Luton Angling Club - Weekly News Reports: September 2025

Apologies for the lack of weekly round up last weekend, this was due to an internet fault and I was unable to create and upload the report, I am now back online and this round up covers the period from the 1st to the 14th of September.

Wyboston River Ouse

Thanks to Jason Mash for this stunning photo taken at dawn on the River Ouse at Wyboston. A quiet reminder of the beauty our waters offer—before the rods are even cast.

The Ouse at Dawn - Captured by Jason Mash

Lavendon Mill - Downstream

Neville Hunt had a good session at Lavendon downstream, he caught Roach and a few small Chub on corn and maggots.

Neville Hunt - Lavendon Downstream

North House Lake

Geoff Hattle fished on North House for a quick 24hr session, the last time he fished there was back in the early 80s and he said it’s changed a bit since, he really enjoyed it and can’t wait to get back. During the session he ended up with a few fish, the biggest being a 26

Geoff Hattle - North House Lake

Martin Houghton fished the lake for the first time. He nabbed these 2 Commons that were lurking in the margins in the first few hours of the session.

Martin Houghton - North House Lake

Martin Houghton - North House Lake

Martin Scholes had 3 fish, he also had 1 half run and lost another in the lily's, but he was happy it wasn’t a blank.

Martin Scholes - North House Lake

Rod Gladston spent a night on North House with his grandson Harry, catching a 10lb stockie and a 20.5lb Common early on Sunday morning.

Rod Gladston - 10lb Stockie - North House Lake

Rod Gladston 20.5lb Common - North House Lake

Beckerings Reservoir
Martin Scholes also fished Beckerings and had a total of 18 carp during a 48hr session, he lost count of the Bream, 5 of the carp were over 20lb all were caught on mainline cell and iso fish.

Martin Scholes - Beckerings

Jacob Rowley shared his captures from Beckerings last weekend. Fishing a day session, he had a 28lb mirror and a 25lb common.

He also had 5 bream between roughly 8 & 12lb.

All fish were caught on DNA Bug crushed boilies with mainline pellet and a tin of sweetcorn. The mixture was soaked with DNA betastim and crayfish hydrospod. Fishing a 12mm dna bug half tone popup with pva socks over two spodded areas.

Jacob Rowley - Beckerings

A group of North House lake regulars decided to give Beckerings a go for a 24 hour session on Saturday night (6th Sept) and they were not disappointed. Adrian McColl had 7 carp up to 26lb 8oz,13 bream and an absolute stunning tench at 5lb. One of Adrian's carp looked very much like a koi. He was definitely on fire that night.

Adrian McColl - Beckerings

Adrian McColl - Beckerings

Paul Sweet had 5 carp up to 25lb and a lovely mirror at 18lb, plus a few bream.

Paul Sweet - Beckerings

Brian Turner had a lovely dark common at 25lb and a small stocky mirror at 9lb. He also had a bream and then unfortunately a hook pull after a 30 minute battle with one of the catfish, everyone caught and had a fantastic time and will definitely be back......

Brian Turner - Beckerings

Nathan Porter had a few bream and waited till nearly the end of the session to catch a stunning common at 20lb.

Nathan Porter - Beckerings

Mat Hijack

It was a peaceful afternoon… until a gang of web-footed freeloaders staged a full-scale takeover of a member’s landing net and unhooking mat. Thanks to Jason Lapworth for capturing the moment. We’re still unsure if he deserves a photography award or an apology from the ducks.

Mat Hijack at Beckerings

South Lagoon - Wyboston

Paul Parkinson had a 24 hour session on the South Lagoon and managed to get 3 Commons all were caught on wafters.

Paul Parkinson - South Lagoon

Let's Fish

With the start of the new school term, we concluded the summer holiday series of CRT ‘Lets Fish’ events that had been running on the Canal on Tuesdays and Thursdays throughout the school holidays. These events were based around Berkhamsted and Leighton Buzzard and were extremely successful. All our events were well attended, and we managed to recruit several keen new members into our junior ranks.

This last event concluded our current published program of Lets Fish events for the year, but it is likely if the weather stays mild we may try and do some more around half term, so watch this space.

