A flotilla of 100 trawlers with some 700 fishermen on board gathered at Castletownbere, Co Cork, yesterday to protest against fuel prices.
Trawlers from Crosshaven to Baltimore joined the protest in Castletownbere but left to resume fishing again after midday.
There was no disruption in the port or to any of the other ports in the south-west, such as Kinsale, Schull and Union Hall, where fishermen tied up for several hours as a mark of solidarity.
After a meeting at the BIM Training Centre in Castletownbere, the fishermen dispersed quickly and went back to sea again.
The plan, said Mr Jason Whooley, manager of the South and West Fishermen's Organisation, had never been to cause a blockade of the port or to create disruption.
The protest was aimed at sending a signal to the Government that something would have to be done about fuel prices.
Fishermen were by far the worst hit because of the price increase in fuel over the past 18 months, he added. "There's a lot of talk about quitting the industry. In the past 18 months the fuel bill for fishermen has gone up by 80 per cent, and it is putting ferocious pressure on people in the industry.
"When you take it that fuel represents 80 per cent of the cost of running a fishing vessel, you can see the kind of pressure the fishermen are under.
"The problem is being made even worse for the industry by the fact that there are plenty of high-paying jobs ashore such as in construction.
"Fishermen are price-takers - they take what the market gives them - and right now owners and crewmen are suffering a huge decrease in their take-home pay because of the increase in fuel prices.
"Profits on trawlers are distributed after the overheads are discharged, and when you have a serious increase in the overheads you have a corresponding decrease in net pay. It is as simple as that," Mr Whooley said.
Mr John Nolan, manager of the Castletownbere Fishermen's CoOperative, said that the fuel costs for the 54 trawlers in the Castletownbere fleet during the first six months of last year were £510,000, whereas the costs for the corresponding period this year were £1.2 million.
"Some crewmen have had to suffer pay losses of up to £2,000 a year because of the fuel situation.
"What's happening is that people are afraid for the future and are looking to see if they can sell their boats now, because the way things are going there won't be any buyers for them in a very short while."
Mr Whooley said he felt that many fishermen "won't be able to make it until the Budget".
The protest action, he added, was an attempt to highlight the plight of fishermen and to bring home to the Government the seriousness of the situation.
The next move would be to wait for feedback from his members after today's Cabinet meeting to see whether the Government had taken on board the legitimate concerns of the industry, he said.