Despite a couple of showers the crowds turned up in big numbers
From a weather point of view Sunday morning started of a lovely summers morning. We had been well prepared and had our stand assembled since Saturday lunchtime leaving only a few little bits and pieces to be done on Sunday. We had our shed assembled which acts as a focal point/office incidentally we have it since 2011 and is still in good condition despite being put up and down and transported away every year. We also had the use of a very large Gazebo courtesy of Derek of Leinster Turf Machinery and where Fiona from Inland Fisheries Ireland based herself. Fiona had an excellent display of the different species of fish and invertebrate which inhabit Irish rivers and lakes including some fine specimen eels, perch, roach and some damsel fly larvae ect. It is really interesting to see the wide variety of marine life which the general public had no idea even existed. Thank you Fiona and Inland Fisheries.
We also had our very popular fishing pond which was a great draw for the small children and kept them busy during the heavy showers, in fact I don’t think they even knew it was raining.
There was great competition in the fly casting event with Paul French taking 3rd position, Andrew Dempsey taking the runner up spot and our casting instructor taking the top spot, Pat O Toole. Very well done to you and thanks to everybody for taking part. All monies raised are being donated to Make A Wish Charity.
Walter Bayer put on a great display of Fly Tying showing his impressive skill at tying the Mosche di Facocchi style. This method is used for tying dry flies and no vice is used. The fly is tied upside down, looks complicated but Walter assures me its not??? The flies he tied were very impressive and looked very convincing to me.
We also had a visit from the Irish International Youth Fly Fishing team who were in Trim training on the river Boyne for their trip to Bosnia this summer to compete in the 20th Fips Mouche world youth fly fishing championship. All involved were very grateful to be able to use such a great fishery, it was great practice for these young men.
The general consensus was we are already looking forward to next year.
Mr Pat
