 nymph droppers, pheasant tail, GRHE goldhead and a pulsating caddis that I bought froma US website. Went to a spot where there's a lot of cascading water when the river's low. There's a large overhang and the water swirls underneath it. I was really thinking I'd spend an ho…
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Added by Enda Scahill on May 22, 2008 at 9:00am —
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Was working in Tyrone on Fri and Sat and didn't plan on fishing (sorry Paul!) but due to great driving (!) and little traffic I ended up on the Clare upstream of Claregalway at 1pm. The main purpose of the trip was to practice using my 11'3" Rod that I bought last year but never used. I'm fishing the ridge pool at the start of June so figured I better get used to the extra 2' before going. To this end I headed upstream, tied on 9' of maxima 12lb chameleon leader, 2 4lb drennan droppers, tied a s…
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Added by Enda Scahill on April 27, 2008 at 8:32pm —
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Cong River still running very high, about 12-18" above optimum summer levels. Recent rain won't be helping either.
Got a date of June 4th to fish the Ridge Pool in Ballina so looking forward to that, it'll be a new challenge as I haven't fished for salmon on fly yet
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Added by Enda Scahill on April 1, 2008 at 11:54am —
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Fished the Gweeston near Swinford on Saturday. Plenty of water in the river which is usually very low in summer time. Was fishing with single black beadhead nymph cast across and drifted down. this was my first time fishing nymphs and I had read about watching for the slightest delay or twitch on the fly line. Eventually I struck into a nice 1/2lb trout based purely on a tiny twitch of the line, I had felt nothing through the rod. I missed a few where I felt the nibble but couldn't strike quickl…
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Added by Enda Scahill on March 23, 2008 at 4:24pm —
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This was my second year fishing having taken it up in April 2006. Last year I had a €75 fly rod and reel combo. In January of this year I ordered a St Croix 9' #6-7 midflex rod from the US and used this with an Irish Trout Co reel and an expensive floating line. I took a day's flyfishing tuition with John Fahy of the Cong Angling Centre and this really helped sort out my overhead casting - my roll casting still needs a lot of work. My intial trips were to the Abbert River early in the season
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Added by Enda Scahill on November 2, 2007 at 3:32pm —
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Added by Enda Scahill on October 9, 2007 at 2:43pm —
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Fished friday in Cregmore and Saturday and Sunday at Crusheen Bridge. Caught a 2.5lb trout in the dark on Friday evening and lots of small trout on Saturday on fly. Fished late into the evening on Sunday and lost a large salmon after a short fight. 5 mins later Shane 5.5lb salmon which I was on hand to leap recklessly into the river to net as Shane was high up on the bank. Exciting finish to season, looking forward to cleaning out the boot of the car and trying to get rid of the slight fishy sme…
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Added by Enda Scahill on October 1, 2007 at 10:02am —
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Fished Fahy's Bridge on 2 evenings with limited success. Water is up about 6 inches and clear. Tuesday caught a 1.3lb trout on second cast and two casts later lost a bigger fish probably around 2lb who threw the hook straight away with a impressive splash. After this start we thought we were in for a bumper evening with lots of newly moved trout but Shane caught a 1lb trout further downstream and ,bar a few small fry, that was it. It was a bitterly cold evening and this may have influenced th
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Added by Enda Scahill on September 20, 2007 at 4:28pm —
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