What is recorded here

Eel Weir, Watch Ho stands on the Camoge River beside Monasteranenagh Abbey, where Cistercian monks trapped eels and pike until suppression in 1540. A rope tied to a net rang a bell inside the watch house whenever a salmon struck, turning the river into a musical trap. The abbey owned sixteen townlands, a mill and these weirs, so the water gave food, flour and income to the monastery. Even after the monks left, the stones remained in the current, marking a place where human ingenuity and river life still meet.

In gently undulating low-lying pasture, 100m upriver from Monaster Bridge (LI031-009001-), on the Camoge River, which also forms a townland boundary between Monaster North and South. Cistercian monastery of Monasteranenagh (LI031-050004-) lies 145m to SSE. Annotated ‘Eel Weir’ on the 1840 ed. OSi 6-inch map 110m E of Monaster Bridge. On this map the eel weir is depicted running off an island in the middle of the river which contains the remains of a 'Watch Ho.' associated with the eel weir. A second eel weir (LI031-050002-) lies 50m downriver to W. According to Power (1930, 46), ‘At the suppression, in 1540, the abbey [Monasteranenagh] was found possessed of a great estate – sixteen townlands, a mill and watercourse with eel and pike weirs in the Camoge’. Westropp (1889, 238), refers to a type of medieval fish trap in the vicinity of Monasteranenagh Abbey (LI031-050003-): ‘There are some remains of a detached building near the Cammogue, perhaps a mill, though the country people say that a rope from a net in the river rang a bell in it when a salmon was captured’. Remains of stone built fish weir visible in the Camoge River to the E of the bridge opposite Monasteranenagh Abbey. According to local information the river was last dredged at this point during drainage works in 1978. See attached Google Earth orthoimages Compiled by: Fiona Rooney Date of upload: 22 March 2021

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