Free Fishing on the Cork Blackwater from February 8 to 12th.
Blackwater Lodge will once again be offering free fishing from Monday to Friday, February 8th. - 12th. inclusive.
The river has been in flood for the last couple of days, but the forecast looks mainly dry right up until the 21st.
The river should come into order for the beginning of the week.
Booking is essential so please contact the Lodge to reserve a place.

The river continues to drop. It's down to 1.10m at Ballyduff this morning with clarity 1-2 feet. Good spinning order.

Free Fishing again next week
Blackwater Lodge will once again offer free fishing from Monday to Friday next week - February 15 to 19.
Advance booking please.

Glenda Powell
The Nationwide programme featuring Glenda's tuition has been re-scheduled and will now be broadcast on Friday, February 19.
The whole half hour programme is dedicated to fishing.
For those of you who are not able to access this on TV, you will be able to see it
on the Internet for 21 days after the programme has been broadcast on RTE Player.
Glenda will also be demonstrating at this weekend's Ireland Angling Expo at the National Exhibition Centre, Swords, Dublin on Saturday & Sunday, February 13/14.
We also will be there on Stand 55 next to the Casting Pool.

Feb. 11. Free Fishing next week. Glenda appears at Dublin this weekend.

The spell of dry weather continues, and the river is coming down to a lovely level.
The picture above was taken today (February 11) with the river on 0.75m & clarity about 4 feet.
Air temperature this morning at 8.00am was -6°C.

Here's the current river situation:


This graph should update itself each time you log in until the end of February.

The river is now getting close to the magic 0.65m level which I would regard as ideal for fly.
There hasn't been any news on fish caught since the two on opening day,
but there have been very few rods out on the river.
Prospects for the next fortnight look very good with mainly dry weather, so we certainly shouldn't be flooded off the river.
With the comparatively low water levels, the best of the fishing will be concentrated in the lower river from Clondulane down.

Free Fishing again next week
The Lodge will once again offer free fishing from Monday to Friday next week - February 15 to 19.
Advance booking please.

Glenda Powell
The Nationwide programme featuring Glenda's tuition has been re-scheduled and will now be broadcast on Friday, February 19.
The whole half hour programme is dedicated to fishing.
For those of you who are not able to access this on TV, you will be able to see it
on the Internet for 21 days after the programme has been broadcast on http://www.rte.ie/player/.
Glenda will also be demonstrating at this weekend's Ireland Angling Expo at the National Exhibition Centre, Swords, Dublin on Saturday & Sunday, February 13/14.
We also will be there on Stand 55 next to the Casting Pool.
Glenda will also be giving free tuition & advice throughout the weekend.

Blackwater Lodge beat 7 – Upper Kilmurry on Wednesday, February 17.

The Lodge will once again offer free fishing from Monday Feb. 22 to Friday, Feb. 26 inclusive.


This graph should update itself each time you log in until the end of February.
The river is in superb fly order. We’re still waiting for our first springer to be caught, but are seeing some fresh fish running through every day.

If you missed The Nationwide programme on Friday, February 19 - which was entirely dedicated to fishing - you can access this on the Internet for 21 days after broadcast on http://www.rte.ie/player/.

Took a few pics at Swords Show last weekend & put them up on Youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7ib-WLdmd8

The First Springer is Caught on the Blackwater Lodge beats

Lodge regular Gavin Wishart from Newcastle, Co. Down came down to celebrate his 40th. birthday
this weekend & scooped the First Salmon of the 2010 season to be caught on the Lodge Fishery.

He was fishing yesterday (March 6th) with Connie Corcoran on Ballinlovane and took the fish on Flying C at Cloonbeg.
The fish would have been released, but was bleeding from the gills so had to be kept.
The cast before he lost what they both believe was another springer, so there were definitely a few about.
It was hardly surprising that it took us until now to catch a fish as there were only 64 rod days
for the whole month of February. There would certainly be more springers caught if there were
more rods out on the river each day.

Prospects
There are more fresh fish being seen in the river in the last few days.
The river is in absolutely cracking order at the moment - even for the fly.
0.44m on the gauge so perfect fly height & clarity a good 4 feet.
The weather forecast (Metcheck) looks dry for the next 2 weeks apart from about 6mm on the 15th.
Daily Updated Fishing Report: [url="http://www.ireland-salmon-fishing.net/FishingReport/fishingreport.htm"]www.ireland-salmon-fishing.net/FishingReport/fishingreport.htm[/url]

The Second Springer is Caught on the Blackwater Lodge beats

Bass fishing guide Michael McCormack from Wexford with the second fish of the season from the Lodge beats. It was sea-liced & weighed in at 10.2lb.
It was taken on Silver Bullet on the Green Bank on Upper Kilmurry.
Michael saw 3 or 4 more fresh fish as well during the day.
He was the only rod out on the river today - one springer for one rod day cain't be bad!

