What do they really get up to when they abandon a warm bed before the crack of dawn, stuff a haversack with tins of assorted maggots, half a hundredweight of pulped bread and a folding campstool and disappear into the drizzle? It is estimated that well over one and a half million wives wish they knew the answer.

When Thelwell fell victim to this strange phenomenon he made a startling discoveryanglers –  don't know either. It was clearly time that some sort of enquiry was conducted into the strange rituals of the cult and its secrets exposed to the public gaze.

After years of crawling through wet grass, 'conducting lonely vigils in distant torrents and extracting needle-sharp hooks from inaccessible parts of his clothing, Thelwell has at last presented his report.