An Irish Anglers Year 2012
A game of two halves just about sums up the angling year which was 2012, kicking off brightly with a heatwave in late March which prompted some wonderful early season stream fly fishing and the lower Barrow bream to come out and play, by mid June the rot had set in prompted by wet and windy weather which more or less lasted until Christmas. Early sea fishing trips from shore and boat proved promising with south Wexford delivering early season bass and smooth hounds, while a trip to the Beara yielded the usual crop of pollack, wrasse, and dab biggies.
Kilmore Quay in June provided some nice inshore fishing for the boys from South Wales, but after that other than Gary Robinson’s kayak caught tope double sea angling got pretty grim. All sorts of excuses were given, mainly centering around the meteorological situation, however this soldier isn’t in denial, three words explaining the marine drought, “commercial over fishing“, sad but true.
The west Wicklow streams came alive during late March and April with many a few hours spent casting soft hackle spiders for free rising trout on the Derreen, Slaney, Liffey, and Kings Rivers. The best fish went three quarters of a pound, however on the four weight set up used it fought like a demon, and what colours. Up to a dozen trout in a session, what a start to the angling year.
The annual Beara trip lived up to its billing with some fine shore specimens landed. Pound plus dabs, wrasse to specimen weight, and pollack to eight pound plus being the highlights, that said Gary Robinson opened a door to sea angling dreamland when launching his kayak into a flat calm West Cork sea with some cracking double figure pollack. Two months later the intrepid all rounder surpassed that feat with a kayak hooked tope in excess of fifty pounds, now that’s fishing.
Autumn into winter redeemed with some good local pike fishing and a late season bass splurge. South Wexford winter codling failed to show, but then again with the Celtic Sea fishery opened up that was always on the cards, however some excellent whiting fishing did swing the balance a little. Here’s to 2013, if effort counts for something it will be a success, here’s hoping……
See also: An Irish Angler’s Year 2011.
