Twelve-year-old Basildon youngster Dean Strutt has a spring in his step after winning the Basildon Junior Angler of the Year competition by a huge margin.

Dean weighed in three carp totalling 15lb 8oz, more than doubling the runner up weight!

The popular event saw 65 young anglers lining the banks of Gloucester Park, all anxious to share in the lengthy prize list.

The large turnout was a record for the event, and is also believed to be a new record entry for a junior match in the area.

Dean's 15lb 8oz carp haul was taken from the big bay. His fish fell to homemade boilies presented on semi fixed carp rigs.

Dean won a rod, a reel, and a trophy for taking first place in the 12-15 year old age group.

He also collected an umbrella and the prestigious Basildon Junior Angler of the Year for taking the top weight overall.

The second place in the 12 to 15 years age group fell to 14-year-old Kieran Groves.

Kieran fished the cockle bank using pole tactics to take a fine bag of roach.

Richard Lloyd took third place in the section with 4lb 11oz, followed by Fred Saunders with 3lb 12oz.

Keir Dove, last year's winner, took fifth place in the section with 3lb 10oz.

The under-12 age group was won by ten-year-old Joe Russell.

Joe fished waggler tactics and maggot bait to land a 3lb 12oz haul of roach. He won a rod, a reel and a trophy.

Second place in the section went to Danny Barry with 2lb 1oz followed by William Matthams with 1lb 12oz.

Ricky Joy was fourth with 1lb 10oz, whilst James Blackburn and Chris Reed shared fifth place with 1lb 9oz each.

A total of 37 youngsters had fish to offer the scalesman and they all received a prize from sponsors Angling Enterprises.

The top three youngsters in each section were also awarded trophies provided by co-sponsors Basildon District Council.

The prizes and the trophies were presented by Basildon District Council parks development manager Ron Fallows.

Other prizewinners were Wayne Gray, Michael Brotherwood, Alfie Cartey, Rob Simmonds, Ashley Russell Stephen Havill, Chris Cooper, Keelan Byrne, Daniel King, Simon Cross, Stuart Dufries, Dean Hatton, Joe Seber, Chris Bernard, Lee Duggins, Scott Duggins, Ryan Parry, Jefferson Smith, Luke Bernard, Tony Smith, Terry Grant, Scott Cook, Gez Sayers, Jordan Walsit, Ross Cook, and Emma Parry.

Basildon Junior Angler of the year Dean Strutt shows his 15lb 8oz winning catch

Steward in control for adults

While the junior match was under way the three finalists in the adult Basildon Angler of the Year competition were fighting it out from the Gloucester Park cockle bank.

There was no doubt about the clear winner when Wickford Angling Centre squad member Peter Steward hauled his two keepnets from the water - In one he had 10lb 3oz of bream, the other held a tremendous 40lb 10oz of carp and tench!

Peter's run of successes over the past year has dominated the local match scene.

He was the clear winner at the Northlands Park Evening Series, and at one recent Gloucester Park Evening Match took 56lb 8oz of fish in the two and three-quarter hour event.

Second place in the Basildon Angler Of The Year final went to Paul Rounce with a 12lb 3oz mixed catch. Ron Smith took third place with 5lb 1oz.

Paul gets into pike

Paul Watkins started the Northlands Park pike season in style landing three good fish from the road lake.

Using the same piece of lamprey Paul landed pike of 17lb, 12lb and two of 9lb each.

Other good fish from Northlands Park include a common carp of 18lb taken by Alan Grimes during a short evening session.

Big carp at Park

The biggest pleasure catch of the week at Gloucester Park fell to Geordie Cator who netted a 22lb common carp.

Geordie took his fish from the big bay, tempting it with homemade boilies presented close to the Island.

However, at Billericay's Lake Meadows there was bigger and better things to come as fourteen-year-old schoolboy Peter Hudd proved by landing a mirror carp of 24lb.

Wright result!

A steady rate of fishing as Pipps Hill Carp Fishery has seen the Basildon water providing some big carp for its anglers.

Justin Wright, a regular at the Cranes Farm Road venue, took the biggest fish of the week with a cracking 24lb common.

Justin took his big fish from the oaks swim on a size six hook with a 3oz lead and fish flavoured boilie.

