The Key to Catching a Pike on The River Shannon

These tactics and advice I am giving you have worked for me for years. They have guaranteed me a catch within an hour nearly every time. I believe you have to know everything about it, what it likes and how it lives in order to use the correct tactics and where to fish. Pike are a distant relatives to sharks, many believe that pike were introduced to the Shannon by man a few hundred years ago. Recently it was discovered that pike in fact came in two waves into the Shannon. The first was believed to be over 3000 years ago and the next wave came in over 1000 years ago. The Pike is believed to have come from the shark. Theories are that a shark found its way into the river and over the thousands of years evolved to better suit its surroundings. Leading to the fish they are today.




Pike are quite a scary fish to handle due to their sharp teeth and strong bony body. They have very little meat on them, which allows them to be very quick in the water. Pike like hiding in murky, shaded areas, usually in the reeds or under trees. They grow quite big and therefore eat large prey. They are greedy and will sometimes go for fish nearly half their size. They always love a race for their food, they rarely go for an injured fish. That's why I find trawling off the back of my boat at a moderate speed very effective. I would advise against using any bait bigger than the size of your hand because it is too big for the Shannon, unless you want to catch big! The bait I find most effective is a rubber look alike perch that is 10cm long. Always use a trace when fishing for Pike.


Source of pic:http://www.guideline.no/Matt+Hayes%E2%80%99+Guide+to+Fly+Fishing+for+Pike+Part+2.9UFRrW2L.ips

Getting into Fishing

I first began realising my love for the sport a few years after my first catch. There is an indescribable feeling you get when you feel the pull on the line when the fish begins to bite and that's when this adrenalin kicks in. You get that final bite and you hook the fish. You feel it trying to pull away and the tension on the line starts to increase, the fight has begun. You take hold of your rod and get a good sense of the size fish you are dealing with. (On the Shannon the biggest fish you can catch is about a metre long pike, so it wouldn't be much of a fight, but thoroughly enjoyable no matter the size) You begin to reel in, although you expect and hope it is a fish, you still have it in the back of your mind that you may have caught some river weed. Its one of the best feelings when you reel it in and as it gets close you see the fish jump out of the water or see it wriggle. I always get wonderful sensations when I get a catch, but I also get them when I return the fish back into the water. I make sure every time that the fish is able to breath by moving him back and forth through the water, to get the oxygen flowing in through his gills. It was times like these that I look back so fondly on my childhood.
Source of video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myG1IqpmOmM

My Introduction to Fishing on the River Shannon

My interest in fishing first began at the young age of 4 when my Mam and Dad introduced me to the boating life on the Shannon. My Dad would bring me trawling off the back of our Mercury 50hp Rib. Being an amateur fisher all we brought with us was a pliers, a few spinners, a cheap rod and a bucket.
We could go out for an hour and not catch anything, as fishing goes. As you can understand to last an hour not catching anything at the age of 4 was kind of off putting. Those days were annoying, but the days that we caught fish were the best! We would usually catch Perch or Pike, but there was the odd bream and perch hybrid. We used mostly spinners at that age, predominantly due to their ease but they were also very effective on the fish in the River Shannon.