27/09/25 - Junior Points Match - River Stour, Upper Colber.

Graham Howard
Sep 28
9 min read

Forgot to take a photo of the river. Here's last years!

It’s been quite a tumultuous few weeks both in and outside of the juniors.

So many things have happened that I can and cannot talk about, but I was glad to be back in my ‘Happy place’ again. With the juniors by some water…

God’s watering-can has not been kind to many venues lately and the river was no exception. It was a little low, even with the rains we have had. But the juniors experienced what REAL fishing is when they were faced with a ‘shallow stretch of river’ at a mere ten to eleven feet deep!

I use the term ‘real fishing’ because, without rivers, natural lakes, and even canals, modern coarse fishing simply would not exist. We live in a world where fishing is artificial to a large degree. Purpose made holes in the ground filled with hungry pets for easy fishing. I’m not a purist, but river fishing is the grass roots of all fishing, and it is important for the juniors to experience it.

I will say however that event of commercial fishing has saved angling from a slow and painful demise in many areas. With the slow decline and neglect of natural waterways, we have leaned heavily on commercials for our sport.

It was a late decision as which part of the river we would be using which led to much gnashing of teeth and an amber alert on the ‘Squeaky bum-bum’ scale. So late in fact that the river had not even been strimmed until Friday, and thanks to some sterling work by friend of the juniors, Ian Paulley, swims were cut into the ten-foot-high reeds to make some perfect fishing swims for us. Many thanks Ian….

Special thanks must go to John Hanham the farmer and owner of the fields that we delightfully able to drive upon. Thank you, John…

I had arranged to meet Ian in Sturminster Mill car park at 8am. But when I arrived, Ian had morphed into someone I recognised as Simon Dennis who coached the juniors on the river last year.

In all honesty, I had met Simon a few days earlier and completely not recognised him! In my defence, I had never met him without a beanie hat and I didn’t realise he had hair…

I followed Simon along the lane after stopping to put out some signage. We passed the gate we’d used last time and headed into farmyard. After stopping to thank the farmer for allowing us onto his land, we proceeded through the farm and onto the old railway line. We drove, and drove, and I thought we were looking for the source of the Stour! But eventually, we peeled through a gate and across a field.

There it was, in all its magnificence…The River Stour.

It looked lush to be fair, and it wouldn’t have taken much for me to metaphorically flip the table and fight some gear off one of the smaller kids to have a go myself!

Ian came down to say hello accompanied by a brown and white blur that he called ‘his dog’. I have never seen a creature with so much energy! It’s all I can do to find the energy to lift a kettle on some days. I really need to do some research into the commercial viability of bottling it as a financial enterprise….

Nothing was safe from the blur as rabbits, birds, wasps, two dear and an elephant were pursued for sport at extreme high velocity. The blur even had fun repeatedly retrieving pieces of dispatched Crayfish emptied from traps and thrown into the undergrowth. Over and over again….

As much as I appreciated the job offer from Tom Kennedy (Austin’s semi-creator), I had to decline the position because his wife, Amy, has been through enough lately. Although, on reflection, the ‘one’ that she was to be ‘given’ may have been a prize or voucher for finding the venue with little to no assistance. She did, and I didn’t…Let’s leave it at that….

I want to stop with the daftness for a moment to offer love and best wishes to Kenzie and Tina Toulson. Also, to John, Mia, and Wendy who are all finding themselves in some dark places lately. Your fishing family is always there for you…

Your collection of juniors today were:

Peg 1: Alfie ‘My dad wore his clown shoes today’ Ellis.

Peg 2: Harry ‘Why do poles have to be so long?’ Cryer.

Peg 3: Austin ‘Are you sure pike don’t count’ Scott-Kennedy.

Peg 4: Alexander ‘Mr Crayfish’ Adey.

Peg 5: Josh ‘I travelled light honestly’ Roe.

Peg 6: Jack ‘I just sacked my dad/You can’t get the staff these days’ Copp

Peg 7: Seth ‘I have no idea what to expect’ Hopkins.

Your Cow-pat (the correct collective noun for a group of five angling coaches) of coaches today were:

Simon Dennis – The Fonz

Graham Howard – Richie Cunningham

Jerry Bracey – Ralph Malph

Chris Ward – Howard Cunningham

Tim Broughton – Joanie Cunningham

Peg One:

Alfie Ellis:

1lb:

Not really the start Alfie wanted for his first river match.

Having your dad use your pole as a tight rope isn’t the best way to start any fishing session. Ok, so, there MIGHT have been a little exaggeration in the last sentence but, foot did connect with carbon in a catastrophic way about 5-minutes before the whistle was blown, and 30-seconds after I had given our one and only spare pole away.

It didn’t help that, somehow, the broken section had become immovably jammed inside another section of pole. So, there wasn’t a lot that could be done to help.

Naturally this restricted his fishing to a large degree and probably blew his concentration too. What didn’t help was a very large marauding Chub that would neither leave his fish alone nor get on the ruddy hook itself!

It wasn’t the river debut that Alf was looking for and I told him that we had blanks last year so…Silver lining and all that…

Peg Two:

Harry Cryer:

1lb 10ozs:

A returning Harry had changed in every way since the beginning of the year. Either he had grown a lot or Paul and everyone else had shrunk! Maybe Paul keeps Harry in a growbag at home? Whatever the method, Harry is a fine example of runner bean farming at the highest level.

Like anyone who steps away from fishing for a while, Harry was a bit rusty. I also remember Harry not being a huge silverfish fan and returning at a venue that has one Carp every 25-miles, wasn’t going to float Harry’s boat. So-to-speak…

One thing that Harry has still got is a remarkable flexibility of his spine. He is able to accurately spell every letter of the alphabet using his body, but I had to draw the line at ‘Q’…

Being a teenager now, Harry felt it difficult to process the need to move his arms to effectively manoeuvre a pole in and out. The look on his face told me he longed to be starring at a feeder tip again.