This Saturday 6th September we held a Club coaching session in the afternoon at Slapton to welcome some of our new recruits, and give some final practice to some of our young Luton A/C team members that will take part in the National Celebration of Young People and Fishing 2025. This is an event organised by the Canal & River Trust. This is currently the largest event for young people in angling with 500 places booked over the two days.

Our Coaches will be at the event,helping with the organisation as well as aiding and supporting our teams over the weekend. We are sure our competitors will again do very well and come home with some good prizes.

The picture of one of our new Junior members, Elliot, was taken at Slapton on Saturday where he caught his largest roach to date, a nice scale perfect Canal roach on pinkie despite the far from ideal conditions of gusty wind and heavy boat traffic.

Hopefully Elliot and his brother will be well and truly hooked and will be part of next years Celebration Event.

Elliot at Slapton

Wednesday Group Match Reports

Wednesday 10th September Stanborough Lake, Welwyn Garden City

This Wednesday was the 3rd in a row with less than ideal weather forecast, but it was dry when 15 of us met in the car park at Stanborough Lake to book on and do our peg draw. We opted for a walk off this week which was easier as there were some anglers already bivvied up which we had to peg around.

The weather turned just after we made it to our pegs and we had a light shower, which quickly blew through. The sky turned very dark and menacing a couple of times during the morning, and we had another light shower at lunchtime, followed by yet another heavier shower as we were packing up and doing the weigh in, but although we all got wet again it wasn’t nearly as bad as the previous weeks, and the forecast thunderstorms stayed away.

The lake had nice colour, but there was a gusty wind blowing diagonally across, which at times made accurate casting difficult.

Simon Foulkes decided to set out to snare the lakes bigger bream, spending a while preparing an area at around 35m with micro pellets, dead reds, and crushed corn, but it proved tough going on a day where the big bream seemed reluctant to feed. Simon had just the one big bream of around 6lb. However, as plan B he had been feeding 10 to 15 red maggots every 10 mins from the whistle on the waggler line, and after four and a half hours he had a look and found the roach were there, so switched onto that line catching well on double red maggot to weigh in 14lb 9oz and take first place.

Second place man Paul Carr intended to fish the feeder, but unfortunately whilst setting up his feeder rod one section of it cracked, so that enforced a change. He decided to fish his pole, so he set up by plumbing up on two lines—one top kit +3 under a tree just to his right and one down the reeds on the left margin. He cupped in 3 balls of groundbait laced with pinkies and caster on both lines and started fishing under the tree with single pinkie as hook bait feeding small balls of groundbait every 3rd fish via pole cup. He also fed caster and pinkie via catapult over the top. Paul caught steadily averaging about 12 fish an hour for first two hours, and this picked up a bit in the 3rd hour before dying, so he switched to his other line for an hour but found bites here slower. In the final hour he switched back to his original line with single caster on the hook, and this change got more bites from fish of a slightly larger size. Paul ended with 71 fish made up of roach and perch weighing 12lb 3oz to take second place.

Colin McBeth spent the first 3 hours on the feeder at 25m, using groundbait and worm chasing the big bream, but only had a few roach and perch on this line. Colin changed to using his pole at 6m and had some nice roach and perch on maggot, around 40 fish in an hour. He spent the last hour back on the feeder for bream to no avail, saying he should have stayed on the pole line. Colin ended taking third place with 11lb 5oz.

Thanks to Welwyn Garden A/C for allowing us to fish the venue, and all who helped with the admin and the weigh in this week.

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Results

1st Simon Foulkes 14lb 9oz

2nd Paul Carr 12lb 3oz

3rd Colin McBeth 11lb 5oz

4th Dennis Hunt 9lb 8oz

5th Andy Frankum 9lb 6oz

6th Jim Tookey 7lb 3oz

7th Graham Stringer 6lb 2oz

8th Terry Vickers 5lb 9oz

9th Dave Ridley 5lb 6oz

10th Mark Sessions 4lb 13oz

11th Richard Gibbs 2lb 14oz

12th Colin Holmes 2lb 9oz

13th Roger Baker 1lb 5oz

14th Tony Hickmott 0lb 14oz

Richard Darbon tipped back DNW

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Our next match is Wednesday 17th September and is at Slapton on the GUC. Draw at the venue at 8.30 as usual, fish 10am till 3pm. £5.00 optional pools plus £2.00 Luton pegging fee.

