Anglers last night called for an independent inquiry to investigate what they claim is the lack of action by the Minister for the Marine, Dr Woods, and his Department, the ESB and Limerick County Council, in handling the Mulkear river fish kill last week.
Yesterday, a prominent Co Limerick Irish Farmers Association member claimed that agriculture was not the cause of the fish kill, but it was due to a natural phenomenon.
An emergency meeting of the Mulkear and District Anglers Association last night also urged that the Minister locate the culprit, who should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. The anglers association say it is enraged with Dr Woods over what it sees as a complete lack of action by his Department. It insists that the Minister make additional funding available to local authorities to help the clean-up operation.
A leading Co Limerick IFA representative, Mr David Thompson, said that farmers were angry at the "scurrilous attacks" made by the authorities and the media on the farming community, which in his view is innocent of anything to do with the fish kill.
As secretary of the Mulkear Co-Op, set up to promote the drainage of the catchment area, and chairman of the Co Limerick IFA Animal Health Committee, he said: "We have experienced a very aggressive approach together with verbal abuse and untrue accusation. Even the Minister for the Marine seems to have jumped to a conclusion," he said. "I have looked at all the drains entering the area and can state quite categorically that there is no farm effluent connection with this disaster, where over 2,500 acres lie barren as if sprayed with weedkiller.
"In my view, this is most likely to be due to a natural phenomenon, a combination of high temperature, fast vegetation growth covered by the recent big flood combining to release various gases, including ammonia and sulphurated hydrogen which killed the grass and produced the bad smell.
"The rotting vegetation deoxygenated the water, which was left to stagnate and worsen from the bank holiday Monday until last Wednesday evening, nearly 10 days later. The resultant dangerous liquid then started to be released through a sluice gate . . . into the Mulkear, which resulted in the fish kill."
He revealed that a few days before the incident, he had alerted Teagasc to the rotting grass in the fields and he urged the Office of Public Works to initiate phase three of the Mulkear Flood Relief Programme immediately. He also wants a scientific investigation into what produced the deadly liquid that caused the death of more than 20,000 salmon and trout in an eight-mile stretch of the river. The secretary of the Mulkear and District Anglers Association, Mr Andy McCallion, said yesterday that in view of the fact that this disaster is being attributed to farm effluent pouring into the river from a drainage trench, the anglers are also calling on the Minister to halt immediately all drainage works on the Mulkear and Newport rivers, which are presently in progress, pending the outcome of a full investigation.
Meanwhile, Shannon Regional Fisheries Board, which blamed agricultural practices for the fish kill, is awaiting laboratory results this week as to exactly what happened and it hopes to carry out a survey of the area.