Geoff's Rants

28th July. 2009
Yesterday a local angler called at my house with a plastic pot with a screw down top. I asked what it was and he replied that it was an Eastern European fishing kit. When I opened the container I found a small pole winder with nylon line on it the thickness of my old grandma's washing line. As I explored further I found over 25 sets of treble hooks, a tent peg and a small indicator, the kind carp anglers clip on their lines on the odd occasions they are not sleeping in their bivies. The angler had watched a bloke string this lot together, bait it up with worms, launch it into the canal at the first lock up from Leitrim village and then tether it to the tent peg which he conveniently hid under a bush. For some inexplicable reason he placed the bite indicator on to the line and then walked away and left the lot in the canal. The Irish lad spoke to him as he walked away and the gentleman who had left the sorry mess in the water indicated that he didn't speak much English. After he had left, the local angler removed the mess from the water and then placed it all into the white pot that was conveniently left under the bush.
This nonsense is now a daily occurrence. Our coarse fish are being slaughtered by these law breakers and little or nothing is being done about it. I have reported illegal activity on several occasions where the miscreants could have been caught in the act if action had been taken. last year I reported a Polish gent who drives a blue VW caddy van taking fish from the Marina area at Keshcarrigan. A year later he and his co-horts are still at it in the same area. Not that many weeks ago, along with another angler I watched this person set nets in the basin below Castlefore lock. The following day I removed them and removed gill netted roach and hybrids. An English visitor recently reported to me an incident that took place on Lough Scur. He had set up on the back of Lough Scur on the rocks. Not long after he arrived ten foreign gentlemen arrived and immediatley lit a barbecue. All started to fish and soon small coarse fish were being placed over the hot coals. At the end of the session what they hadn't cooked were placed in black bin liners and taken away. Now I'm not saying all foreign anglers break the law, only most of them. The few that don't I commend. The ones that do should deserve all they ought to get. It won't happen of course. The plundering of our coarse fish stock will unfortunately carry on unchecked.