THE amazing thing about the latest Bury St Edmunds Angling Association's weekly veterans' match at Water Lane Reservoir was that Jack Wetherill did not feature in the leading positions.

Chris Boughton

Angling in West Suffolk

By Chris Boughton

THE amazing thing about the latest Bury St Edmunds Angling Association's weekly veterans' match at Water Lane Reservoir was that Jack Wetherill did not feature in the leading positions.

After five first places and two second places in his last seven veterans' matches, Jack's luck ran out last week and Andy Hardy stepped in to take first place with an all carp catch of 20lb 13oz. Andy caught his fish on feeder from peg 11 and his catch included an impressive crucian of just over 3lbs. Johnny Barnet continued his recent return to form with 14lb 6oz of pole caught fish taken from from peg 6, for second place, with match organiser Ron Hubbard coming third with 10lb 4oz using the same method from peg 3. Ron could have won the match but he uncharacteristically lost several good fish. Rumour has it that Mike Stavely also lost a carp of around 5lbs but in Mike's case he did not fail to land the fish he just failed to put it in his keep net and with Jack watching from the next peg it wasn't going to remain a secret for long. Water Lane continues to fish well for pleasure anglers with carp showing up all around the lake.

Middle Reservoir is now firmly established as a challenging specimen water that requires patience and application, but rewards good angling skills. It is a classic long session specimen venue with a band of devotees and not for the faint-hearted or the pleasure angler who wants a net full of silver fish caught at close range, but then Barrow Lake fits that bill very nicely. The reservoir's prize catch is a 30lb-plus mirror carp named Doris by the regular anglers who fish there. Association junior angler Jack Lloyd landed Doris recently using a sauce-flavoured boilie and a hooked PVA bag (see adjoining photo), a memorable catch - well done Jack.

Rougham Lake kindly plays host to the annual Eric Bolton Memorial charity fishing match on July 18 in aid of The Parkinsons Disease Society. For more details or to book a place call Helen on 07933 682955

Going back about 20 years ago Eric was a very effective junior officer for the Bury St Edmunds Angling Association and it has been very pleasing of late to see a resurgence of interest in angling by juniors with some notable catches including Jack Lloyd's catch of Doris. The Association is therefore looking to reintroduce junior teach-ins and to enable them to gauge if there is sufficient interest it would help if the parent or guardian of the junior could email buryaa@live.co.uk or leave their contact details at Tackle Up. No commitment required just an expression of interest at this stage. Further information will also be available on their web site.

If you would like your local angling stories or match results included in this article then please email them to westsuffolkangling@live.co.uk