MAYO RIVERS

Samuel Lewis

A Topographical Dictionary of Ireland

1837

No rivers of any importance rise in the county or pass through it. The Moy, which separates it from Sligo, after receiving the waters of Loughs Cullen and Conn, flows in a broad stream by Ballina into the bay of Killala. The bar has deep water after great floods, but is dangerous from its liability to shift. A few years since it was passed by vessels drawing 14 feet water; it is now often fordable in dry summers: sloops, however, ascend within a mile of Ballina. It has been proposed to form a lock at Belleek castle, by which vessels of heavy burden might come up to the town, if a passage were cut through the limestone ledges that obstruct the navigation, and measures are in progress to effect this object.

The Blackwater, which for a short distance forms the boundary between Mayo and Galway, has an underground course for three miles near Shrule; after its re-appearance it falls into Lough Corrib. The Aile, which is navigable for boats of six feet draught for a distance of five miles from Lough Mask, also disappears for some time, after having sunk under a stratum of limestone. The Castlebar river is navigable from Lough Conn for the distance of four miles: the Lung, which flows into Lough Carra, admits boats from the lake, which ascend the river about three miles. The other rivers are little more than mountain streams: the principal are the Owenmore, falling into Blacksod bay, and remarkable for the great quantity of water it sometimes carries from the mountains; the Deel, the Robe, the Erriv, and the Carnamart.

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