Does anyone out there have any opinion or knowledge on the effects of the huge numbers of roach in corrib, mask, conn and cullin since their introduction.

Dr Martin o Grady of the c.f.b reckons the adult roach in lough conn are competing with the juvenile trout but not in lough corrib (brown trout in ireland).

Yeah i bet martin is right,
next time you see him tell him its called nature

Welcome to the forum.It is a total disaster with these invasive non natural species

Jim

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The Fishermans Friend is the Flirty Fly,Fickle Food for Fleeting Fish.

I'd also be worried about the effect on char. I think Melvin is seeing the effect.

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Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Roach up to about 8" in length feed predominantly on zooplankton - daphnia to you & me. Zooplankton is one of the control measures on phytoplankton - algae in other words. Therefore no zooplankton equals more algal blooms. However, there is another player in this which is the zebra mussel. This is a filter feeder and will filter out phytoplanktons. Therefore no phytoplankton equals no zooplankton equals no juvenile roach. It's a complicated picture and demonstrates very clearly what happens when us stupid humans f**k about with a nicely balanced ecosystem with the intention of "improving" it.

THESE SO CALLED DR s AND FISHERY EXPERTS ONLY EVER BLAME THE ROACH POPULATION OR THE PIKE RESIDENT IN A FISHERY, NEVER ANY OTHER SPECIES OF FISH, THE OLD CORMORANTS THEN GET BLAMED WHEN THE FISH ONES WEAR OFF,

ANOTHER THING IS THE AMOUNT OF TIME THE FISHERY BOARDS BRING UP THESE EXCUSES OF ROACH AND PIKE ETC IS ALWAYS FOCUSED ON THE WESTERN LOUGHS, AND RIVER SYSTEMS,

NEVER ANY WORK DONE FROM THEM IN THE MIDLANDS OR THE EASTERN REGION,

NO REPORTS FROM THE SO CALLED DOCTORS,

THE REAL REASON IS THAT THESE SELF ACCLAIMED EXPERTS WHO ISSUE THESE REPORTS HAVE NOT A BULLS NOTION ON THE ECO SYSTEM,, ZOOPLANKTON OR THE INVASIVE ZEBRA MUSSEL,
KEEP YOUR REPORTS TO YOURELF, KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF NATURE,

WORKED BEFORE YOU WERE AROUND, WILL STILL WORK WHEN YOU AND I ARE LONG GONE

So introducing roach into these loughs isnt messing with nature

Like nature, Trout were about for a long long time before the roach were introduced.

Speak to Mr Cussack who lives on the shores of Mask and he will tell you all about roach, first hand.

Humans are wrecking our great loughs. Roach didnt swim over dry land to get into these places they were introduced by humans. Zebra mussell was also introduced thru the shannon system by humans on the hulls of pleasure craft

Its simple, government bodies dont care about nature and in particular our great loughs. Even now that it may be too late for some of them they dont care. If the government could tax nature it would

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It is of course interfering with nature, but the old arguement of fish been resident and non native fish arises, does that mean that a cull will take place all over the country to eradicate roach , and other non native species,
i think its just a bit unbalanced , ive never seen any reports from the other great loughs that we are blessed with ,

on another note, i was terribly disappointed to see a fishing report for journalists fishing on the shannon system in a well known irish sunday newspaper, it was a pike competition, some of the visiting anglers were the ones caught with live bait , "juvenile carp" coming off the boat at dun laoire,

you know whom im speaking about greg???

As far as I know roach were not a deliberate introduction in the full sense of the word. As I understand it they were introduced to the Erne in Northern Ireland by British pike anglers releasing unwanted livebait bought from the UK and soon spread into the ROI via the interconnected Shannon system etc.

How they got from there to the western lakes I don't know but I'm sure that a human hand was involved.

The only roach (and dace) in Ireland prior to that were in the Blackwater and maybe from the same source. They have been there for a considerable time, at least 40 years, maybe more.

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Oliver Kite
“A Spring Day on the Usk”
A Fisherman’s Diary

There are lots of Rudd in Currane. Are they native?