Joking aside, it was great to see them again. Hopefully we’ll see more of them for the rest of the year…

Peg Three:

Austin Scott-Kennedy:

2lbs 15ozs, 3rd place:

Austin was now reunited with his pole and holdall after casting it adrift at Todber Manor FIVE WEEKS AGO! Lucky, someone has a little humanity left in them and handed it in. Thank you, whoever you are…

Austin had arrived with Amy, and a hyperactive creature that likes to roll in fox-poo, chew its lead, and take off at a moments notice. Fern the dog was also present.

The first thing that Luther said to me was ‘Hi Graham, I have a weapon in the car!’

I broke instantly into a cold sweat, choked down some bile and resisted the sudden urge to flee for my life as fast as I could. (For the record, the ‘weapon’ was a toy dragon).

Austin caught steadily at the start until ‘Mr Pike’ took a shine to the fish flashing through the water. From that point, Austin fate was sealed and he suffered at least one more attack during the match. Once a ‘Don’t tell ’em’ is in your swim, he/she is there for the day…

Austin managed 3rd place on the day so a decent haul of points and a contribution to his silverfish tally.

Peg Four:

Alexander Adey:

1lb 8ozs:

The Micro Junior was facing a steep challenge today with long rigs and long poles making for a cumbersome day. I’ll never get tired of the squeaks he emits every time he catches a fish, but the blood curdling scream that sounded out at around 1pm made the town of Sturminster stop dead in their tracks, look to the skies, and wonder if the Russians were here…

The DDAS Junior Rapid Response Service was in full flight as Jerry and I made the two peg distance (50-metres?) in less than 10-minutes. A new record for us.

The reason for the ear shattering squeal was crawling on the grass. The Crayfish was probably wondering why it had been unceremoniously plucked from its watery home, why the piece of worm tasted so sharp, and why it was being stared at with fascination by four MASSIVE treelike creatures. It may have been thinking that, if push came to shove, if it could take out the small blonde one.

Alexander asked why it was blowing bubbles from its ‘mouth’?

I told him it was either because it had been drinking washing up liquid or it was a West Ham fan.

Nobody laughed.

Mrs H did when I told her about it at home. So, I will be using that one again…

Alexander needed a walk to get over the trauma of catching such an alien creature, and Mr C was sent to meet his flat mates…

Peg Five:

Josh Roe:

2lbs 13ozs:

The narrow corridor cut through the reeds did not give Josh that much room to shoehorn the semi-tackle shop of gear into. But he managed it. The blurb before that the match said, ‘Only bring what you need’. Clearly, he needed it all!

All the gear meant that approaching to speak with him meant stepping through an expensive forest of carbon fibre. So, I accessed my inner Britney Speares and ‘spidered’ and bent my way through the maze. (FYI, I always wear a PVC catsuit at all times. I’ve even had a special one made to look like hair and skin. There’s fuel for nightmares. You’re welcome…) The trouble was, once I’d made it through, I was stuck until he shipped his pole out again. The inability to speak AND fish at the same time made this a lengthy process…

Rivers may not be Josh’s preferred venue, but it’s all good experience. I just ask that Sadie brings him next time please?

Martin’s bleating about ‘not proper fishing’ and ‘I don’t like rivers’ almost resulted him being tied to a gatepost one the other side of the field with Luther’s dog lead!!!

Peg Six:

Jack Copp:

3lbs 10ozs, 2nd place:

Jack was on a roll of success having won three junior matches and TWO SENIOR MATCHES on the bounce. Even I thought it would be a matter of ‘who came second’ today.

With the backing of some very knowledgeable river anglers, I thought it was a forgone conclusion and, to be fair, the lad did fish a tidy match. It’s just a shame that Jack’s support staff feels the need to offer opinion and not just do what he’s told. It must be so difficult being forced to waste energy organising the help, rather than being able to concentrate on the match in hand.

Despite the handicap, Jack managed to soldier through to claim a creditable 2nd place on the day.

His run had come to an end, but would you bet against him?

Well done…

Peg Seven:

Seth Hopkins:

4lbs 7ozs, 1st place:

Look, there are not many anglers that trot up to their first match and win.

Even fewer can hold their nerve amongst people who they have never met.

You reduce your chances even further when you choose a deep, slow river as your debut.

Add to that fishing a pole at a longer length than you ever have before, and your chances are reduced to ‘not a lot’…

But, you know what? That’s exactly what Seth did today…

Yes, without the bonus fish he would have finished much lower down. But I don’t hold with that kind of thinking. Not one of Seth’s fish simply swam into his keepnet. He put them there and with decent skill too.

A river is not a man-made hole in the ground, nice and flat with no features. It’s a natural ‘living’ entity that changes every year. Winter floods had piled up a large mound of silt and gravel on the line that Seth started on. But, with a little help, we found a nice flat run in front of the mound that enabled him to run through cleanly and find some very nice fish. Even a small ‘Jack-Pike’ made it almost to the net, even though it would not have counted if it had…

It was great to meet both Ollie and Seth today, and I hope we will see much more of them in future events. I hope that Seth is as proud of his efforts as I am. What a brilliant start to his fishing career. Very well done…

Just as a point of interest, Ollie and Seth travelled all the way from New Milton to be with us today…

New Milton is where Orchard Lakes are located…

You, know… The venue that few people wanted to go to because it was ‘so far away’…

No excuses now…If they can travel, then so can you!