Students from St Brigid’s High School, Armagh, participated in their first angling trip and competition of the school year at Rectory Lodge, Cookstown on Tuesday 22nd November 2011. Twenty- eight anglers caught and landed over 80 trout weighing over 140lbs. “ A great day out” was how most described their angling experience with all students catching some trout and the majority catching their limit of 3 fish.
A small number of students chose to fish the fly only lake and before the end of the day all had managed to catch fish, with numerous big fish hooked and lost. While young James Kelly caught and landed 2 lovely rainbows the number of fish he missed, hooked and lost was incredible, a potential winner in the future on this lake. Seamus Graham, a regular on the fly only lake since his first year in St Brigid’s, caught 3 lovely rainbows for nearly 6lbs. The winner this time however was Shane Cartmill, an excellent caster of a fly rod, with 3 fish for over 6lbs. Congratulations Shane, well done.
Most students fished the all method lake with nearly all students catching their limit using a variety of methods including worms, power bait and spinning. Good friends, Fintan Heaney, Francis McCool and Martin Sheridan all managed to bag their limits. Brothers Mark and Matthew Devlin had 6 lovely rainbows between them for nearly 9lbs. Daniel Donnelly and new member, Shane Devlin, had 5 fish between them weighing nearly 8lbs. Tony Cavanagh, Marc Ward Elliot, Eoghan Black, David Devlin and Nathan McCann all displayed great angling skills catching numerous trout. However it was Darren Duffy, joint winner on this lake last May, who emerged victorious with 3 great fish for 5lbs. Congratulations Darren, well done.
Both winners received lovely trophies and free tickets to return to the fishery donated by Morris, joint proprietor of Rectory Lodge. All the students had an excellent and enjoyable days fishing and would like to thank Raymond for all his help throughout the day and also Noel and Morris for letting the students avail of their excellent facilities and for sponsoring the winner’s trophies and prizes. The next competition will be held at the same venue in May 2012.
