Outback Paddlers

[Alison_Bailey]

This is a heads up to anyone who goes paddling outback, we cannot paddle past the black bridge. For those who don't know that is the first bridge that you come to when you paddle up stream away from the boat house.

Why I hear you ask! Well its simple, we're not the only creatures who use the river and in the section of river above the black bridge and around Thomond is the home to some fishes. So basically its a protected area that we can't disturb.

If people could heed this and not paddle past the black bridge it would be much appreciated.

[EoinK]

The section of river above the black bridge and around Thomond is the home to some fishes. So basically its a protected area that we can't disturb.

The fishermen would have you believe that there's fish there. Which we apparantly need to preserve by not paddling near them, just so that the fishermen can pull out any fish that are left. Bullshit. The area isn't protected at all, or else they wouldn't be allowed to fish there. Neither is there any fish; in four years of paddling out there I never saw anyone catching a fish, any only saw one fish jump. The fish have long been taken by the foreign nationals who eat anything that moves. They're clinging on to some agreement which was apparantly made when UL was first built, which was that UL clubs would stay off the section of river there at their huts. I've never seen any evidence of this agreement existing, or heard of it from anyone but irate fishermen.

Basically a bunch of auld lads are still pissed off about UL being built around their precious fishing huts and are being tribal about their little patch of river. How has this come up again? Has someone been complaining to the club again.

...rant over. Life is easier for everyone involved if we do just stay below the black bridge. During daylight hours anyway, there's no fishermen there to give a shit as soon as it's dark in the evenings.

[StephenODea]

There's definitely fish there, just saying. Having worked all summer there, fish were jumping numerous times all round us most days.
Anyway 90% of those cranky old men only fish for salmon and the season only runs from February to September (its now closed). So i cant see why not, the fish dont get disturbed drastically by a kayak playing in a hole for 15 minutes every few days.
Fair game now a days!

[JackPhelan]

Its not fair game, we have been talking to Waterways Ireland, the inland Fisheries and ESB. While there may not be many fish left, the rapids above Thomond bridge are an EU protected breeding ground so can't be disturbed any time of the year. All the organisations above want us to be able to use the river but can't publicly say it due to it being protected by the EU.
So can everyone just please stay below the black bridge to avoid any more hassle, no reason why you can't just go downstream.

[Cathal]

There's no "Special Area Of Conservation" in effect on the area outback, relevant to kayaking or the prevention thereof, based on information here: http://www.npws.ie/protected-sites/sac The SAC in operation is generic from the mouth of the Shannon to Kilalloe, and includes the Feale and Mulcair catchments. There's absolutely nothing specific to the Black Bridge as a boundary mentioned in any of the SAC supporting documentation. The Lamprey spawning is either in clean gravel downstream of major weirs, or in still fine-silt depositing areas, neither of which are relevant for outback kayaking as our paths are not crossing those types areas in that place.

There is a Special Protected Area in effect on the lower Shannon as a whole, but seeing as this includes the commercial traffic to Limerick port and general water traffic through the city I don't think that kayaks are excluded from trafficing on the Shannon at any point. Outlined here:
Doesn't apply to the river out back when you see the outlined area! Plus it applies to waterfowl - not fish..

To be honest, I would happily kayak on any of the lower Shannon at this point in time. There's no basis that I have been able to find, for the anglers to claim a conservation area upstream of the Black Bridge.

If anyone can show me a document that refutes this then we should revise and review our actions, but until then, the actual paperwork that is relevant to the angler's dispute shows that there is no relevance to our usage of the waterway at this point.

As a matter of fact, any anglers in the water downstream of Annacotty Weir, have done much more damage than our paddling has ever done, if they are walking in the gravel!

Other references (I've read them, nothing relevant about kayakers around Castletroy in there)
http://www.npws.ie/sites/default/files/ ... Doc_V1.pdf
http://www.npws.ie/sites/default/files/ ... 004077.pdf
http://www.npws.ie/protected-sites/spa/004077

[GavinSheehan]

The Salmon fishing season is over on September 30th and there may not be any fish spawning there at the moment but just don't go up there. I personally can't see the appeal of going up to a tiny little rapid to scrape down rocks while all the while you're just doing more and more damage to any sort of good relationship that might have existed between the fishermen and ULKC/UL.

You might think it's alright to go up Stephen but you aren't the one that has to send countless emails and make loads of phone calls to try and defuse a situation when the fishermen threaten to blockade the boathouse or chase us with boats. They may be in the wrong but I for one would rather not make the situation any worse. It has to be sorted this winter before the next Salmon season. This process is going to start with a meeting with Inland Fisheries in the coming weeks.