Gary Taylor fished a one-night session off the hotel bank, casting towards the island and was rewarded with a 17lb ghost carp and a tremendous bream of 11lb 6oz.

Both of Gary's fish picked up on his size six hook and Kevin Nash boilies.

Away from the carp, another notable catch at Pipps Hill went to Danny Jenkins who took a mixed bag of tench and silver fish weighing 36lb.

Danny's haul took him just four hours to land with his best fish being a tench of 6lb 8oz.

Morse man Carl cracks Hockley code

Morse Controls, a Basildon company, booked Hockley Angling Club's day ticket water for what proved to be a very productive day out.

Despite the very hot weather the lake still fished very well with Carl Nowak making a solid claim for the winner's trophy with a 41lb 3oz haul.

Second place went to Ian Brand with a 27lb 6oz mixed bag.

Kevin Bishop was third with 23lb 6oz.

All competitors took good bags with Steve Goodwin took the biggest fish trophy with an impressive mirror carp of 9lb 5oz.

Tench take to warm nights at Doggetts

Rochford's Doggetts fishery continues to fish well through the recent warm weather with roach, bream and tench being the main quarry.

Southend angler Steve Hull landed seven tench on one of the warmer nights from the Doggetts' back pool.

Float fished bread tempted Steve's haul - with fish up to 3lb 8oz.

Martin Spooner, travelling in from Chelmsford for the first time, failed in his attempts to take some of the famed Doggetts' tench but was not unhappy with his bag of four bream to 4lb plus numerous roach.

Robert Ellis fished a short session from the south bank with boilies and enjoyed some good sport with a 3lb bream, a 12lb common plus a 13 mirror.

Rochford angler Paul Whalley raised a few eyebrows by landing a 15lb mirror on floaters within minutes of setting up.

Paul's fish took chum mixer from the top pool against the north bank.

Regulars Alan Turner and Kevin Hall opted to fish for carp from the end of the long arm in a 48 hour session.

The pair landed a total of eight fish between them, including two 17lb fully-scaled specimens.

There overall catch was made up entirely of double figure fish - bar one 11lb mirror.

The female angling contingent has been well represented by Sonya Glenisto who landed an 18lb mirror while keeping a watchful eye on her husband's rod.

Ragworm is still the top tempter

With the local lugworm in spawn and getting smaller by the day, most shops and diggers are prefering to leave them to rest to hopefully regroup for the winter onslaught. Peeler crabs are also coming in short supply due to the end of the season.

However, it is not all bad news on the bait front. The ragworm are still here and catching plenty of fish, especially with the changeover of species now being more evident.

Ragworm will catch both winter and summer species and is far more successful than most people realise for the colder climate fish.

Indeed, many anglers have found themselves bringing in winter species when they were expecting summer fish.

Further up and down the coast more reports are being received of whiting and codling being caught from the beaches.

Conditions round-up

Southend boats

Dave from the Predator tells me that boats are finding decent numbers of roker, smoothounds, dogfish, whiting and codling.

Tony Smith, aboard the Equinox caught a 10lb bass in the barrows last week.

Southend pier

There are still good catches of mullet being taken from the end with maddies the best bait. If you can not get any then the tail end of ragworm often works well.

Apart from the ever-inceasing number of very small bass there is not much else for pier visitors, although one angler did have two good-sized bass weighing 6lb.

River Crouch

Generally only a few fish about, one or two of most species, the best baits being ragworm and crab.

River Blackwater

The Kingfisher ventured out on Sunday but found the trip to be shortlived as very bad fog brought the day to a premature end.

However, in the short time that they were fishing the party had a few good smoothounds.

The best specimen fell to Bob Mathews with an18lb fish.

Eels are also still a plenty with the best baits being ragworm and crab.

West Mersea

Dave Weaving took out the Jenna D over the weekend on a wrecking trip.

The first two wrecks were covered in nets, on the third the party found ten cod to 10lb plus a 2lb plaice and a 4lb black bream.

The worrying result of this trip was the number of wrecks even 30-plus miles out that are surrounded by nets.

Sea round-up

Contact Bait and Tackle's Ray Power on 01702 617764

Bait and Tackle Centre are holding some more beach matches this autumn. The first is scheduled for September 20 at Westcliff with fishing from 8pm to 11.30pm.

Four more matches are already pencilled in for later in the year. For more details please phone 01702 617764.

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