Over 10,500 fish killed in 12 incidents across Ireland this year, new figures show
"It's atrocious and shocking that these things are still going on"
Over 10,500 fish have been killed in 12 separate incidents in Irish waterways this year, we can reveal.
The data, provided by Iascach Intíre Éireann following an information request, shows almost half of them perished in Cork’s Allow River but the cause hasn’t been identified yet.
The notable spawning habitat is in a Special Area of Conservation. Dead fish spotted up to 4km downstream of the source included vulnerable Atlantic salmon whose numbers have fallen 60% in the last four decades as well as brown trout, lamprey, eel, stone loach, roach and dace.
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Ecologist and author, Padraic Fogarty, says: "It's atrocious and shocking that these things are still going on. Fish kills are acute poisoning of the water, effectively, or the fish get suffocated because the bacteria comes out of the water and the fish can't breathe.
"This is on top of the chronic degradation of water bodies. It just adds to the burden of everything that our rivers and our fish life are suffering."
Some 3,000 Atlantic salmon, trout, lamprey and other species perished in the second biggest fish kill this year in Wicklow’s Newtownmountkennedy Stream, while another in the same county saw 42 more die in Aughrim River.
Fish kill incidents were also recorded in Cavan’s Lough Ramor (20) and Castle Lake (20), Dublin’s Tolka (430) and Liffey Valley Park pond (60), Tipperary’s Kings River (500) in Lough Ennell in Westmeath (100), Sligo’s Ballisodare River (1,079) and Donegal’s Skeoge (289) and Crana Rivers (6).
Inland fisheries don’t know what caused the deaths in seven of the incidents, while the fish kill in the Skeoge was put down to agriculture with disease or natural causes registered for the rest.
A spokesperson said: "Species of fish discovered dead in fish kills in 2024 included Atlantic salmon, brown trout, sea trout, eel and lamprey."
Mr Fogarty added: "Inland Fisheries Ireland do take a decent number of prosecutions. We need these agencies to be much better equipped to follow up on incidents of pollution and wildlife crime.
"Even when you get the likes of Inland Fisheries Ireland doing an investigation and they follow through and bring it to court to conviction... sometimes what happens is the penalty is measly - it's a couple of hundred euros or something like that."
Padraic believes the review of the Wildlife Act which is currently underway could be used to "review the penalties for pollution and wildlife crime and just bring them into line with other European countries where they are much stiffer".
He added: "At the moment... they are not afraid of being prosecuted for pollution because it is not that big of an expense at the end of the day."
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