Paradise is being lost to commercial fishing

For years, my friends and I have line-fished on Beara Peninsula, practising ‘catch and release’, but stocks are being ruinously depleted by gillnetting from boats, says Ashley Hayden.

First cast a line on the Beara peninsula in May 2005, close to the Dursey cable car. The line was a 32g silver Kilty catcher. After a count of forty seconds — yes, Dursey sound is that deep — I hit mackerel. I have returned often, more than once a year, and on one such trip I met Roger Ball, on the rocks at Garnish.