Classic anglers look to the skies
Chris Donegan • Published 22 Apr 2010 11:31
0 Comments
It has survived the Icelandic volcano and the economic recession but all eyes are on the weatherman ahead of next week's Waterways Ireland Classic Fishing Festival on the Erne.
Eddie McGovern, tourism development officer with Fermanagh District Council, is praying for conditions that would send most tourists running.
"Warm and damp with overcast skies would be nice," he says.
Not nice if you are a sun worshipper or a barbecue fanatic but just about ideal for fishing. The problem is, conditions have been far from ideal.
"The fishing to date has been hard," confirms Eddie, "mostly due to the weather conditions. A couple of weeks ago there was ice on the lake. There's a lot of cold water. We are hoping it will warm up again for next week."
With over £20,000 in prizes the Classic attracts hundreds of visiting anglers to Fermanagh and is the jewel in the crown of the county's match angling season.
You can put money in their pockets but your only hope of putting a smile on their faces is to put fish on the end of their lines, and lots of them.
The organisers try to time the Classic to coincide with the annual spawning migration when thousands of roach, bream and other fish gather in large shoals around Enniskillen.
That used to be around the first week in May but a couple of years' of milder weather meant that by the time the Classic kicked off the fish had been, done the business and gone.
The organisers attempted to tackle this global warming head-on by moving the Classic back a couple of weeks to mid-April.
They quickly learned that you can never out-manoeuvre mother nature who responded with two years of cold weather when the fish were not in the mood for love and certainly not in the mood for biting.
"We are at the mercy of the weather," sighs Mr. McGovern.
But if the weather comes good everything else is in place for a successful Classic with the number of entries up on last year despite the economic recession.
"We are approaching 250 which is the biggest entry for the past four years," says Mr. McGovern.
Most of the competitors travel from England by car and ferry so their plans have not been disrupted by the Icelandic volcano that has grounded flights across Europe.
On Monday they will draw for pegs at 14 or 15 venues, mostly around Enniskillen but as far downstream as Boa Island, for the first in a series of five-hour matches that will continue on Wednesday and Friday.
There is a top daily prize of £500 and hundreds of section prizes worth £50 with the overall winner with the heaviest aggregate catch for the week netting a cheque for £5,000.
This article appeared in Impartial Reporter 22 Apr 10
Return to the main index, get more from this section or browse our News archives.
