‘During mayfly season, you’ll probably find me here every day’

An evening spent chasing trout on Lough Sheelin

The fading light bathes the vast lake in a deep blue hue. The fresh green of the distant island trees has turned misty grey. With the mirror-like surface reflecting the scattered clouds, it is hard to tell where the water ends, and the purple sky begins. A blissful, serene setting where thoughts are formed and dispersed like the clouds above. Half a dozen boats are lying motionless on the still water. Each with two anglers perched on small stools, scanning their parameters. A passing egret croaks into the silence. Then a sudden bloop. Like a pebble falling into water. The chase is on.

After ten hours on the boat, Eamonn and John were ready to give up. Despite hopes for better fishing conditions, the mesmerising setting that followed a dreary day does not entice trout. As if they know, they duck between soft ripples while feeding off the mayflies lying on the surface. They hide beneath the mirrored sky of the motionless water. This was not the end of the fishing tale the two anglers wanted to tell the reporter from the Celt. But the soft smack of lips eating a fly, a “bloop” 20 meters in front of the boat was a chance to end the day on a successful note.

Lough Sheelin is widely known for its unique trout fishing grounds, also because of the annual emergence of mayflies. On a “bad day” like this, Eamonn Ross says, there are about 80 boats with 300 fishermen on the lake. There used to be far more, but Eamonn feels there has been a generational shift. “Young people don’t come any more.” Maybe holidays on the beach are more attractive, maybe the lack of B&Bs in this area have contributed to the decline.

Maybe both are true.

Stages

The mayfly passes through four stages of development: egg, aquatic nymph, subimago and adult. The eggs hatch in freshwater, where nymphs can live underwater for up to two years, feeding and growing through repeated moults or shedding of outer skin. They later rise to the surface and emerge briefly as a winged subimago before changing into a fully mature adult. Adult mayflies survive for only a short time, often just hours or days – which is why in some countries they are called ‘One-day-flies’ - but long enough to mate and lay eggs on the water surface. Once the deed is done, males and females fall into the water. Because this final phase occurs over such a brief span of time, the whole spectacle can be observed in one evening.

And the proficient angler does observe closely, deducing from the swarms of mayflies where on the lake they will succumb in droves, and thus attract the most fish.

“Finding the right spot is key,” Eamonn says. How to find it? “To that question every fisherman will have their own answer. Or think they have it,” he smirks.

The mayfly hatch starts early to mid May, once the water temperature rises above 10 degrees for at least three consecutive days. Before that, the aquatic insect or nymph could have spent two years burrowing, crawling, clinging, and swimming around the bottom of the water feeding on algae, organic matter and microscopic organisms. Generally, environmental experts view a strong mayfly population as a sign of clean, well-oxygenated water and a healthy lake ecosystem.

Pea soup

Eamonn, who has been active in the Lough Sheelin Trout Protection Association (LSTPA) for years, is more than aware that the 4,600 acres lake has been under recurrent stress. “Pea soup green” was the water colour described by Westmeath Senator Donie Cassidy in 1987. In the Seanad he spoke about the first algal blooms seen in the late 1960s: “Investigation revealed that the nitrates and phosphates were mainly emanating from the uncontrolled proliferation of intensive pig production units in the catchment area.”

As little remedial efforts had been undertaken to restore the lake 20 years later it was even worse. He urged the government to finally take action.

Water pollution bye-laws, wastewater controls as well as habitat restoration and local advocacy by the LSTPA among others have led to massive improvements. However, setbacks are all too common and heartbreaking. Not even a year ago, more than 1,500 fish were killed in Captain’s Bay – threatening decades of careful conservation work undertaken in co-operation with landowners, local fishery staff with funding from LEADER and the County Council.

Bobbing between Curry Rocks and Inchicup Island on the Meath side of the lake, Eamonn mentions this was the only area where they spotted mayflies during polluted times. “They somehow survived here.” A fisherman knows his hunting grounds like his box of spent. So after venturing the lake on this mild evening, we have settled just off Church Island, with a view of Crover House.

Gobbling

In his long time of fishing, Eamonn has made out a few markers he tries to follow. From wherever a mayfly dance is spotted, the wind will carry the flies over the water along a certain corridor. Trout will swim towards the wind in the slick, gobbling up the flies en route. Ideally anglers stop their boat in this path.

It is common courtesy on the water not to stop right in front of another angler, so each vessel keeps a respectful distance from one another. After being satisfied that the big dance of thousands of mayflies in a sheltered corner of Church Island will provide the winning corridor, Eamonn and John let the boat bob towards the northeast. With a slight breeze in our backs, we spot hundreds of mayflies in the water. “Good feeding ground,” John agrees.

John opens his case full of mayfly spent. Three centimetre long fuzzy mimicry flies that are handmade from squirrel fur hair and feathers. His weatherworn fingers carefully tie a new spent onto the nylon string, just below a silver hook protrudes.

“I think I’ll go with this one now. It lies flatter on the water,” John says to his fishing pal. In theory, once the fish grabs the spent, the angler has to firmly yank the rod to hook him. A split-second before the fish realises this is not a tasty supper fly, but mere fluff.

“You could be impatient and pull too soon, or mistake your fly for the real one beside the fish and scare him away with the motion,” Eamonn sums up years of experiences with the trout on Lough Sheelin. “I’m a pensioner now, so during mayfly season, you’ll probably find me here every day.”

Asked whether the spent or the spot is key, he answers with a self-conceived proverb: “I always say it is better to have the wrong spent at the right spot than the right spent at the wrong spot.” That said, we wait. Time passes in silence. Every so often a subdued conversation unfolds. But mostly, only the quiet repeated whizzing of the whipped line can be heard. Here and there a trout’s fin has appeared, but all too far away.

Then the bloop.

John casts his line. “Good shot!” whispers Eamonn loudly. A firm pull and the trout is on the hook.

“It’s a big one,” John gauges by the pull of the fish. He slowly draws the line back, letting the trout tire himself out. Eamonn holds out the net and finally lifts the goldenbrown fish into the boat.

“Around 5 pounds” they beam.

As if on cue. The boats around us start their engines. One successful catch will have to do the community tonight.

“Oh, they will be telling each other at the pier how close they got,” Eamonn laughs. The trout is released. He won’t be a fisherman’s breakfast tomorrow.