Lough Logic: free conditions for 24 Irish waters, and what it can't tell you

We have built a second thing. It is free, there is no account to set up, and we are not going to charge for it later.

It is called Lough Logic. You pick a water, and it tells you what the conditions are doing and what that suggests about how to fish it. What patterns, what depth, what sort of retrieve. It covers twenty-four Irish loughs and rivers so far.

Before anything else, the limits, because they are the honest part and we would rather you heard them from us.

What it can't tell you

It cannot tell you where the fish are. Nothing can. It reads conditions and applies what generally works in those conditions on that kind of water. That is a starting point, not a location.

It is only as good as the reports it draws on. Weather data is reliable. Water conditions and fisheries reports vary in how current they are, and on a quiet week for a smaller water they can be several days behind.

Coverage is the better-known waters. If you fish a small lough that appears in no report anywhere, we have nothing to give you that you do not already know better than we do.

Local knowledge beats it every time. A man who has fished the same bay for thirty years will out-fish anything a website tells you. If that describes you, this is not for you, and no offence taken.

What it is genuinely good for is the water you do not know well. You are visiting, or the club has an away day, or you have finally got round to trying somewhere an hour up the road. That is the gap it fills.

What is actually in it

Conditions and what they mean. Wind direction and strength, air and water temperature, cloud, pressure, recent rain. Not the raw numbers on their own, but what they usually imply for how to fish.

Tactics. Pattern types, depth, retrieve speed, where on the water to start. Suggestions, phrased as suggestions.

A weekly window. Which days ahead look most promising, so you can pick your day if you have the choice.

A library. Plain-English explanations of the terminology, how to read a rise, what the common patterns are for. Written for someone who is three seasons in and has been nodding along in the club hut without ever asking what a particular term means.

Kit check. A short list before you leave the house, by water and season. It exists because one of us drove ninety minutes to a lough without a landing net.

Safety notes. For the boat waters. Big Irish loughs are dangerous in a way that catches out people who only fish rivers, and a site that suggests where to fish has an obligation to mention it.

A log. Note what you caught, add a photo. Yours, not published anywhere.

Why we are giving it away

Two reasons and both are true.

The first is that we built it for ourselves. The weather app tells you it is going to be windy. It does not tell you what a south-westerly on a big limestone lough in September usually means for what to put on. That gap annoyed us and we filled it.

The second is that we make membership software for angling clubs, called Tadpole, and we would like clubs to know we exist. Building something free and useful is a better way of doing that than buying advertising. You can use Lough Logic forever and never look at Tadpole, and that is a fine outcome for us.

If you are on a club committee

You are welcome to put it in your newsletter, on the noticeboard, or in the club WhatsApp group. It costs your members nothing and asks them for nothing. If you would like a paragraph you can paste straight in, get in touch and we will send you one.

Tell us where it is wrong

The suggestions are a first attempt and some of them will be wrong for your water. If you fish one of the twenty-four regularly and the advice does not match what actually works there, tell us. That is the fastest way this gets better, and you know things we do not.

Try Lough Logic → — free, no account needed.