So, the salmon and trout season is over for another year and while there was plenty of negatives with fish kills and pollution incidents, there was also still a lot of great fishing to be had.

And for this week’s episode we’re focusing on the brown trout season with Eamonn Ross from Lough Sheelin and Mike Keady from Lough Corrib.

Plus Tom also has updates on a recent worrying development of green algae on Lough Corrib.

Keep up to date with all the latest Ireland on the Fly on https://www.IrelandontheFly.com and get regular updates on https://Instagram.com/IrelandontheFly

No matter the fishing and conditions, the 2025 season will go down in memory as the year of the worst ever fish kill in the history of the State, which is certainly saying something based on this country’s approach to pollution, water quality and environmental protection.

We’ve discussed fish kills on this show before, highlighting the fact that when guilty verdicts and fines are handed down, the consequences are risible anyway.

But for this week’s episode we wanted to focus on the questionable practice in the Blackwater investigation and why the current legislation is not fit for purpose.

Conor Arnold of the Upper Bridgetown Salmon Fishery on the Blackwater has been to the forefront during this crisis, spending untold hours highlighting the issue and trying to get to the bottom of it as best as he can.

Conor also spoke as an invited witness at last week’s Oireachtas Committee hearing into the Blackwater fish kill and a day later he spoke to us about the hearing to tell us what arose from it.

Keep up to date with all the latest Ireland on the Fly on https://www.IrelandontheFly.com and get regular updates on https://Instagram.com/IrelandontheFly

As we head into the final days for most of you for the game fishing season, this week we find out about the Boyne fishery, and the superb brown trout fishing to be had on the Trim Athboy Angling Club waters.

Tommy Keogan is a stalwart of the club and he talks to us about how the club manages its eight miles of waters, as well his love of fishing the loughs and why this year was a particularly good one for him.

For more, visit:

https://www.trimathboyanglers.net/

Keep up to date with all the latest Ireland on the Fly on https://www.IrelandontheFly.com and get regular updates on https://Instagram.com/IrelandontheFly.

Kevin McLoughlin is a lifelong angler from Cork who joins us on this week’s Ireland on the Fly to talk about the good old days for salmon when the spring run was something to behold.

Kevin talks about moving to Cobh, working in the fishing industry and even spending a year on the newly formed fisheries board in 1979.  

He has seen it all in Irish fishing since the 1960s and has plenty to tell.

Keep up to date with all the latest Ireland on the Fly on https://www.IrelandontheFly.com and get regular updates on https://Instagram.com/IrelandontheFly.

Throwing Feathers in the Wind is a new book out by Richard Gorodecky, a fly angler who moved full time to Ireland five years ago to be closer to the river fishing that he loves so much.

Richard was a long-time visitor to these shores fishing all over the country before settling in south Munster but his obsession with fly fishing has also seen him fish all over the world.

Throwing Feathers in the Wind is his first collection of essays detailing his fishing in Ireland and further afield, and is, like so many good fishing books, more about the why than anything else.

To find out more and to buy a copy of Richard's book, go to:
Gorodecky.com

Plus, Tom and Daire also discuss the dire fish kill on the Blackwater and ask when will it be the tipping point to stop further fish kills?

Keep up to date with all the latest Ireland on the Fly on https://www.IrelandontheFly.com and get regular updates on https://Instagram.com/IrelandontheFly.

We’re at the tail end of the grilse run now and with the summer conditions we’ve had, coming off the back of a poor spring run, we’ve been desperately looking for some good news on the salmon front.

And we found it – or sort of – because this week Johnny Casey and Yamil Turcuman two passionate salmon anglers who we’ve spoken to before – join us to let us know how their season has been – ranging from the bad to the sublime....

Keep up to date with all the latest Ireland on the Fly on https://www.IrelandontheFly.com and get regular updates on https://Instagram.com/IrelandontheFly.