For anyone thinking of joining us for the first time you must message us, so we know you are coming before turning up. This will help us to manage the pegging of the venue. Please bring your club membership book with you as you will be asked to produce it for your first appearance.

Wednesday Match at Stanborough Lakes

Wednesday 3rd September 2025 - River Ouse, Biddenham
The weather forecast was far from ideal as 12 of us drove to Biddenham in the rain, but this stopped as we arrived in the car park and set off to do our draw by peg 6. Unlike last week, we all took our wet weather gear with us—just in case!

The weather improved through the morning, and we even had some sunshine, so we were optimistic we might avoid the forecast rain. Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be: a heavy drizzle started just after 2pm, with rumbles of thunder in the distance. The drizzle was soon followed by a torrential rainstorm, but the thunder and lightning stayed well away, so we thought it safe to continue fishing.(Video's of the rain in the comments)

The river was holding colour but still lacked much flow despite recent rain. It was one of those days where some found fish and others didn’t.

Graham Stringer took the honours this week. He started by feeding four balls of groundbait at 7 metres with chopped worm and hemp, which he left to settle for an hour. In the meantime, Graham fished down the edge and caught a few perch. After the hour passed, he switched to the baited line, fishing his whip at 7 metres with a 6BB shot stick float running over the groundbait. He topped it up once when bites dried up and finished first with 5lb 7oz.

Richard Gibbs was in the frame again, fishing his pole at 10 metres. He fed hemp and maggot and used a 2g flat float set 10ft deep. His first fish was a Daddy Ruffe, followed by roach, a few small dace, the inevitable bleak, and some gudgeon. Richard used single or double red maggot on the hook and said the fish came in fits and starts. As bites dried up, he had to chase the fish further out to stay in touch. He also had a few net perch close in on worm during slower periods, finishing second with 4lb 14oz.

Colin Holmes was third. He planned to use hemp and tare, having had a good day at Lavendon fishing the pole at the weekend. He slowly trotted down at 11.5 metres and held back, but Biddenham didn’t have as much flow and he didn’t get a single bite on tares. He switched to double maggot after introducing a few balls of groundbait and started catching roach and other bits regularly. Then it all went quiet. He swapped to rod and line at the same distance—still no bites—so he came in close, well over depth, and had a roach. He reduced his depth and started catching again. A switch to caster brought only bleak, so he returned to double maggot, finishing with 4lb 3oz.

Fourth place went to Andy Frankum, who started by feeding four orange-sized balls of groundbait laced with casters and hemp at 9 metres. Andy fished this line with caster on the hook, topping up the swim with groundbait every hour, and ended with 3lb 12oz.

A major surprise as we were packing up was a small motorboat that came down the river, turned around, and went back. The person on board was advised they were trespassing on private property, as there is no right of navigation on the Ouse above Bedford.

Unfortunately, there were no markings on the boat to aid recognition. Members are asked to report any incidents of kayaks, paddle boards, boats, or canoes navigating our river at Biddenham —with pictures if possible.

Despite the wet weather, we all enjoyed the day out. Happy birthdays to the Beckerings duo: Mark Sessions and Colin Holmes. Thanks to all who helped with the admin and weigh-in. You never know—we might have dried out again by next week!
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Results
1st Graham Stringer – 5lb 7oz
2nd Richard Gibbs – 4lb 14oz
3rd Colin Holmes – 4lb 3oz
4th Andy Frankum – 3lb 12oz
5th Chris Howard – 3lb 8oz
6th Barry Roper – 2lb 11oz
7th Dennis Hunt – 1lb 10oz
8th Mark Sessions – 1lb 8oz
9th Ray Burton – 1lb 0oz
10th Terry Vickers – 0lb 8oz
11th Les Burton – 0lb 6oz
12th Roger Baker – 0lb 4oz

Wednesday Match at Biddenham

Wednesday Match at Biddenham

That is all we have for this week, Please keep your catch reports coming in! You can send them via our social media pages, the club website or directly via What's app to 07940 229071.

Tight Lines,

Dave

Luton AC

Luton Angling Club - Weekly News, Information and Catch Report Roundup - Week's Ending 7th and 14th September 2025