McHugh's Miscellany: The first bradán caught on the Drowes River has become a yearly institution

I was pondering on the meaning of life and the price of turnips when I was reminded that this time of January is always associated with the first salmon of the year, certainly in my lifetime of journalism in this county.

Traditionally January 1 signalled the first day of the salmon run on the famous Drowes River which straddles the border between Donegal and Leitrim and which also happens to be the provincial boundary between Ulster and Connacht.

There is also a certain irony as the river enters the sea at Bundrowes near Tullaghan on the Leitrim side of Magheracar in Bundoran, a coastline of 4 km or 2.4miles, the shortest in Ireland, while here in Donegal we have the longest coastline of any county in Ireland stretching to some 1,000kms.

Doubt was cast in 1978 that the first salmon was caught on Lough Gill in Sligo but a 'Democrat' investigation “discovered beyond doubt” that the Drowes salmon was indeed the 'first'.

When growing up the Drowes competed with the likes of the Liffey in Dublin for ‘bradán one’.

If perchance the first salmon was caught in Dublin on January 1, it made the front page of the national papers; if caught in Donegal outside the Pale, that photo was usually curtailed to the following edition of the Donegal Democrat.

Of course, in the days before internet and digital photography, sending the photo with the prized salmon and angler was not just simply the click of a button via email, from a downloaded photographic assortment of alternatives.

The late and great Anthony O’Malley Daly was an employee of the ‘Demo’ in my early days there and self proclaimed angling correspondent.

Bagging the rights in 1956

You didn’t dare write about the great salmon’s ancestry, as Anthony would know within the inch where the salmon was caught on the Drowes, what was used to catch it, the height and temperature of the water, what it had for its breakfast and who the salmon’s parents were.

His tales of some of the catches could often surpass legendary status, leaving even Fionn MacCumhaill and the bradán feasa in a lower division of the fishing league.

The salmon river’s fame has been around for centuries.

A contemporary account of the area back in 1837 described it as such:

“Lough Melvin is a beautiful sheet of water, studded with picturesque islands and celebrated for the gillaroo trout, which is found in abundance.

“The River Drowse which flows from the lake into the sea and separates this county (Leitrim) from that of Donegal abounds with salmon of choice quality, which is in season during the whole of the year.”

As recently as 2021, a specimen (20 lbs) salmon of 25lbs was caught by Ballyshannon angler Seamus O’Neill who admitted that despite being on Drowes’ doorstep, he had never fished it, according to his friend, Ed Hanna.

My own abiding and lasting memory of that beautiful stretch of water was a telephone call from the late Thomas Gallagher, who was the then proprietor of the Drowes fishery and whose son Shane, is now salmon-in-chief.

It was 30-years-ago, almost to the day, but I learned that the Finnish Prime Minister Aho and half his front bench were in Ireland to meet their Irish compatriots as the Finns were contemplating joining the EU.

And they had sneaked up to the north west to try their luck on the Drowes.

The keen rivalry that was a yearly event between the River Liffey and the River Drowes

On hand that day was Peter O’Reilly, the famed salmon fisherman from Cavan who was described as the most knowledgeable fly fisherman in Ireland of his generation, who has since sadly passed away at the end of 2018.

Despite Peter’s great efforts, high waters that no more than this week, made it impossible to catch anything, saw all empty handed.

The first salmon of the 2019 season from Briney's Pool was caught by angler Jackie Mc Erlean earning him a one kilo bar of fine silver, the Drowes Perpetual Cup and the newly commissioned Thomas Gallagher Conservation Cup for the first caught & released fish from the fishery of that season.

Anyway, the other reason I recall the visit so vividly, is that in the small forested area behind us, literally a few metres away, stood members of the Special branch with Uzi machine guns at the ready with the rain bucketing down.

It was a surreal experience, there were no fancy caps or jackets in those days.

Security was heightened because it was still during the Troubles and we were not too far from the border.

And slightly to the right of them was another person in a trench coat holding an array of little boxes of ‘gourmet’ sandwiches, in case the Finns (not MacCumhaill) got hungry.

The Donegal Democrat article itself from January 13, 1994

My recollection was that he was a government official from the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Flooded Drowes hampers any prospect of first salmon for now

Through another quirk of fate the Democrat photographer had forgotten to load film in his camera, so a single photo appeared in the following edition of the paper, which lo and behold, happened to have been taken by myself.

Finland later joined the EU on January 1, 1995.

Esko Aho did not get a snap of a salmon, but I managed to get a snap of the Prime Minister casting out onto the Drowes that memorable day.