We know salmon numbers are down and we know there’s an existential threat endangering their very future, but this week on the Last Salmon, Jim Murray speaks to the chair of the Outer Hebrides Fisheries Trust, Richard Davies, who believes that their engagement with fish farms on the Isle of Lewis has resulted in helping the survival of wild salmon there.

As listeners to The Last Salmon podcast know, salmon farms are polluting the environment and causing irreparable damage to wild salmon stocks and that currently they have very little interest in doing anything to help.

However, Richard is one of the most passionate salmon conservationists we know and he will do anything to help save the wild salmon in the Outer Hebrides and beyond, so we had to speak to him and to hear his side of the argument.

To see Richard's incredible salmon footage visit:
https://www.instagram.com/racdavies_photos/

The Last Salmon Season 2 is supported by The Missing Salmon Alliance.

Image courtesy of: Richard Davies

The Last Salmon, presented by actor and salmon activist, Jim Murray MBE, offers hope and solutions to the tragic story that is unfolding for an iconic species in crisis - the wild salmon.  

For regular updates, follow the show at Instagram.com/TheLastSalmon.

You may have seen the recent campaign and news stories about the disappearance of sprat from our coastal waters and the government’s unwillingness to do enough to protect our marine habitats – but what has it got to do with you if you're an angler and only interested in freshwater?

Well in the current environmental climate, pretty much everything, and whether it’s marine or freshwater conservation it’s something every angler needs to be informing themselves of and trying to do their bit to help with.

So this week we’re joined by campaigning ecologist, Padraic Fogarty, to tell us more about the SaveOurSprat campaign, how the government isn’t doing enough and why everything from sprats right up the marine food chain are in danger.

Plus, Tom is back from his week's fishing in Orkney and tells us how the heatwave hit the loughs and the brown trout even that far north.

Keep up to date with all the latest Ireland on the Fly on https://www.IrelandontheFly.com and get regular updates on https://Instagram.com/IrelandontheFly.

Images: https://westcorksprat.net/

Is a river alive?  What a question….it throws up so many if, buts, maybes, but most importantly, why not?

They are our lifeblood, our circulation, our healing waters.  

But they also need saving now in these troubled times of extraction, industrialisation and pollution.

To kick off Season 2, we’re taking the big picture view when it comes to rivers, and we’re asking shouldn’t the rights of nature be respected in our laws and constitutions?  If a limited company can have legal rights why then can’t our rivers?  

Without our rivers, without due care, without oversight…..well, we all know what can and is happening in terms of water quality and how that is affecting us all, not least of all the wild salmon.

So to help with some of these existential questions, celebrated nature writer, Rob Macfarlane joins Jim Murray to discuss how he set out on journeys around the globe, from Ecuador to India and Canada, and finally to his own home waters in Cambridge, to ask is a river alive?

The Last Salmon Season 2 is supported by The Missing Salmon Alliance.

Image: Richard Davies via https://www.instagram.com/racdavies_photos/

The Last Salmon, presented by actor and salmon activist, Jim Murray MBE, offers hope and solutions to the tragic story that is unfolding for an iconic species in crisis - the wild salmon.  

For regular updates, follow the show at Instagram.com/TheLastSalmon.

Wild salmon are in a perilous state.  But we can’t and won’t give up.

The Last Salmon with Jim Murray is back for another season, launching July 25th, addressing the problems and hearing from all sides of the argument, to find the solutions to help save our wild salmon.

It’s not too late, the salmon haven’t give up, and nor can we.

The Last Salmon, presented by renowned actor and salmon activist, Jim Murray MBE, offers hope and solutions to the tragic story that is unfolding for an iconic species in crisis - the wild Atlantic salmon.  

Listen and follow on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts, and for regular updates, follow the show at Instagram.com/TheLastSalmon.

Season 2 of The Last Salmon launches in July 2025 with more insights from salmon anglers, fishery scientists and conservationists.