The ESB are instructed by law and by the Shannon Fisheries Act 1935 to preserve and protect the integrity of the river and the species of fish etc that live in it but also not to hamper any navigation. Here's an article about it and the actual act itself:

http://irishwaterwayshistory.com/2015/0 ... leconnell/

http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/eli/1935 ... d/en/print

From my reading of it we are actually entitled to paddle where we want as long as the ESB have no issues with it, which for now they don't. They want us the paddle all of the sections and use the river. Inland Fisheries also are in favour of equal use of the river by all parties. But the ESB also have the responsibility to protect the fishery...which they aren't doing and haven't been ever since Ardnacrusha was built.

There is a general EU directive for protected species; Article 17( http://www.npws.ie/article-17-reports-0), which includes Lamprey Eels, many of which spawn on the Shannon and Mulkear and they for sure spawn between Thomand Bridge and The Living Bridge. I have seen them.

So I think there's 2 issues. One of them is the salmon fishery which the ESB control and do not want to and have never wanted to. As a result they are giving us more free reign and this has been majorly upsetting all of the Lower Shannon ( The Mulkear downwards, Plassey etc) fishermen and has made this mess even worse.

The other issue is that the fishermen are now using the Lamprey Eels conservation initiative as a safety net to tell us not to paddle above the bridge and disturb their Salmon fishing. But there is no actual area outlined where the eels are to be protected( As Cathal said it's just the whole area is specified as "protected"). It's just a general directive.

If this is ever to be completely resolved, every single party needs to sit down and outline what they want but that will never happen because the fishermen have no time for the ESB and if they had their way they would kick every other water user off the Shannon and use it exclusively for fishing. The ESB want to be relinquished of the management of the Shannon but that's not going to happen either. It would have to go all the way to government and a new Act would have to be written up and passed and nobody will ever see that through. So we will have to come to an agreement between ourselves and Limerick District Anglers and Plassey Anglers and The Inland Fisheries and try and get ourselves sorted and have more ground to stand on. If we can get it agreed with these organisations it will at least definitely settle tensions next year as all of our members and all of their members will know exactly where everyone stands. The guys who are fishing without a licence can be forgotten about as they have no right to be fishing on any beats.

As for now, I think we should stay below the Black Bridge and do absolutely nothing to raise tensions or degrade what little relationship there still exists between the kayakers who use the Lower Shannon and the fishermen. They paint us all with the same brush so if one of us or one club does something, they think we all do it. So lets not be the ones to do anything stupid. They have been fishing the area at Plassey for hundreds of years. Let them have it for now until we can come to an agreement. I would be of the opinion to let them have all they want at Kilmurry Rapids and that area. We have unrestricted use of Castleconnell and everything below the Black Bridge. It's more than enough for us.

Here's a few interesting articles about what the river used to be like before the power station was built:

http://oldrivershannon.com/2015/09/26/t ... r-shannon/

http://oldrivershannon.com/2014/10/27/shannon-salmon/

[doyler1596]

Jesus, if the captain says no it's in the best interest of the club...

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[Cathal]

It is true that there are more issues than just the current legislation and how it's interpreted, given there are people that (mistakenly or otherwise) think they have more rights than others to the usage of the area.

If it eases local tensions without having a legal agreement in place then we can easily choose (completely of our own volition and nothing to do with the anglers) to not regularly paddle from Kilmurry Beach to the Black Bridge. We should still maintain the ability to navigate from Castleconnell through the disputed area, given that there is absolutely minimum disturbance to the listed spawning habitat types for that use case.

Given that there is no issue with the Castleconnell section of the river, this is a lever that we could use to maintain complete navigability along the Shannon.

It is nice to know exactly where the legal side of it is, as any agreement will have to refer to that, as otherwise the agreement can be trivially challenged and becomes useful.

Still, I wouldn't be too inclined to roll over too easily on the matter as it will have precedent for future restrictions to paddle. If there is a binding agreement put in to restrict paddling e.g. between Kilmurry and the Black Bridge, then that can and likely will be used to prevent paddling elsewhere in the SAC as the conditions are no different elsewhere. This would affect paddling on the the Mulcair, the Newport river and the Clare Glens as well, as these are all in scope.

The projected works to repair the bridge stanchion foundations and reopen the Black Bridge are also within scope for any water usage issue in this area.