I just had a phone call to report fish number 3 from Larry Sheridan (Dungarvan) who gillies for the Lodge.
He's just released a fish of about 12lb taken on black Flying C at the top of the Island Stream on Beat 4 - Kents.
No sea-lice but very fresh. He saw a couple more springers there as well.
Unfortunately no picture as he doesn't carry a camera with him.
Summer level at 0.36m on the Ballyduff gauge.

Only four rods out today & Michael McCormack from Wexford did it again.
He caught our fourth & his second of the season on spinner on the Island Stream on Beat 6 - Lower Kilmurry.
He was on his own, so no picture as the fish was released. He saw a couple of fresh fish up to ~15lb as well.
The other 3 rod party also saw several fresh fish on Beat 4 - Kents.
Gauge is now on 0.33m with superb clarity.

Ian, any fish down there yet??

Here's the current water level at Ballyduff.

Source: Blackwater Lodge Fishing Report page - http://www.ireland-salmon-fishing.net/FishingReport/fishingreport.htm
The river is falling slowly but steadily. The clarity has improved dramatically & is now about 5 feet on the lower river.
It's still a bit too high to fish the fly comfortably.
The 5th. springer of the season on the Lodge beats was caught last Sunday (April 4th.) before the last flood hit the river.

Fishing the fly at last!

With such a beautiful balmy evening this evening, four of us decided venture out to the river about 6.00pm this evening.
We opted to go to Upper & Lower Kilmurry, the best of the Lodge's seven beats below Careysville
with the gauge height having dropped to 0.80m.
Glenda & I headed for Lower, and the picture above is her at the Lug Pool at 7.15pm.
She was able to wade & fly-fish the whole way down the pool even at this height.


I headed down below to the Island Stream. This was about 10cm too high to be able to wade,
though could be fished from the (rather high) bank with a shooting head.
The picture above was taken looking downstream at the Island Stream at 7.45pm


and this picture was taken looking up the Island Stream to the Lug Pool on the bend in the distance.

We didn't see or touch any fish on Lower Kilmurry, but when we went back up to Upper Kilmurry,
the other two had seen three large fresh fish moving through the Sand Gap & the Hut Pool and Daniel
(a student on work experience at the Lodge from the Swedish Sport Fishing Academy)
had briefly hooked one of them just after it showed.

The clarity is about 5 feet & the level is falling steadily, so the prospects for the coming week look good.

For the latest information, see our daily updated Fishing Report page: : http://www.ireland-salmon-fishing.net/FishingReport/fishingreport.htm

River down to 0.47m. One of the only 2 rods out today just reported losing a very big fish which he had on for 10 mins & never saw. Took a small black, red & orange tube on the top of the Island Stream on Kents - Beat 4. Another hooked briefly on Upper Kilmurry & a number of fresh fish seen moving through the lower beats. Also reports of 2 fish caught up around Mallow area last weekend.
For the latest info: Blackwater Lodge Fishing report page - http://www.ireland-salmon-fishing.net/FishingReport/fishingreport.htm

Vampire with the first of the season on prawn on Blackwater Lodge Fishery.
It weighed 5½lb & was caught on the Lodge's very top beat No. 16 just below Mallow.
He lost another bigger fish on the prawn as well. This is the sixth fish of the season so far.

The prospects for the coming week are excellent, certainly in terms of the river conditions
Last night's rain brought the river up a couple of inches, but the clarity is still superb.
The upper river has already peaked & started to fall back again by this evening.
More fish were starting to be seen over the weekend, and it appears to me that there are
actually fish holding in the lower river that have been there several weeks.
This would explain why fish are not taking well, as springers are aggressive takers
when they have just come into the river, but tend to go off the take very quickly - especially to spinner.


This is the river below the Lodge at lunchtime today - Sunday, May 25.


This is the rain fall & river height at Ballyduff today.


This is the gauge height at various points along the river.
No big dirty flood appearing from the headwaters
so there wasn't that much rain fell on the upper river!

For the latest info: Fishing report page http://www.ireland-salmon-fishing.net/FishingReport/fishingreport.htm