Arrived at the Spar garage in Cloghan and picked up our €15 day tickets and some snacks at around 9:15am. The lake was 5mins away and after getting suited and booted, headed down to a regular spot on the west bank of the lake where both brownies and rainbows usually hole up.
Cloghan Lake
Met one of the caretakers, Jimmy, who checked our tickets and then informed me that he had already landed 8 trout in the space of 20mins, they were on the feed alright! As we were chatting there was one other early bird fishing and was in the process of playing a fish, so with excited eyes we took our places on and around one of the platfroms on the north bank. The wind was blowing lightly from NE to SW so this was a better spot than trying to cast almost directly into the wind. I started on Intermediate line with a short 5ft leader and my trusty waggle tail lure from the Aisling outing (16 fish that day, gonna be hard to beat!).
Almost immediately, I was in and it was a nice rainbow, deep brown in colour and a great start to the day.
Within 30mins I had 5 in total!! I had a lovely brownie just under 2lbs but unfortunatley, as Adam was pulling in so he could take a pic, he hooked up, so I decided to get it back safely and help net Adam's 1st fish. Worse still, Adam lost the fish before we could even see what it was, lost fish and lost picture opportunity all in 2mins. Ronan arrived just after 10am and didn't believe me when I told him I had 5 already, but low and behold, as soon as he took his place beside me I was in again! Shortly after, Adam finally got his first trout of the season, a nice rainbow that put up an amazing fight for it's size.
Ronan struggled for a while, lost a fish or 2, but finally managed to hang on and bag his first trout from Cloghan, another rainbow that again was fighting fit.
For the next couple of hours I moved around the NW corner of the lake and had 12 before lunchtime. A nice mixture of brownies and rainbows. Adam had 4 fish and Ronan was on 2 for the morning session. It is worth noting that Ronan was really off his game, lines snapping off, using low grade 6lb mono that the fish would not even look at and when they did, they managed to get off!! He must have lost 5-6 fish all day, it was just one of those days that we all have eventually and you can do nothing about. Adam and myself headed back to the village for a spot of garage lunch in the Spar shop while Ronan stayed lakeside, determined to get his act together. Half an hour later we were back to the despondant figure of Ronan trying to get his tackle right, another fish had snapped off!!! Woo-sah my friend, woooooh-saaaah!!!
At this stage the only thing on my mind now was to try and break the record I had just made a couple of weeks ago on Lough Aisling, I was on 12 with about 4hrs of fishing to go. Could I get 5 more fish in that time to have a new PB for the day?
What happened next will probably never be matched again as far as I am aware. The only thing to say is that the fish were on the feed, no doubt about it. I stayed on the waggle tail all day and the intermediate line and while it may seem boring, I found it was far from it. Fish after fish fell to this method and by 3pm I had 17 for the day, record broken, let's see how far we can go. Adam was hooking up regularly too but still, Ronan was having no luck.
The final straw for Ronan came at around 5:30pm, I was on 24, Adam was on 8 and one of the regulars from last season showed up. A young boy of 9 or 10 that would always have time for a chat, stopped at Ronan and asked how he was doing, not great was his reply but he told the young lad that I caught 24 on a black\green waggle tail that he should try and use something similar. The young lad then came to me and showed me an orange lure that he was using and said it was a good lure that never failed him. Off he trotted to the north bank and 3 casts later he landed a fish. Ronan simply threw his hands in the air, packed up his gear and left muttering under his breath. We stayed for another 15mins, had a couple of pulls but no hook ups so decided we had done well enough and it was time to head home.
Few more pics from the day.
We had another outing planned for Saturday and as I mentioned in the title, talk about swings and roundabouts! Arrived that morning at the same time, very similar conditions and was ready for another good days fishing. Chris arrived shortly after me and we set up again in the same spot. We had agreed to try dry lines only today so with the same lure again we started fishing. Ronan arrived half an hour later and we did not have 1 pull between us. There were a few other lads fishing and they too were not getting any action. It looked as if the fish were just not interested. Ronan, however, had his game face on today and he was the first in to a fish after an hour or so. I had 2 pulls all morning, Chris had nothing and Ronan was on 3, at this stage I had given up on dry line and switched to the trusty intermediate line. We fished all around the lake and eventually at 1pm we decided to take a break. Back to the Spar shop for tea and a sandwich and Chris decided he had had enough.
Myself and Ronan headed back and took a spot on the east side of the lake, wading knee deep to a spot I knew held some fish. Had a couple of pulls on 2 different patterns but we suddenly noticed that the lads on the south bank seemed to be landing fish. When a spot opened up, we dashed to the platform and started casting with renewed hope. I was on a brown gold-head pheasant tail and within 30mins I had 4!! I was finally doing something right. Ronan hooked up on 3 occassions but lost 2 at the net.
At this stage we were just happy to finally be catching so we stayed there for another hour but it just dried up. We headed back to the west bank hoping they were back on the feed up there but again, nothing was biting. We finished the day on the SW bank and I had 1 small brownie on a cats whisker, it was a far cry from the feeding frenzy that was 2 days ago. With tired arms and sore backs we packed up and headed home. I won't be out again until the end of the month, it was a draining 2 days but well worth it. Both exillerating and humbling with a new found respect for our triploid frends!!!
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