Whitewood Lake Monster

 

Whitewood Lake, near the village of Nobber in Ireland, is popular for fishing .It  has depths in excess of 10m (30 feet) on the eastern shoreline.

In 1972 a strange creature was sighted by Dennis Barnes of Doncaster while fishing .'It was raining,' he said at the time, 'but in the area which joins the part of the lake from the River Dee, I saw something turn in the water'.He then witnessed what  appeared to be a Conger eel rise from the water.'It resembled a smaller version of what has been photographed on a number of occasions in Loch Ness,' Mr Barnes claimed. 'The part protruding from the water seemed to be about nine inches high and two foot long and was dark brown and green. It resembled an eel and although it was near to my bait it didn't bite.About 10 seconds later something frightened my son Peter out of the water where he was standing. If it was the same creature it traversed about 100 yards of water in 10 seconds.If it was an eel, he said it must have weighed up to 60lbs

About 12 years earlier, three local fisherman, Paddy O'Brien of Robertstown, Patrick Finnegan,  and David McDowell of Boynagh were reported to have seen something similar in the lake.

In 1981 there was a new sighting by local man Denis Naulty He was fishing on the lake and saw a large black creature with a head like a swan or a goose.

"On Wednesday night I saw it from 9 pm to 9.05 pm,I got a fair view of it from about 70 yards range. It seemed to be about seven feet long, has a neck of about three feet in length, has a head like a goose and seems to be black or grey in colour. It is about three feet in diameter. Bit like a big black sow"

Years earlier another local man Bert Onions saw a long object in the same lake, but he did not report it at the time due to fear of ridicule. Denis wrote to the Department of Fisheries asking for them to send a team of divers to prove the Whitewood Lake monster exists. This didn’t happen but as the water is black with poor visibility they may not have been able to search the lake.

 In 1982 some visitors from England reported seeing something in the lake but refused to be identified.They said it was about seven feet long ,head like goose and  bluish in colour.

Since then there appears to have been no other sightings. Explanations vary from a large otter or a huge eel. It is possible that some creature came up the River Dee and got into the lake but it remains a mystery.